G
Guest
I don't know if we (me and my blinking buddies) have a virus or if I'm just clumsy, but I've spent two days nearly without sleep in front of a couple of miserable computers who are driving me up the wall.
I think my problems started when I downloaded SP1 for my aging Pavilion. Or maybe Norton SystemWorks was the problem. Whatever, after installing SystemWorks everything started going wrong so I believed I had no choice but to reinstall XP.
Halfway through installation I got an error saying that some file was missing so I tried to cancel the install. No luck. I couldn't go forward and I couldn't back out so I called MS tech support.
We messed around for over an hour and finally concluded I would have to partition my hard drive if I had any hope to ever use the computer again. It was frozen with just a black screen and the mouse arrow, which worked nicely but pointed at nothing.
Prior to partitioning, I'd always kept up with updates and had no problems so I thought I should continue to do that. However, there were 47 updates waiting to be installed so I assumed that SP1 was the best idea. Apparently I was very wrong.
Things went from bad to worse, which was when I installed Norton SystemWorks.
I should explain. My husband had just been given a new PC by the State to use for a Vocational Rehab program he's in. He's an engineer who can't get a job because he's never learned CAD drafting and apparently no CAD, no work, at least not in his field.
The State contracts with a private party who sometiems buys computers and software, sometimes builds systems, for people who need them as part of a rehab program. My husband, who is also recovering from two bouts of lung cancer, a heart attack and two asbestos related lung cancer surgeries over the past 7 years, thought that he still had to get a job if we have any hope to continue to buy groceries.
SystemWorks is one of the programs the State bought my husband for the new computer but the software belongs to him (to us, you might say). So, even though I've heard some warnings about Norton, I installed it, hoping it might protect my own aging Pavilion.
I rarely download anything from Internet and have no games installed on my computer. Regardless, I'm still careful with my computer because I've had virus problems over the years. No big deal, I don't think but I'm not so sure anymore.
Shortly after installing SystemWorks, my CD and DVD drives disappeared from my computer. I spent many, many hours troubleshooting with the help of MS and had almost yelled "uncle" when a nice young man from Calcutta or Bombay or thereabouts figured out a way to tweak the registry and restore the drives.
About a week later, Outlook Express disappeared. And I mean, it DISAPPEARED. Just plain gone.
This time I was too weary to sit locked to the telephone so I tried finding help online and a little bit on my own, with absolutely no success, until I ran across a website run by someone who calls himself MalcolmX and has a website called the Old Geek or something like that.
He had a complicated string of commands to follow, but voila! Outlook Express was mine again!
Now, all of this time I was only using the new PC, which is networked to the "old" one, for e-mail, when I could. I have Broadband on both computers.
Just when I thought all was fixed again, I had to send an e-mail just when I was in the middle of doing a virus scan. That's when I discovered that, although the little icon that shows connnection to Internet was in my start bar, I could not get a connection to Internet nor could I get any e-mail, on the new computer. Somehow, the new computer was affected by the problems on the old one even though I'd been told that they are not networked in a way so that the problems on one will affect the other. Nor had this happened to that point.
Further, when I would reboot the new PC, the old one sometimes but not always would also reboot. This had never happened before.
I have done hours of poking around and I've discovered that the new PC thinks it doesn't have a modem of any kind installed.
Is it possible that the high speed modem installed by Comcast does not show up as a modem in my System Devices for the new computer? And, I'm also wondering if the tech guy hired by the State might have failed to put a regular modem into the new PC when he built it. Maybe figuring we'd never know the difference?
Anyhow, my big question right now is whether maybe I have some new or established virus in both computers despite my daily virus scanning.
That's one question.
The other one is, how do I locate and reinstall a modem in the new computer? The hardware is certainly there but the computer doesn't want to admit it. If nothing else, I should be able to at least access the high speed modem installed by Comcast, huh?
Further good news or maybe just confusing news is that the network is working except for the modem/Internet access part. The networked printer is still working from either computer and I can also access documents from either computer. But I simply can't access Internet from the new computer because it denies it has a modem of any kind.
For some reason, I can't do a System Restore, either, or at least no restoration that will do me any good. I've done restores on both units and even when there's a supposed restoration, still no modem on the new computer.
Except for SystemWorks and SP1, I've installed absolutely nothing on either computer but they've both been poked and prodded so much, hard telling what has been accidentally tweaked that maybe is the problem here.
Oh, yes - and each time the old PC reboots for no apparent reason, I get a warning that there's just been a serious error.
The error report says that the problem was because of a driver that can't be identified. But since I haven't installed anything that should include a driver unless I just don't know the difference, I don't know what to do about it. I would happily uninstall the offending program or hardware or software, etc., if I only knew what it is. But since I haven't installed anything, how do I uninstall it?
Sorry if I sound a little hysterical and maybe flippant. I'm probably a little of both. I'm very, very exhausted from these days of tilting at Mr. Gates windmills. MalcolmX/Old Geek has convinced me that there are fixes out there for every seemingly insurmountable problem so hopefully someone will come riding along on their dark horse and rescue me one more time. Please?
