The "fun" never ends. (rant)

Christwriter · Post by **Christwriter** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 1:56 pm

I think the Internet wants to kill me.

Seriously.

FIRST there is the whole we-moved-too-far-out-of-the-city-for-cable-and-DSL thing, THEN there was the fiasco involving the Post Office and our mail-box, which kept our NetZero disk from getting to our home for at least two weeks.

Now the designated "Internet Computer" has gone down. At first it just had little problems with the Internet--which I chalked up to too much stuff on the harddrive, age and Dial-up. Then it started backfiring and freezing every couple of hours. THEN Mom decided to try to fix it by downloading IE6--computer only had IE5.

It worked. Once. And then refused to work again.

So we go to a friend of ours--who built my computer for me, so he knows his stuff--who suggested that we reformat the harddrive. We figured this might be a good idea...the computer was a pawn-shop find for my brother, to be his gaming computer, and somehow it ended up getting hooked up to the 'net.

It wouldn't reformat itself. It refused to.

So Mom spent most of last night trying to get the computer to kill itself, reload Windows and basically clean up its act.

It is now so completely dead, it's in rigor-mortis.

And these things make life EASIER?????

CW

YarpsDat · Post by **YarpsDat** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 2:16 pm

So... if it refuses to format itself... connect the HD to the other box, and format it there? Or am I talking gibberish?

Skylark King · Post by **Skylark King** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 2:19 pm

It's not all that bad...

Sippan thinks you're cute. You'll always have that goin' for ya.

Faub · Post by **Faub** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 2:30 pm

You need to use something that is not the hard drive to do he formatting. Preferrably, boot from Windows CD, and be sure to delete the partition when Windows asks where to install itself. Then create a new partition and format that. Unless you have a hardware problem where the drive is really bad and cannot be formatted, you shouldn't have any problems. I say a CD because CDs cannot be written to if there's a boot sector virus or something on the hard drive. A write protected floppy is almost as good but you'll need 6 floppies to boot Windows Xp and you still need the CD.

I recented tried to fix my aunt's computer and the problem ended up being hardware related. The drive worked fine if you didn't try to read a certain group of sectors and you didn't try to format it. 99% of the problems (the rebooting after 20 minutes of useful operation) was caused entirely by a Windows ME installation that had corrupted itself.

[AlmightyPyro] · Post by **[AlmightyPyro]** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 2:36 pm

I think your cute... and I'm the future Dictator of the world!

McDuffies · Post by **McDuffies** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 3:20 pm

Hey, well this is the second thread that talks about how cute you are. Isn't that a good thing?

Toxic · Post by **Toxic** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 3:40 pm

I recently discovered the college I'm going to... DOESN'T HAVE WIRELESS yet!!!!!!!

I'm stuck with normal DSL.

Xmung · Post by **Xmung** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 3:51 pm

well, whatever you do - don't let phil from spare change try to fix your pc...

LAGtheNoggin · Post by **LAGtheNoggin** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 3:57 pm

I've had similar problems.

Except try coupling it with a CD drive that chewed up disks (we only realised after it got through 3 copys of Windows 2000 (one legal), a copy of XP and one music CD) and a computer rig that was harder to tweak than buggering a hedgehog (I had the GPU fan attached to the video card heat sink with a piece of coat hanger and several ellastic hair ties, I also had a Zalman Flower cooler that has a fan suspended over the processor by using 3 PCI screw holes, oh yeah, that's a JOY to work around!).

In the end I pillaged the back-up HD (main HD wouldn't format, ran out of disks) off the old rig and thiefed my brother's computer, which just so happened to have better specs than my old one. That was a fun weekend ^.^

Rkolter · Post by **Rkolter** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 5:36 pm

faub wrote:You need to use something that is not the hard drive to do he formatting. Preferrably, boot from Windows CD, and be sure to delete the partition when Windows asks where to install itself. Then create a new partition and format that. Unless you have a hardware problem where the drive is really bad and cannot be formatted, you shouldn't have any problems. I say a CD because CDs cannot be written to if there's a boot sector virus or something on the hard drive. A write protected floppy is almost as good but you'll need 6 floppies to boot Windows Xp and you still need the CD.

