Help save my son's computer

[Newbie64]

ops:
Having half a brain is more dangerous than none at all. I recently
read an article in regards to limited internet access and the
potential for a virus to be infecting the drivers which was a problem
I was having on my son's computer. I inadvertently 'lost' the whole
driver folder and subsequently lost most of his computer. I've
managed to regain most of it but am still unable to regain audio and
use of the USB ports. I've removed the internet card and will try
to re-install that once I recover the rest of the system. So here's
what I'm working with and what I've tried. Anything anyone out there
can do to help will be awesome.

The motherboard is a Soyo SY-7VCA, I've been to the websites and have
all the 'drivers' but when I point the system in that direction it
doesn't see them for what they are. I've tried to restore to a
previous save point but it won't move backwards from today's date.
Under the System, I'm currently looking at "PCI-Multimedia Audio
Device !" under "Other devices" and "3038 PCI to Universal Host
Controller" (2 times because there are 2 USB ports I guess) under the
USB Host controller section. I've 'removed" them and 'refreshed' them
and pointed the system to the right files I have on disk
(hotplug.dll, usbd.sys, among others) but the errors still prevail.
The operating system is Windows ME and before I pulled the bonehead
maneuver of the year it was all working okay except for the selective
internet intermittent problem. I realize this is and older system and
an older operating system but for my 12 year old son it's the whole
world and I'd prefer not to trash the system because of my stupidity.
Thanks for any help out there.
Mark

 

[YKhan]

Why don't you take this opportunity to upgrade his computer to Windows
XP? It sounds like it's an Athlon XP system of some sort and it'll
handle XP just fine. It's likely the upgrade will fix up all of the
driver problems as it will replace it with the XP drivers.

Yousuf Khan

 

[George Macdonald]

ops:
Having half a brain is more dangerous than none at all. I recently
read an article in regards to limited internet access and the
potential for a virus to be infecting the drivers which was a problem
I was having on my son's computer. I inadvertently 'lost' the whole
driver folder and subsequently lost most of his computer. I've
managed to regain most of it but am still unable to regain audio and
use of the USB ports. I've removed the internet card and will try
to re-install that once I recover the rest of the system. So here's
what I'm working with and what I've tried. Anything anyone out there
can do to help will be awesome.

The motherboard is a Soyo SY-7VCA, I've been to the websites and have
all the 'drivers' but when I point the system in that direction it
doesn't see them for what they are. I've tried to restore to a
previous save point but it won't move backwards from today's date.
Under the System, I'm currently looking at "PCI-Multimedia Audio
Device !" under "Other devices" and "3038 PCI to Universal Host
Controller" (2 times because there are 2 USB ports I guess) under the
USB Host controller section. I've 'removed" them and 'refreshed' them
and pointed the system to the right files I have on disk
(hotplug.dll, usbd.sys, among others) but the errors still prevail.
The operating system is Windows ME and before I pulled the bonehead
maneuver of the year it was all working okay except for the selective
internet intermittent problem. I realize this is and older system and
an older operating system but for my 12 year old son it's the whole
world and I'd prefer not to trash the system because of my stupidity.
Thanks for any help out there.

When you say "driver folder" do you mean the OS drivers as a whole or just
the specific hardware drivers? If the former, have you tried running SFC?
I don't know how it's implemented in WinME, but if it's like Win98SE, go to
Start/Run and enter SFC and you should get a Dialog Box; now click on
Settings and from that box, make sure that the check for both deleted and
changed files are enabled. Now go back to the previous box and tell it to
do the check.

If SFC is more like WinXP's you need to go to a command prompt and do:
SFC /purgecache
SFC /scannow.

In both of the above, you'll need access to the WinME installation files,
from CD if necessary.

 

[Pankaj]

Are you trying to fix the driver folder problem or have you reinstalled
the OS. If you havent done it, I would strongly recommend that you
reformat the hard drive and do a clean install. It takes only about an
hour to do clean install. Once you install the OS, first thing you do
is install chipset drivers that are on the CD or from Soyo's site. Then
only you install any other device. If you are seeing this problem
despite trying it, I would recommend taking out any hardware that is
plugged in (which is not integrated) and try installing them after
chipset drivers are installed. Despite general perception, I had very
good experience with win ME. I had to move away from it as it couldnt
handle more than 512MB memory and doesnt support file size greater than
2GB (or 4GB?). Both of which I found out the hard way

Regards,

Pankaj

 

[Captin]

ops:
Having half a brain is more dangerous than none at all. I recently
read an article in regards to limited internet access and the
potential for a virus to be infecting the drivers which was a problem
I was having on my son’s computer. I inadvertently
’lost’ the whole
driver folder and subsequently lost most of his computer.
I’ve
managed to regain most of it but am still unable to regain audio and
use of the USB ports. I’ve removed the internet card and will
try
to re-install that once I recover the rest of the system. So
here’s
what I’m working with and what I’ve tried. Anything
anyone out there
can do to help will be awesome.

The motherboard is a Soyo SY-7VCA, I’ve been to the websites and
have
all the ’drivers’ but when I point the system in that
direction it
doesn’t see them for what they are. I’ve tried to restore
to a
previous save point but it won’t move backwards from
today’s date.
Under the System, I’m currently looking at "PCI-Multimedia Audio
Device !" under "Other devices" and "3038 PCI to Universal Host
Controller" (2 times because there are 2 USB ports I guess) under the
USB Host controller section. I’ve ’removed" them and
’refreshed’ them
and pointed the system to the right files I have on disk
(hotplug.dll, usbd.sys, among others) but the errors still prevail.
The operating system is Windows ME and before I pulled the bonehead
maneuver of the year it was all working okay except for the selective
internet intermittent problem. I realize this is and older system and
an older operating system but for my 12 year old son it’s the
whole
world and I’d prefer not to trash the system because of my
stupidity.

Excuse my ignorance, are you trying to install the VIA 4 in 1 package?