On Tue, 2 Mar 2004 05:08:08 -0800, "Ian"
This case calls for some "kick butt support"...
I recenlty installed some software and my pc went wrong
OK
so i put in my hard drive from my old pc to boot it in
win 95 to correct the problem.
Er... how was *that* supposed to work?
But i hadn't accounted for the drivers not being the
same for some reason
Reason such as being a different PC? Well, duh.
so i formatted the hdd and tried to reinstall win 95
Step one: When in a hole, stop digging...
but my win 95 cdrom boot disk wasnt universal so it
woulnt work for my CD drive
Which you didn't discover when testing this before nuking the HD?
so i removed the HDD and put it back in
my old pc. But that wasnt the last of it now i am getting
blue windows stop screens saying
DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL
and i dont have the technical info on me at the moment
but ill get it and post it
I'm not kicking your butt because you're a newb. I'm kicking your
butt because you're a newb who is playing cowboy, and wondering why
everything gets worse and worse. If you want to be a tech, that's
fine - but clue yourself up first, and build some tshooting instincts!
1) When in a hole. stop digging
If you have a problem that is limited in scope (e.g. everything works
except one particular program) then do NOT start by making sweeping
irreversable changes that affect things beyond that scope (such as
"duh, just re-install Windows")
2) Never delete what you can ;comment out or rename away
Can rephrase as; whatever you do, make sure you can undo. Make sure
you are aware of the full scope of what you are doing, and start with
focussed interventions that are narrow in scope. Things CAN get
worse, and you may be grateful you can get back to your initial state,
even if that state is imperfect.
3) Document the initial state before changing it
Later on you may need info that your troubleshooting may obscure -
IOW, preserve forensics and log all changes. For example, if you were
now speaking to a tech who really knew your problem scope (say, the
guys who wrote the problem app) and they asked for error message
detail etc., you'd wished you'd written it down, notso?
4) Check your rock before pulling yourself up on it
The PC's software environment is built as a layer of abstractions,
each of which will function rationally only as long as the underlying
layers are sound. So before doing something drastic at one level
(say, the dumbo's "just re-install Windows" suggestion) you should
first verify the sanity of the deeper layers (e.g. RAM, fans, hard
drive physical defects, exclude overclocking, file system OK etc.)
5) Do NOT boot a HD into Windows on another system
This is so terminally stupid as to begger belief. PCs are all
different at the hardware level; even the same components can run
differently at the CMOS / PnP resources level, based on which cards
were installed first and into which PCI slots. Win9x detects the core
hardware at install time and builds a system-specific Vmm32.vxd based
on this; subsequent PnP detection of changes has to work from these
shoulders. The LAST thing you want a flaky system to do is go on a
Plug-n-Play rampage, shuffling resources are re-deteing everything.
6) Check your rock, part II
If you do decide to do something hairy, then make COAB sure you have
your ducks in a row before yoyu start. For example, make sure your
boot diskette can see the CD drive, and ideally copy the .cab set to
HD and install from there, before re-installing Windows. Also, make
sure your data's safe, you have all application and device driver
installation disks to hand, with all product keys.
I have very little sympathy with ppl who paint themselves in acorner
by starting chainsaw moves without chacking these things first. I
like to help ppl, but at some point, it's Darwin take the hindmost.
This is not a "nice" post, but hopefully you will learn from it!
------------------------- ---- --- -- - - - -
Kick-Butt Support! Call us, explain the problem,
and we'll pop right over and kick your butt.
