The General "Computer Issues" Thread

[En Sabah Nur]

Oh, great.
My laptop was being rather slow today, and occasionally needing to be restarted. Now, if I restart it, it will seem fine, then stay at the blue screen that it goes to normally before loading the desktop. This is getting really irritating. The battery is fine.
Mac, by the way.

Just to be clear, you have a Mac, as in apple right?
I thought only Windows only had the Blue start up screens.

 

[Rho]

Indeed.

I dunno what to tell you.. The screen is a shade of blue when it pretty much freezes.

 

[Hanshotfirst1138]

So, I've been trying to reformat the entire hard drive from the ground up. Unfortunately, in a classic catch-22 situation, the computer, though it will inexplicably read audio CD for iTunes last I checked, even though iTunes says that said peripherals are missing. The printer is still on the fritz (hence the desire, now that everything is backed up on an external hard drive, to simply reformat), and when I try to open things in IE, they pop up in Firefox (WTH?). The computer, furthering my belief that Windows update is at the root of all of this, keeps trying to download updates when shut down which it cannot, and bring up the dreaded blue-screen DOS prompt of death when I try to start the computer up again. My brother discovered some way around this and back into Explorer, as I can post this, but that's just messed up. Oh, and I get no audio through the speakers. Just through headphones. And my car just broke down too .

 

[Mynd Hed]

Ouch. Yeah, that sounds like a pretty classic "cut your losses and reformat" situation to me, especially if you managed to get your important files backed up.

So here's a question. I just got my lady friend a shiny new EeePC 1005HA for her birthday, and she's wondering what the best antivirus software for a lower-powered system like that is.

I guess Kaspersky and Panda both have builds specifically for netbooks, but I've read mixed reviews about Kaspersky: the consensus seems to be that mostly all they changed was the front-end (to make it look better on a smaller screen) rather than making it less system-resource-intensive, which is more what we're worried about. I couldn't really find much in the way of reviews on Panda's "Cloud Antivirus"-- I guess it's pretty new.

I've heard that Avira sucks up the least system resources and has the strongest protection out of the free offerings, and that the newest version of Norton is surprisingly light-weight when compared to other paid stuff.

Does anyone around here have much in the way of real-world experience running this stuff on a netbook?

 

[En Sabah Nur]

So, I've been trying to reformat the entire hard drive from the ground up. Unfortunately, in a classic catch-22 situation, the computer, though it will inexplicably read audio CD for iTunes last I checked, even though iTunes says that said peripherals are missing. The printer is still on the fritz (hence the desire, now that everything is backed up on an external hard drive, to simply reformat), and when I try to open things in IE, they pop up in Firefox (WTH?). The computer, furthering my belief that Windows update is at the root of all of this, keeps trying to download updates when shut down which it cannot, and bring up the dreaded blue-screen DOS prompt of death when I try to start the computer up again. My brother discovered some way around this and back into Explorer, as I can post this, but that's just messed up. Oh, and I get no audio through the speakers. Just through headphones. And my car just broke down too .

Get a new car and format your PC with the Windows XP disc. The reason why your links open in Firefox and not IE is because Firefox is set to be your default browser. But damn, with so many problems, for so long, just format the damn thing, what the heck were you waiting for all this time?

 

[En Sabah Nur]

Does anyone around here have much in the way of real-world experience running this stuff on a netbook?

I have installed NIS 2009 (do not get Norton 360) to every one of my clients, (yes I make them buy it) and I have installed it on every PC they had, including an Acer Netbook. NIS2009 is very sweet with resource use, it even keeps itself honest by showing you the CPU usage of your system and the CPU usage of NIS 2009. Plus its the best protection the money can buy.

 

[DeadJohNNyAngel]

Hope it's ok if I add my computer dilemma here.

I actually managed to 'accidentally' delete my sound driver during the deletion of unused programmes on control panel's add/remove hardware app.

I've tried everywhere online to get a free sound driver replacement for download and even reinstalling the driver by disc however my computer refuses to read the dell driver disc thus further complicating the issue.

My computer is basically a dell dimension 3000 with XP home edition installed and the whole dilemma this causes is there is no sound while trying to listen to music or video media online however WMP still manages to run fine. Also the volume icon has been wiped out in both the tray and in the start tab where it's usually located in accessories/entertainment.

Can anyone give me the sound driver model name for a dell dimension
5000 with XP home edition so I can find and download it? Also Website recommendations or any general recommendations for fixing said issue?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Tapout]

Dell's driver site is usually pretty straightforward. This is what I found for a Dimension 3000.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

Yep its as simple as Dirtbag said it is. Just follow his link, download the said sound driver, and it should be ok. To make sure its only your sound driver, right click on "My Computer, go to Properties, go to Hardware Tab, cluck on Device manager tab. If you see only 1 yellow question mark, and it goes away after the driver install, everything is good. If not, something else is wrong, so report back here.

 

[Hanshotfirst1138]

Get a new car and format your PC with the Windows XP disc. The reason why your links open in Firefox and not IE is because Firefox is set to be your default browser. But damn, with so many problems, for so long, just format the damn thing, what the heck were you waiting for all this time?

