Computer Help Thread v4.0

Tech Talk
61

Probably just a buggy driver/software issue. Of course, your printer could just be hosed as well, but unless it’s suffered some physical damage or got shocked in a storm or something like that it’s not likely to be physically broken. Peripheral hardware like printers usually don’t just bug out all of a sudden for no reason. It’s probably software.

Uninstall the printer:[LIST=1]
[] unplug it.
[] go (in XP) Start > Printers and Faxes
[] Right click the printer’s icon and “remove” it (I think it’s “remove,” but it might be “delete” or something similar)
[]Reboot (probably not necessary, but do it anyway)
[*]plug it back up and Windows will probably install the drivers again automagically.[/LIST]That ***might ***work, but if not you’ll probably have to force the drivers manually. Post again if you need help with that. :tup:

62

I probably should have posted this problem last time after I decided to be an idiot and fuck with, ostensibly, the wrong things when using HijackThis.

I wasn’t wanting to bother the thread again despite the problems persisting. I thought they would all be done away with after that nasty forced system restore, especially since Webshots had been done away with.

That appears to be a large of the problem, anyway. Webshots causes resets when it says that it can’t find “the album” or some bullshit like that. This appears to persist even after that aforementioned system restore, though I could have sworn that that had eliminated Webshots as it was. (Webshots is my mother, which is why I’m reluctant to actually make sure I remove, especially when reinstalling things doesn’t seem to have done anything for me.)

Speaking of which, I’ve reinstalled the new version of eMule twice or thrice and yet it only seldom works, which is why I don’t think it’s necessarily the firewall this time.

I seem to be having a lot of “random” computer problems considering that my laptop just decided to stop working on Friday (as if this week hasn’t been fucking annoying enough yet), but I’m taking that to my ex-roommate to see if he can do anything about it. It would seem that it just decided to not start up again due to “not finding operating system”, which is bullshit because I’ve downloaded nothing on it and I can’t imagine it would have randomly caught a virus when I was at his house the day before.

63

I’m actually having this same issue with a networked printer at one of the LAN sites I work at. Out of 16 or so PCs, only a couple of them print jibberish across the top of pages and the rest of the sheet blank. Good to know that it’s more of a client machine issue rather than a printer issue as that printer I have is brand new over there. Luckily, I have Ghost image duty these next couple months. :tup:

Thanks for the tip.

64

Well, I guess I can come out of lurking just to post this, though I think it isn’t going to be much help

A year ago, we moved into a new house and started using my sisters computer from college. Basically, the older computer I was using had the same specs as this one, except this one has a better video card and much more hard drive space. Anywho, I’m big on anime and used to download them through torrents. Here’s where the problems begin:

AVI and higher quality videos would lag to hell. This didn’t make any sense to me, since the video card had a TV receiver and was essentially made to run those types of videos. But I just ignored it and found other websites to get my anime fix.

Then over the months, the other lower quality videos I’d been downloading (mostly game trailers) began to lag. At first it wasn’t noticeable, but nowadays its horrible. The video stutters, the sound is choppy… ugh.

I talked it over with one of my computer teachers (who knows his stuff) and he suggested that I probably should just update my drivers. Thinking it wouldn’t hurt, more problems arose from that. I installed a new driver (probably incorrectly) and started getting the blue screen of death regularly, so I did the deal to drive windows back to before I had installed them. Things were “normal” now.

But still distressing, I tried to find other ways to fix this like defragging the hard drives, looking for spyware among other things, but none have worked. So I gave up, thinking my low quality free games would tide me over until I could get a new PC. But guess what? Games that I have downloaded recently are now “incompatible” with my video card. I tried to pull up this 2d Sonic rip off game, didn’t work. I tried opening up “Free Civ”, a game a Windows 3.1 machine wouldn’t have trouble running. Laggy. I tried running various Quake 3 mods that could be played on a Pentium II. Wouldn’t even start up.

I’ve just been putting up with this and I really don’t know what to do. I was hoping that I would get a computer as a graduation present. Nope. Maybe enough graduation money to buy a new PC. $200. My friend said he would give me his old computer if he got a laptop. Lied. So whatever should I do? Here are specs of my ancient PC btw:
Pentium III 500 Mhz
512 MB RAM
AMD-K6 3d Processor
Radeon 7000/ VE Family.

Sorry if all that was long winded, but I wanted to be somewhat thorough.Thanks in advance…

65

Operating System not found? That usually means that the drive was wiped, or there is some problem causing the files to be hidden, like… if the drive wasn’t working properly, or if you caught some virus that can mess with file allocation tables like Chernobyl. Does your computer ever make noise, like a phaser on Star Trek? Or a crunchy noise, like there’s a motor in your computer? If so, the drive is probably dying, and it will not be recoverable. :sad:

If there’s no noise sometimes FAT tables just like to screw up and the drive itself is fine, although you’ll have to wipe and re-install everything in order to recover it. There might be some programs that can recover from a bad FAT table, but I don’t know them if they exist. I’ve never experienced NTFS, the Windows XP file system, to do this, but that doesn’t at all mean it can’t happen. Your best bet is just to save what you can and wipe/reload to save you some headaches. :tup:

66

@The Damned
try fixing the master boot record (mbr), there is a chance that the OS is still there just not linked so it can be booted

to do this, put in the install cd and run recovery console, when it finish loading, type in the command: fixmbr
reboot and take out cd, OS should boot afterward.

hope this help, btw im new here to i would like to say hi to everyone here at srk :smiley:

67

What determines the speed of minimizing between programs?

