Computer Problems & Solutions

[George Wallace]

Thought I'd start this topic on COMPUTER PROBLEMS AND REMEDIES.

Why?  As I have some problems with this computer running Windows XP Home edition.  Some days it refuses to boot up going to a black screen giving me an option to boot up normally (which it will do after 30 seconds and then land up back at this same screen when it won't boot again and again), boot up in SAFE MODE, boot up in Network, or boot up from a previous date in the Restore option (again via SAFE MODE).  I've figured out that I have some sort of virus, but nothing is showing up when I do a virus scan, nor when I ran MCAfee Stinger.  If I run the Virus Scan in Safe Mode, it can Restart and everything seems to be OK, until a couple days later and I have the same problem all over again.

Any ideas?

Any Solutions?

GW

 

[jmackenzie_15]

Whenever anything like that goes wrong with mine, that I am unable to immediately identify, I just reinstall windows =p
reinstalling windows and screw up alot of your programs because i think it resets the registry keys, so you might have to reinstall alot of stuff to get it to work properly again, usually I havnt too much of a problem with that.... a game or two goes out of whack.Your PC wont delete anything on you though. If you really want to do it, not much bad can happen from doing it really.If your PC is anything like mine, it might have a backup hard drive with only windows files on it that you use to reinstall, or you might have disks to do it.

 

[-rb]

Hi George, although no real immediate solutions there are a few things you can do to help check for virus, spyware, adware etc.

first, for virus and security checks go to http://www.symantec.com/securitycheck/ , it's a free online virus and security check with the latest definitions of crap out there. (Also, are your McAfee virus definitions up to date? this is important as new garbage is constantly coming out)

second, a freeware tool for wiping spyware, can be downloaded from zdnet - http://downloads-zdnet.com.com/Spybot-Search-Destroy/3000-8022_2-10289035.html?tag=lst-0-2

third, another great tool for spyware and adware, free version and a higher-end pay version - http://downloads-zdnet.com.com/Ad-Aware-SE-Personal-Edition/3000-8022_2-10319876.html?tag=lst-0-1

These are all great little freebie tools that will help mitigate the threat of malicious code, virus, adware etc but the best thing you can do to stop this stuff is make sure you are running AV software with current definitions, also, investing in a firewall is a great idea too. Some higher-end models are capable of doing virus scanning on the firewall box itself, before anything even gets to your computer, which is an even better option.

hope this helps and best of luck!
cheers,
ryan.

 

[sigpig]

Ok, I see I type slowly and others have already presented some of my ideas  :-[

Some random thoughts:

1.  Have you backed up your computer? Having backups of your important documents, pics, etc will make the (almost) inevitable windows crash much easier to deal with. Dont get caught without a backup.

2.  There are several sites where you can do an online virus scan and some decent free anti-virus pgms, such as avg, to check your machine. Use google to locate some.

3.  Do you use a firewall? Zone Alarm offers a basic free pgm that does the trick for most home users.

4.  Have you ever run an anti-spyware pgm? Spybot and AdAware are good free pgms that will check your machine and get rid of spyware crap.

5.  Do you have something like Norton Utiliities to run and check your machine? Sometimes this can fix some small problems before they get too big.

6.  Depending on how much you have on your computer and how confident you are in your backups, sometimes it's good to reinstall windows in an effort to make it behave better.      If that doesn't work, a new partition/format will allow you to start with a clean machine and by using the above suggestions increase your chances of having a happy and healthy computer. Of course nothing will help when windows decides to freeze up in the middle of an os upgrade and screw your system totally or your d: drive decides it no longer wants to be recognized by windows. Not that I speak from experience or anything  :crybaby:

 

[winchable]

I've only ever had that problem after my computer shuts down suddenly (power failure or running far too many programs)
Are you the only person using the computer? If not you might want to find out what other people have been doing on it, IE Have they been running programs too powerful for your configuration, which might create the instability neccessary to merit the computer shutting down and starting again in safe mode.

I've never run into a virus that does that and it doesn't sound like anything that's circulating right now.
Everything else said in the thread is good, I'm just brain storming a bit here.

