Adobe Community: Missing Fonts

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40. (TraceyWhite),

Aug 14, 2007 6:33 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Mauro....you are my favorite person of the day! Thanks a bunch!

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41. (Rob_Zee),

Aug 21, 2007 8:52 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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If you are using Office 2007 or Vista and receive "missing fonts" error for the Arial Narrow family, then please try these intructions.

Office 2007 and Vista change the old fonts dated 11/12/1998 to a newer version dated 7/14/2006. Apparently, InDesign does not like this newer version. If you have access to a computer with Office 2003 (or a machine that doesn't have Office 2007 or Vista installed), then go into the folder C:\Windows\Fonts and grab the old versions of:

ARIALN
ARIALNB
ARIALNBI
ARIALNI

Dated 11/12/1998 and save to a folder.

Then go into the folder:

C:\Program Files\Common Files\Adobe\Fonts

and delete the files:

ARIALN
ARIALNB
ARIALNBI
ARIALNI

dated 7/14/2006

and replace with the older version.

This should resolve the issue.

-Rob

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42. (Todd_G),

Oct 15, 2007 5:41 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Wow. Thank you Mauro. After killing an entire day on this, that trick worked.

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43. (Adam_Saleem),

Nov 30, 2007 9:28 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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Cheers for that.Nice and simple!!

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44. (Myrna_Larson),

Dec 3, 2007 12:45 PM in reply to (Mauro_Bertuol)

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I can tell you what the problem is, and it lies in the font name that is embedded in the July 2006 versions of these files.

There are "advanced naming options" in which one can specify the Preferred Font Family and the Preferred Font SubFamily to be exposed by Windows. In the 1998 versions of these fonts, those fields are empty.

In the 2006 versions, the Family is simply "Arial" and the SubFamily is "Narrow".

I used a font editor and changed these fields to Family = Arial Narrow and SubFamily as appropriate, i.e. Regular, Bold, Italic, or Bold Italic, and saved the modified fonts under new names. These fonts now show up in InDesign as Arial Narrow, with the 4 subtypes. Arial Narrow is no longer a subtype of Arial.

Yes, I know that modifying the files isn't legal, but I did this for testing purposes only, to determine the source of the problem. If you want to stay "legal", just install the 1998 versions, as previously described.

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45. (Cathleen_Abers-Kimball),

Dec 11, 2007 5:57 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Thank you Mauro for your solution and Peter for directing me to this thread.
This looks like it will work (although not completely convenient).

However I hate to blow a hole in your theory but I experienced the Arial narrow problem after upgrading from CS2 to CS3. It was OK in CS2, AND I do not have Office 2007 installed. I have had the same Arial Narrow fonts for years and so cannot be attributed to new version font files. The problem must be connected to Adobe CS3.

I think it would be nice if Adobe would address this with patch or whatever especially since Arial narrow is so universally used as a convenient "tight space" font. I have not come across any other fonts yet which experience this problem, but then I just went to CS3 about 2 months ago. Is there anything I should watch for?

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46. Thomas Phinney,

Dec 21, 2007 4:10 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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Unfortunately, this is not something Adobe can patch.

Microsoft made a change in the newer versions of Arial Narrow, to fill in some additional "name" fields in the font. Unfortunately, they also inadvertently gave all four Arial Narrow fonts the same OpenType "style" name in the new versions of the font. That's just a bug and causes some of the problems described.

But even without that error, the new fonts might very well be showing up as having different names, for the simple reason that they do indeed have different names.

Once Microsoft updates the fonts to correct the bug, and everyone moves to the even newer fonts, the problems will go away. Until then, there's not a lot Adobe can do.

Regards,

T

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47. (Cathleen_Abers-Kimball),

Dec 26, 2007 6:18 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Thomas, thank you for your insight on the naming issue caused by Microsoft. The thing I do not understand, however, is why if the font works fine in InDesign CS2 and does not in InDesign CS3, how is this not an Adobe issue? Obviously there was a change made in the way InDesign recognizes font identities between CS2 and CS3. It would appear that Adobe could supply an adaptation to the program to enable users to have access to one of the most universally used fonts. This is causing such a problem for me to the extent that I cannot use CS3 for any previously designed project and I do not dare to delete CS2 and cannot imagine when I would feel safe doing so. Most designers have projects that they update from time to time and most use Arial Narrow to some degree.