I bought a new computer that has an onboard video card 64mb, (512-64=448) 448 DDR2 RAM running. Its specs are:

CPU : AMD Sempron 3000+
Motherboard: Jetway MCP51 Socket AM2
Memory: Kingston DDR2 667 512M
Hard Disk: WD 80gb SATA2 Hard Disk

I have both Real Player and Warcraft III running. For my old computer before it broke down, it could minimize between Real Player at Warcraft III pretty fast. But this new com takes a longer time. Which one would lower the minimizing speed more: buying a 64mb video card so that the onboard video card won’t be using 64 mb of my RAM, or just buying 512 more DDR2 ram? I can only get either one, not both.

68

It should be a seperate program from windows that your manufacturer should have included. That Power Options program you talk about sounds like it, but if the brightness and cpu speed is not there I don’t know where it could be.

There might be another program on your comp. that you can adjust the things I have listed

69

All this information and nothing about the operating system:shake:. Just kidding…

On a serious note if you are using XP by any chance that amount of ram could be your root of problems. If you can’t come up with a reasonable answer to all the lock ups and blue screens you can always format -> reinstall windows and see how that works.

I’m not particularly fond of and have knowledge about ATI cards either so I can’t give you info on the video card.

70

OMFG i just turn on my comp and i cant hear shit!!! i go to control panel n chek the sound system. all the sound is all the way at LOW. it say NO AUDIO DEVICE. how do i FIX THIS. this is soo gay!!

71

Try download and install the latest sound card driver. What sound card are you using?

72

Hey thx for the fast reply, appreciated!! I don’t know how to check my what version my sound card is, where do i go?

P.S i just got my sound back, i dunno what i did. i go around the sound system n start dl n updating shit. :clap:. I’m interested to know where i can dl the lastest version of sound card and where do i go to check though.

73

Usually, you can determine the type of sound card you have by using the “Device Manager” -> Audio, or, if you want, open up your PC, unplug the sound card from the PCI(?) slot, and look at the printed marks on top of the IC chips. I bet you’re using WinXP. …

And as for drivers, I got the ones from “Realtek”.

74

Sounds like a video card issue if you ask me.

75

New PC’s pretty much always use on-board memory allocated to video/sound/etc, so I don’t think that the onboard video is using 64MB of your RAM. It’s probably got it’s own allocated specifically to video. Even still, 64MB out of 512 isn’t that big of a hit to make a considerable difference. System memory (RAM) always determines the speed of application swapping. Be sure to get the exact same kind of memory if you want to utilize dual channel memory options. In fact, you might want to look for a 2-module 1GB pairing and just sell the old stick of 512 or keep it for backup/testing.

FYI - software can cause the same issue as well, so if you don’t have the exact same software configuration as your old system (or even if you do) you will experience differences from your old system to the new one. Check what is running. :tup:

76

That’s not a really good board, iso it’s very possible. It could also be the mobo itself, not liking certain numbers, or the fact that it’s kingston ram.

also, don’t get a 64MB video card. that’s pointless. 256MB are the standard now, and they’re fairly cheap, as you can get something like a 7300 for about $70

77

Alright thanks for the replies.

I’m only going to play Warcraft III. In fact, I don’t want a video card that is too much over the recommended specs of Warcraft III since I don’t want a chance to get addicted to games any time soon (due to work and school).

I’m not sure too, but the staff at the computer store told me that the video card is using RAM from the mobo. I don’t really get the 2-module 1GB pairing part though.

Here are my two options, they both cost exactly the same:

  1. Kingston DDR2-667 1gb
    or
  2. MSI 7100GS 258mb
    Core Clock: 350 Mbz
    Video Memory: 64mb 64bit GDDR2 400 Mhz, Shared up to 256mb
    Pixel Pipelines: 4
    Output: VGA, DVI, S-Video

Also, does anyone know what the program between the volume control and time is? It’s the yellow thing.

http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/1526/untitledxx5.jpg

78

My point is…

a 64MB card that works well is only going to run about $10 cheaper than a 256MB card. Unless you find a deal on some piece of shit card, then you’re wasting money by doing that.

don’t get that MSI thing either, cuz MSI"s older stuff sucks balls. Get the memory, but see if you can get a better brand for the same price. G.Skill, Mushkin, Corsair, OCZ, Crucial, GeIL are all better brands.

79

Thanks.

I read your advice and I’ll keep it in my even though I took my laptop into the store anyway since the warranty was still good; my ex-roommate essentially came to the same conclusion.

Can anyone inform me how to the fix the problem with my home computer that I already posted? Because it’s still occuring.

80

i want to split certain video files into smaller segments so i can put it on youtube. does anybody know how to do this or recommend some programs to let me do this?