Thanks, whoever you are.
Geri
I think my problems started when I downloaded SP1 for my aging Pavilion. Or maybe Norton SystemWorks was the problem. Whatever, after installing SystemWorks everything started going wrong so I believed I had no choice but to reinstall XP.
Halfway through installation I got an error saying that some file was missing so I tried to cancel the install. No luck. I couldn't go forward and I couldn't back out so I called MS tech support.
We messed around for over an hour and finally concluded I would have to partition my hard drive if I had any hope to ever use the computer again. It was frozen with just a black screen and the mouse arrow, which worked nicely but pointed at nothing.
Prior to partitioning, I'd always kept up with updates and had no problems so I thought I should continue to do that. However, there were 47 updates waiting to be installed so I assumed that SP1 was the best idea. Apparently I was very wrong.
Things went from bad to worse, which was when I installed Norton SystemWorks.
I should explain. My husband had just been given a new PC by the State to use for a Vocational Rehab program he's in. He's an engineer who can't get a job because he's never learned CAD drafting and apparently no CAD, no work, at least not in his field.
The State contracts with a private party who sometiems buys computers and software, sometimes builds systems, for people who need them as part of a rehab program. My husband, who is also recovering from two bouts of lung cancer, a heart attack and two asbestos related lung cancer surgeries over the past 7 years, thought that he still had to get a job if we have any hope to continue to buy groceries.
SystemWorks is one of the programs the State bought my husband for the new computer but the software belongs to him (to us, you might say). So, even though I've heard some warnings about Norton, I installed it, hoping it might protect my own aging Pavilion.
I rarely download anything from Internet and have no games installed on my computer. Regardless, I'm still careful with my computer because I've had virus problems over the years. No big deal, I don't think but I'm not so sure anymore.
Shortly after installing SystemWorks, my CD and DVD drives disappeared from my computer. I spent many, many hours troubleshooting with the help of MS and had almost yelled "uncle" when a nice young man from Calcutta or Bombay or thereabouts figured out a way to tweak the registry and restore the drives.
About a week later, Outlook Express disappeared. And I mean, it DISAPPEARED. Just plain gone.
This time I was too weary to sit locked to the telephone so I tried finding help online and a little bit on my own, with absolutely no success, until I ran across a website run by someone who calls himself MalcolmX and has a website called the Old Geek or something like that.
He had a complicated string of commands to follow, but voila! Outlook Express was mine again!
Now, all of this time I was only using the new PC, which is networked to the "old" one, for e-mail, when I could. I have Broadband on both computers.
Just when I thought all was fixed again, I had to send an e-mail just when I was in the middle of doing a virus scan. That's when I discovered that, although the little icon that shows connnection to Internet was in my start bar, I could not get a connection to Internet nor could I get any e-mail, on the new computer. Somehow, the new computer was affected by the problems on the old one even though I'd been told that they are not networked in a way so that the problems on one will affect the other. Nor had this happened to that point.
Further, when I would reboot the new PC, the old one sometimes but not always would also reboot. This had never happened before.
I have done hours of poking around and I've discovered that the new PC thinks it doesn't have a modem of any kind installed.
Is it possible that the high speed modem installed by Comcast does not show up as a modem in my System Devices for the new computer? And, I'm also wondering if the tech guy hired by the State might have failed to put a regular modem into the new PC when he built it. Maybe figuring we'd never know the difference?
Anyhow, my big question right now is whether maybe I have some new or established virus in both computers despite my daily virus scanning.
That's one question.
The other one is, how do I locate and reinstall a modem in the new computer? The hardware is certainly there but the computer doesn't want to admit it. If nothing else, I should be able to at least access the high speed modem installed by Comcast, huh?
Further good news or maybe just confusing news is that the network is working except for the modem/Internet access part. The networked printer is still working from either computer and I can also access documents from either computer. But I simply can't access Internet from the new computer because it denies it has a modem of any kind.
For some reason, I can't do a System Restore, either, or at least no restoration that will do me any good. I've done restores on both units and even when there's a supposed restoration, still no modem on the new computer.
Except for SystemWorks and SP1, I've installed absolutely nothing on either computer but they've both been poked and prodded so much, hard telling what has been accidentally tweaked that maybe is the problem here.
Oh, yes - and each time the old PC reboots for no apparent reason, I get a warning that there's just been a serious error.
The error report says that the problem was because of a driver that can't be identified. But since I haven't installed anything that should include a driver unless I just don't know the difference, I don't know what to do about it. I would happily uninstall the offending program or hardware or software, etc., if I only knew what it is. But since I haven't installed anything, how do I uninstall it?
Sorry if I sound a little hysterical and maybe flippant. I'm probably a little of both. I'm very, very exhausted from these days of tilting at Mr. Gates windmills. MalcolmX/Old Geek has convinced me that there are fixes out there for every seemingly insurmountable problem so hopefully someone will come riding along on their dark horse and rescue me one more time. Please?
Thanks, whoever you are.
Geri