Unfortunately the solution suggested by Mauro did not work for me. I feel it is Adobe's responsibility to its customers to either provide a patch for InDesign CS3 if possible or work with Microsoft to provide substitute font files for the Arial Narrow family with are compatible with the new InDesign.

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48. (John_Yerxa),

Jan 2, 2008 7:18 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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This article has been some interesting reading because I have on PC that is having the same problem with Helvetica. In CS3 the only Helvetica that shows up in the font list is Helv Narrow after I get the Missing Font message and go to look for the font in the font list. Helvetica is installed and activated and shows up in PM6, CS2, but not in ID CS3.
I have a Dell running WINXP SP2, I upgraded IDCS3 to 5.0.1 and tried removing the adobefnt*.lsts but Helvetica Bold will not show up.

Thanks
John

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49. (waterrat365),

Jan 2, 2008 12:03 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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I have the same problem: CS3 doesn't recognize Arial Bold and substitutes Arial Greek instead. What would happen if I simply removed Arial Greek from Windows Fonts? Cliff Moore

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50. (James_Behrens),

Jan 24, 2008 11:02 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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We have been struggling with the Arial Narrow/ID CS3 issue for some time now, and have sought Adobe's help, but to no avail. We did however find a link (http://www.indesignsecrets.com/getting-indesign-to-see-your-fonts.ph p), and followed the advice in the first paragraph, suggesting the placement of shortcuts to the Arial Narrow fonts in the ID CS3 font folder, and it worked immediately. We first had to remove the version of Arial Narrow that Office 2007 installed, and replace with version 2.30. Hope this works for others as well.

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51. (Hyla_Skudder),

Jan 28, 2008 7:55 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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I was also grateful to find this post, as I too was tearing my hair out. But interestingly my Arial Narrow nightmare occurred in switching from Windows 2000 to Windows XP. So perhaps there is a larger issue than just between CS2 and CS3.

My Adobe applications actually REMAINED THE SAME (Photoshop 7, Illustrator 8 and InDesign CS2)from the old machine to the new. I literally just reinstalled them. On my old 2000 machine, all was fine, on my new XP machine, none of my Adobe applications recognized Arial Narrow any more. But the fix of copying and pasting the fonts into the Adobe font directory fixed the problem for me. Thanks!

I have noticed a few other annoying font glitches in XP as well. One of the fonts I use heavily for a client, Trajan Pro, has lost it's bold functionality in Adobe applications on my XP (whereas it had a bold option on my 2000 machine), which also drives me nuts. I may see if this trick will help with that as well...
But thanks for the help. Hyla

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52. (shirley_ross),

Feb 5, 2008 8:31 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Can someone please help me in locating these Arial fonts that are dated for 11/12/1998? I have looked into several XP machines running office 2003 and I am unable to find these fonts. I can only find the same fonts that are dated 7/14/2006. I have looked on the Microsoft Website and others and am not able to locate the Arial fonts with the same size and date as needed to fix my CS3 missing font issue. I have found that these websites suggest that these fonts are discontinued. Can someone please tell me where I can go or suggest another option to get these most needed fonts. I would love to see if this solution works!!

Thank you!!

Shirley

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53. (shirley_ross),

Feb 5, 2008 8:37 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Can you tell me where I can locate these Arial Fonts. I have looked at several PCs that have XP on them but all have the same fonts that are dated 7/14/2006 with 175KB. I have not been able to locate any with the date 11/12/1998 or the size of 135KB. I have gone to several websites, including Microsoft's. They say that these fonts are discontinued. Do you know of another way for me to obtain these fonts? I would very much like to see if this solution with work for our many CS3 users.

Thank you!!

Shirley

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54. Peter Spier,

Feb 5, 2008 2:41 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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Those versions are indeed discontinued. My recollection is they were shipped as part of either Windows 2000 or Office 2000.

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55. (JimmyK),

Apr 3, 2008 3:53 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Hi Shirley,

I had the same problem and found the fonts in the following location -

http://www.shootingsoftware.com/ftp.htm
http://www.shootingsoftware.com/ftp/Arialn%20Font.exe

Jimmy.

