HOWTO: Turn off Password Expiration in Windows 7

I found it annoying when Windows 7 one day told me that my password was about to expire.  If you are like me I would rather be the one in control of when I change my password rather than Windows dictating this.

Here is a quick easy way to turn this off.

1. Open the Local Users and Groups administration panel. Do this the easy way; Start –> then enter  lusrmgr.msc into the start menu search box. (or the Run box on XP)
2. Double click to select your user
3. Check the box next to “Password never expires”
4. Click OK, and your done.

HOWTO: Upgrade Windows 7 beta to RC1 directly

Follow these steps to perform a hack upgrade of your Windows 7 beta to RC1

1. Obtain the Windows 7 RC1 ISO file.
2. Extract the content of the ISO file to a folder using utility like IZArc
3. Inside that folder, open the sources directory.
4. Open cversion.ini in Notepad or similar text editor.
5. Change the 4-digit number after the word MinClient build number to a lower value, like from 7100 to 7000.
6. Save the file.
7. Start the Windows 7 installation
8. When presented with the option of Upgrade or Clean Install, choose Upgrade….voilà!