 

[George Wallace]

I am using AVG for Virus protection,  Ad-Aware SE , and MailWasher which are all FreeWare.  I am also paying for my McAfee Firewall.  I am checking updates almost everytime I logon, including Windows Updates.  

I know that it is recommended to reload Windows every year or two, and have been putting it off because of all the historical data and jpgs I have stored on it.  I may have to breakdown and burn everything to disc and reformat the hard drive and reload all the programs from disc or DSL.  One solution I may try first is to get into the START MENU and check what programs are starting up there and clean some of them out, as there may be a conflict somewhere in there.

GW

 

[48Highlander]

It sounds like you have some system service that's causing the computer to restart on boot.  Can you think of exactly when you first noticed this behaviour?  Did you install any new programs or updates a day or two before then?  There's literaly dozens of things that could be causing this type of behaviour, but it's almost definitely not a viurs.

 

[George Wallace]

Is anyone using iClean.  Seems that when I use that on this computer, not my others, that I have a lot of files lately being cleaned.

As the sole user of this computer, I am sure that I have created a conflict somewhere or have a virus lurking somewhere that all my detection attempts have failed to find.

Most, if not all my data is burnt to DVD or CD.  It is just such a pain to have to go looking for it again.  

I hope this thread can be of help to many others.

GW

 

[George Wallace]

It sounds like you have some system service that's causing the computer to restart on boot. Can you think of exactly when you first noticed this behaviour? Did you install any new programs or updates a day or two before then? There's literaly dozens of things that could be causing this type of behaviour, but it's almost definitely not a viurs.

Friday I did a restore back to a date in mid Dec, and then I ran into the same problem when I started up this morning......after everything ran so smoothyly yesterday.

I am wondering about the conflict problem and will try to resolve it with some of the points above.

GW

 

[sigpig]

One solution I may try first is to get into the START MENU and check what programs are starting up there and clean some of them out, as there may be a conflict somewhere in there.GW

Do you mean going into msconfig and checking out what's in startup? That's a good thing to do once in awhile to see what kind of crap has decided to place itself in your startup.

What kind of cpu do you have? Memory? Have you added some new devices recently without upgrading the power supply?

Something to consider in future, after you've fixed the current issues, is to move away from the evil empire as much as possible. I use Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird (mail) at both work and home and am very happy with both. No, nothing is perfect, but the hackers go for the big boys so these end up being much safer to use.

Your best choices for backup are:
1. external hard drive - very convenient, very expensive
2. new internal hard drive -
3. dvd writer - yes a cd writer will work but when you go from more than 30 disks to 8 for a backup life is much better  ;D

P.S. What are hard disk prices like in Canada these days? I've lived in the states now for 6 years and I have no idea of the prices up there.

 

[48Highlander]

You sound like you know what you're doing, so if you're not aware of this, you can get answers to a lot of questions on http://support.microsoft.com

It's a searchable online knowledge-base.  Usualy if I run across a problem that I've never encountered before and can't figure out, I can solve it with 15-20 minutes searching that site.

 

[Lost_Warrior]

Some days it refuses to boot up going to a black screen giving me an option to boot up normally (which it will do after 30 seconds and then land up back at this same screen when it won't boot again and again), boot up in SAFE MODE, boot up in Network, or boot up from a previous date in the Restore option (again via SAFE MODE).

Usually, this happens when Windows is abnormally shut down.  It's not caused by any conflicts.  It's standard procedure.  It's basically a security measure windows takes when an abnormal shut down is detected.  It gives the option to boot up several different methods (most being Safe Mode) so you can fix the issue that caused Windows to shut down the way it did.

When you shut off your computer, do you go through the proper shut down procedure, or are you just hitting the off button?  Are there any programs installing (system updates for example) in the background during the time of shut down?

Also, are you running Service Pack 2?

Hopefully I can help.  I'm MCSE Certified. (WinXP, 2000, 2000 Server, 2003 Server)

 

[George Wallace]

I am doing the normal shut down, usually after a Virus Scan and a scan by Ad-Aware and then iClean to clean up the hard drive and disk cleanup.  I have Sevice Pack 2 installed and also sent away for the Disc (as it will not be available online in a few weeks).





This system is a Pentium 4 CPU, 1.8 GHz with 1GB RAM.....P4X-266A Mainboard.