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56. (philipempey),

Jun 22, 2008 5:54 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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Thank you Jimmy! Copying those 4 files in C:\Program Files\Common Files\Adobe\Fonts and forcing CS3 do dump the preferences when launching worked perfect.

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57. (bpilato),

Jun 25, 2008 10:31 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Thank you, Mauro, for your inspired solution in Message #35!

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58. (Pat_Jackson),

Jul 11, 2008 11:54 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Solution:
Go to www.fonts.com
Purchase Arial Narrow family ($104 for reg., bold, italic & bold italic)
Download and unzip
Go to Control Panel, Fonts, File, Install new font
Done

I just did it, and it worked in XP-InDesign CS3

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59. (Dominic_Hurley),

Jul 12, 2008 10:57 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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People should be pressuring Microsoft to fix the bug in their fonts, not letting them off the hook by buying new versions of those fonts. As well, many people will have older versions of the fonts floating around somewhere, so I wouldn't advise people to rush out and spend $104 on new fonts.

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60. Thomas Phinney,

Sep 11, 2008 9:05 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Microsoft has issued a "Hotfix" for their bug in Arial Narrow.
http://blogs.adobe.com/typblography/2008/09/arial_narrow.html

Cheers,

T

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61. (bilglas),

Sep 11, 2008 10:23 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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Hey... I'm the geek who started this thread, some 15 months ago. I was very excited to learn (thanks, Thomas) that Microsoft had issued a "hotfix" for the problem! Finally! I've gone through the ridiculously convoluted process of applying the fix ... installation successful.

Well, I don't know about Microsoft Word, but for InDesign CS3 and Photoshop CS3, nothing has changed. The font selection list offers either ARIAL or ARIAL BLACK. When choosing ARIAL, the variations include Regular, Italic, Bold, and Bold Italic .... AND (erroneously) Narrow and Black. The only style option when choose ARIAL BLACK is Italic.

I've rebooted, I've check the fonts listed in my windows/fonts folder ... nothing has changed. Still have no way of getting Arial Narrow Italic, Arial Narrow Bold, or Arial Narrow Bold Italic.

Incidentally, all ten variations DO appear correctly in CorelDraw X3, so one might argue that the problem is Adobe's ... but personally, I'd much rather blame Microsoft.

Anybody else have any luck with that "hotfix"?

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62. Dov Isaacs,

Sep 11, 2008 1:25 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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Yep, success here!

The trick is that you need to rebuild the Adobe font cache mechanism. First, exit all Adobe programs. Then, search and delete ALL files of the form AdobeFnt##.lst where ## is a two digit number.

At that point, all nine of the Arial family members appear as styles under Arial.

- Dov

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63. Bob Levine,

Sep 11, 2008 2:14 PM in reply to Dov Isaacs

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> Yep, success here!

And here as well after deleting the font cache files.

Bob

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64. Thomas Phinney,

Sep 12, 2008 4:54 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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Thanks guys. I have updated my blog post to include the cache-deletion step.

Cheers,

T

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65. (duckmiester),

Sep 25, 2008 7:27 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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Ok, so I work for an Architectural firm and we are having this issue all over the place with CS3.

The version of our Arial Narrow fonts are 2.37, which is weird because we don't use Office 2007.
- I tried applying the hotfix even though we only have Office 2003, but it didn't work.

I don't see how this is a Microsoft Problem?

Works fine in Adobe CS2 but doesn't in Adobe CS3.
- yeah i know there is issues with Office 2007 with the font group, but we aren't running Office 2007!!!

Unfortunately I don't have a PC in which I can go back to which has a 1998 version of the font.
- If someone does, i would love them to e-mail me them or something.

I've even got some Windows XP 64-bit machines which are having the same issue.
- Tried all the fixes suggested but NOTHING works.

I called Adobe, and they just said that their systems aren't fully supported by 64-bit and don't support Windows XP SP3.

When is Adobe going to start fixing their god dam product?

I don't see why it works for some but not others?

Any suggestions?

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66. (Dominic_Hurley),

Sep 25, 2008 8:00 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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>Tried all the fixes suggested but NOTHING works.

So, you've installed older versions of Arial then?

Or you installed the hotfix and rebuilt the font cache?

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67. Bob Levine,

Sep 26, 2008 4:53 AM in reply to (duckmiester)

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> Any suggestions?

Try running the hot fix. It works.