Well, a friend of mine got the audio working again, and he claims that he got the printer to work, but as we just discovered that it's gushing ink, I guess that we'll have to wait a while to find out. The other problem is sort of fixed. how do I reformat? My patience is wearing thin. IE will not longer open at all. I'm dragging my feet, I know....

 

[En Sabah Nur]

Well, a friend of mine got the audio working again, and he claims that he got the printer to work, but as we just discovered that it's gushing ink, I guess that we'll have to wait a while to find out. The other problem is sort of fixed. how do I reformat? My patience is wearing thin. IE will not longer open at all. I'm dragging my feet, I know....

First, what brand of the computer do you have? Most HPs and some Dells have a recovery partition there that makes the job very easy.

 

[Hanshotfirst1138]

First, what brand of the computer do you have? Most HPs and some Dells have a recovery partition there that makes the job very easy.

A Dell. What I discovered happened with our boot issues is that the hard drive is somehow partitioned to both Windows XP Media Center Edition (which I run) and Windows XP Professional Edition (which I do not now nor have I ever had). My friend rerouted it so that it simply takes an extra second to select one of the two. I'd rather remove it altogether, but at this point, I'm not sure that I want to do any more damage. I'm still twitchy about reformating because I'm not sure weather or not it will read the startup discs. Our disc drives are still tempermenal, which is part of the reason that I'm iffy.

 

[Shawn Hopkins]

A Dell. What I discovered happened with our boot issues is that the hard drive is somehow partitioned to both Windows XP Media Center Edition (which I run) and Windows XP Professional Edition (which I do not now nor have I ever had). My friend rerouted it so that it simply takes an extra second to select one of the two. I'd rather remove it altogether, but at this point, I'm not sure that I want to do any more damage. I'm still twitchy about reformating because I'm not sure weather or not it will read the startup discs. Our disc drives are still tempermenal, which is part of the reason that I'm iffy.

Your problems are way beyond "reformat" and over into "buy a new one not haunted by ghosts."

 

[En Sabah Nur]

A Dell. What I discovered happened with our boot issues is that the hard drive is somehow partitioned to both Windows XP Media Center Edition (which I run) and Windows XP Professional Edition (which I do not now nor have I ever had). My friend rerouted it so that it simply takes an extra second to select one of the two. I'd rather remove it altogether, but at this point, I'm not sure that I want to do any more damage. I'm still twitchy about reformating because I'm not sure weather or not it will read the startup discs. Our disc drives are still tempermenal, which is part of the reason that I'm iffy.

That other one is probably the XP recovery partition, the one I was mentioning. See what happens when you choose that one instead. And what startup discs are you talking about? All you will need is the dell recovery disc with windows XP on it, and the drivers that you will probably need to download from dell website for your peripherals.

 

[King]

I got a lot of stuff in my computer thats slowing it down. If I delete them, will my computer go faster?

Also, id I do delete some programs off in my computer, will I get some storage back?



(Yes, I'm that dumb.)

 

[En Sabah Nur]

I got a lot of stuff in my computer thats slowing it down. If I delete them, will my computer go faster?

Also, id I do delete some programs off in my computer, will I get some storage back?



(Yes, I'm that dumb.)

Maybe and yes. If the "stuff" loads at startup, then yes its slowing down your computer. You can ether uninstall that stuff if you dont need it, or you can just clean up your startup programs to allow only the ones you need.

Yes, removing large programs can get you your space back, but you arent going to get it back 100%. Removing small programs, you will not see any improvement in space, because all software lives behind stuff like registry keys, dlls in your system32 folder and other junk, like uninstall info, or sometimes folders with logs and other junk in your program files.

 

[defunctzombie]

This is going to sound weird, but can a mouse be repaired? My right click stopped working. It's a shame, I really like my mouse.

Alternatively, is there somewhere that I can get a good, wired USB optical mouse for not a lot of coin? I'm not liking having to tab everywhere.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

This is going to sound weird, but can a mouse be repaired? My right click stopped working. It's a shame, I really like my mouse.

Alternatively, is there somewhere that I can get a good, wired USB optical mouse for not a lot of coin? I'm not liking having to tab everywhere.

Mouse cant usually be repaired (unless its the old ball mouse and even then its difficult) try a can of air, maybe its just dirt and dust clogging it. Good and cheap can never be together. You can get a cheap mouse at Newegg.com for $8 and you get a free shipping.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826250005

There is a $4 mouse as well but the shipping on that one is $6. But newegg being the best online store that it is (and is the second largers online retail store on USA)offers a mouse with a free shipping I linked above.

 

[defunctzombie]

I think something was clogging it. I pulled some crumbs out and it seems to be okay now.

 

[Rho]

I tried firing up my laptop again... It brought up some odd screen on the 2nd start-up that looked like it was something Apple employees accessed or something.. It was a bunch of code or something that gave me two different choices on what to type in. One continued start-up, the other shut it back down. I typed in the one for continuing start-up, and it said it was an "illegal operation" or something like that. After a while, I gave up, shut down, and turned it back on, and it didn't happen again. It just did that freezing at a blue screen thing. What is going on with this thing?