I've recently added an external DVD Burner from LACIE (Which is showing up as a Pioneer model in the Hardware Profiles)

I am positive that RAM is not a problem at this time, but have wondered about the power supply, as that is one item mentioned as a possible problem on that screen.  Perhaps caused by a conflict at Start Up. 

GW

 

[48Highlander]

Usually, this happens when Windows is abnormally shut down.   It's not caused by any conflicts.   It's standard procedure.   It's basically a security measure windows takes when an abnormal shut down is detected.

Bull.   As the man said, the machine will go to the boot selection screen, he'll select normal mode or it'll go to normal mode automaticaly, then at some point during the boot-up procedure it'll shut down again and go back to the boot-selection screen.   That my friend is not "standard procedure"   Going to the boot selection screen once, yes, doing it ad infinitum, deffinitely not.

 

[Bruce Monkhouse]

George, this sounds exactly like the problem I had, I would run the correct programs ,etc. that should have gotten rid of whatever was causing the problems, but no.......
so I took it to my brother-in-law who does this sort of stuff for Nortel and he found 8!!!!! viruses that were there but had programs that would wipe out the part of the program that should have found them, and the partial programs is what caused the start-up errors.
He is a member on this site so I will direct him to this thread tonight.

 

[Air Force Tech]

I'm no expert, more of a self taught tech junkie, but I experienced a similar problem with one of my computers a while back.  Kept killing motherboards and hard drives until finally I traced the problem to the power supply that had gone bad.  Replaced the power supply, motherboard, and hard drive (all on warranty)  and she's been up and running smooth ever since.  I've also fixed a lot of other people's computers and in my experience, every time I've encountered a problem that's been hard to pinpoint,  the cause has been a faulty power supply.  I'm not saying run out and start buying parts and swapping them into you PC,  just consider getting the power supply tested by someone who knows.  Low voltage can fry circuits as easily as voltage spikes, and a hard drive that isn't getting enough juice will start becoming corrupted until eventually it just burns out.  Just my 2 cents.  Good luck.

P.S.  I also highly recommend Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird, especially Firefox.  It prevents a lot of spyware and ad-ware from ever getting onto your PC.

 

[Lost_Warrior]

Bull.  As the man said, the machine will go to the boot selection screen, he'll select normal mode or it'll go to normal mode automaticaly, then at some point during the boot-up procedure it'll shut down again and go back to the boot-selection screen

Didn't notice that.  No...thats not standard procedure at all. 

 

[Lost_Warrior]

As previously mentioned...check the power supply.  If it's re-starting during start-up, that will cause the "chose start up method" screen to show up.

Also, have a look at your motherboard.  Make sure all the plugs are plugged into the board properly (IDE Cables, Power supply cables)

A lot of times, it's just a lose wire that causes issues...and is fixed with a simple push in.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

George,

The problems your stating can be caused by a bad stick of ram. Take them all out except one, restart. If you have the same problem, switch it with one of the others. If the first works ok, add another. Keep doing it until it starts acting up again. If you only have two 512's, it's an easy check.

The other thing you want to do, is go to the computer store, get a used 4 Gig hard drive. Should only cost you about $15 - 20. Back up ALL your data you want to keep. Install the 4 gig, call it C and your regular HD as D. Load your operating system only onto C, format D and reinstall all your other software to it, plus your backed up data. This way when your Operating System goes wonky, you can reformat and reload C without losing all your data. You will have to reintall Office, etc on D after reinstalling Windows on C, but this is only to re-establish the registry keys. Most of your profiles and options will not be affected.

Failing all of this, get an Athlon XP 3000+ and run Linux. Problems solved ;D

 

[Pieman]

Failing all of this, get an Anthlon XP 3000+ and run Linux. Problems solved

Linux, the power of the gods in your hands   8)
I use a dual boot platform with Windows XP, and Linux Fedora core 3, running off the same system. I use windows for the fun stuff (some games, movies, some internet surfing), and Linux for everything else. Windows crashes and gives me problems. Linux has never crashed in my five years experience with it, and man, you can do a lot with it. It is getting more and more user friendly these days, so I don't see why more people don't switch over.