Bob

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68. Peter Spier,

Sep 26, 2008 5:19 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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>Try running the hot fix. It works.

I believe he said he did that, but it didn't work.

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69. Bob Levine,

Sep 26, 2008 5:45 AM in reply to Peter Spier

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Sorry, I missed that. I ran it on several machines and it worked. If it
didn't work then something else is wrong here. But instead of actual
details all we got was a rant.

Bob

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70. (Cathleen_Abers-Kimball),

Sep 26, 2008 5:52 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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My "Hot Fix", after trying numerous things posted here and my reluctance of changing too much on my system which (other than this problem) operating well, is to run 2 versions of InDesign. CS2 for all projects created with that or earlier and CS3 for new projects where Arial narrow is not a must. It is unfortunate that it is necessary to do this due to Adobe's refusal to fix their blunder with this software release. Each time they send me a survey I go over this problem and the stress it causes but have never received a reply. I shudder at what we might expect with the release of CS4.

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71. Bob Levine,

Sep 26, 2008 6:37 AM in reply to (Cathleen_Abers-Kimball)

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Cathleen,

Microsoft issued a fix for this. Did you try it?

If not, why not?

Bob

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72. (Cathleen_Abers-Kimball),

Sep 26, 2008 7:53 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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I do not have Office o7 on my Computer, I am still on 03. I do not have a problem with any other programs in this area, I do not believe it is a Microsoft issue and I have had enough "yeah, just run this simple patch" "solutions" cause issues in my computers over the years. It is obviously an Adobe mess-up and it should be a fix that is applied to the Adobe product which is not working rather than the Microsoft product that is working (with full Arial narrow). Just the fact that I can use the fonts without issue in ID CS2 but not CS3 is enough to convince me the problem came from Adobe and the fix should be applied to the Adobe product.

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73. Bob Levine,

Sep 26, 2008 8:03 AM in reply to (Cathleen_Abers-Kimball)

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Are you running Vista? If so, it's the same issue and it's still
Microsoft's to fix...which as already noted here has been done.

I've got a brief summary of the whole thing here:

http://indesignsecrets.com/hotfix-corrects-arial-narrow-problem-on-win dows.php

Bob

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74. (Cathleen_Abers-Kimball),

Sep 26, 2008 8:35 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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No still on XP (and glad of it)

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75. (bilglas),

Sep 26, 2008 11:18 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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I got the hotfix, I've follow Robert Levine's instructions, and YES, things are, now, as they should be! So thanks to Robert and Microsoft for that (although I still agree with Cathleen that the responsibility should've been Adobe's, but why point fingers?)

BUT: Why isn't there an OpenType font for Arial Black Italic? What's up with that? As it happens, in my case, it's a moot question, because I still have an old TrueType version of Arial Black Italic installed, and it IS available as an entirely separate font choice. (That is, I've got the NINE variations of OpenType Arial available from ARIAL, but I've also got the TrueType Arial Black Italic available from ARIAL BLACK.) Just wondering, though, why Black Italic isn't part of the latest Arial family? I couldn't find an answer online ... anybody know?

Bill

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76. Bob Levine,

Sep 26, 2008 11:22 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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You'd need to ask Microsoft that. It's their font.

Bob

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77. Ildhund,

Sep 26, 2008 12:32 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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It's a Monotype font:
http://www.fonts.com/FindFonts/mondosearchresults.htm?kid=arial+black+ italic&st=12

Yours for all of £19 in Britain.
--
Noel

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78. (bilglas),

Sep 26, 2008 1:05 PM in reply to (bilglas)

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What you're forgetting, Noel, is that converting £19 into U.S. money comes to about $700 billion...... ;-)

Bill

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79. (Dominic_Hurley),

Sep 27, 2008 4:31 AM in reply to (bilglas)

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>I do not have Office o7 on my Computer, I am still on 03.

But what version of Arial Narrow do you have? It could have been updated with a Windows SP or with some other update.

>I do not believe it is a Microsoft issue ...

So why did Microsoft issue a fix for it then? Or are they covering for Adobe for some nefarious purpose?

>I have had enough "yeah, just run this simple patch" "solutions" cause issues in my computers over the years.

So, do a system restore if it doesn't work. But don't expect a lot of sympathy if you're not prepared to take the advice offered.

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