What Faub said. Take this advice.

It wouldn't hurt you to reconsider XP if you're system is old enough that you're concerned about "age related" issues. But then, you didn't give us any info on the system itself.

Grabmygoblin · Post by **Grabmygoblin** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 2:36 am

so long as we've got all the computer geniuses on one thread, let me ask you guys a question: can spyware kill a modem connection or a cdr drive?
my modem connects, but the browsers say that they cannot find any sites. my older brother who is good with computers and myself cannot find anything wrong with the computer, so naturally my older brother blamed it on all the "spyware" on my computer, which he built and is therefore perfect.
my cdr drive does not register that any discs have been put in. it's been this way for months, ever since I allowed a school network person to look at my computer in hopes that maybe my contribution could help the school FINALLY fix the damn network.
so naturally my older brother blames it on all the damn "spyware" on my computer, which he built and is therefore perfect.
I have grown attached to this computer. I've spent more time with it that with most friends.

and it's broken because I let other people touch her, not because of the spyware.

YarpsDat · Post by **YarpsDat** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 2:50 am

grabmygoblin wrote: my modem connects, but the browsers say that they cannot find any sites.

Try WinsockFix

Grabmygoblin · Post by **Grabmygoblin** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 3:01 am

YarpsDat wrote:
grabmygoblin wrote: my modem connects, but the browsers say that they cannot find any sites.
Try WinsockFix

ok, duh. I knew that actually.

Rkolter · Post by **Rkolter** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 4:18 am

grabmygoblin wrote:so long as we've got all the computer geniuses on one thread, let me ask you guys a question: can spyware kill a modem connection or a cdr drive?
my modem connects, but the browsers say that they cannot find any sites. my older brother who is good with computers and myself cannot find anything wrong with the computer, so naturally my older brother blamed it on all the "spyware" on my computer, which he built and is therefore perfect.
my cdr drive does not register that any discs have been put in. it's been this way for months, ever since I allowed a school network person to look at my computer in hopes that maybe my contribution could help the school FINALLY fix the damn network.
so naturally my older brother blames it on all the damn "spyware" on my computer, which he built and is therefore perfect.
I have grown attached to this computer. I've spent more time with it that with most friends.
and it's broken because I let other people touch her, not because of the spyware.

The problem with saying it's spyware is twofold:

1) Spyware is, in the end, designed to generate business. Whether it's giving your browser activity to someone, determining what ads you've already seen, or popping up advertisements for you, it is counter-productive for spyware to disable your browser. Could it be done? Sure. But why?

2) In the CDR case, the problem is that if spyware was out there and disabling CDRs, you'd have heard of it by now. People would be complaining to hell and back about it. Again, sure it's possible - but very unlikely.

Have you verified you aren't infected with any of the numerous worms out there? I've regularly had people come in saying they cannot get to anywhere on the internet through a modem, only to find out that one or more worms are so busy scanning the internet for infectable IPs that there just isn't any bandwidth available for their browser and it times out.

For the hardware problem, I'd suggest using the driver disk that came with the unit to overwrite the existing drivers in use for your CDR. If that doesn't work... try yanking the CDR, removing it from your device list, then reinstalling. *Shrug* Or, buy a new CDR. They're like what... ten bucks?

Grabmygoblin · Post by **Grabmygoblin** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 5:04 am

welll, when I was using my computer regulary I was sure to download patches and was careful when worms around, but one did hit the school network. but when it hit I had already protected myself. but who knows? *ponders* I'll run some more scans tonight, just to be sure.
thanks guys, much as I love my brother, whenever he gets a problem he cannot fix he automatically blames it on whoever is closest

Christwriter · Post by **Christwriter** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 2:23 pm

Well...

I'll suggest that to her. I think my brother managed to get it to boot, so it's doing SOMETHING right--and my music teacher/computer builder suggested we take the thing apart to see if the fan's dirty or not...it might be over heating.

Oh, and the reason why I've been out of touch so long is that MY computer, my precious, artwork tool, DOESN"T HAVE A FRIGGING MODEM!!! Or a place to plug one in, as far as I can tell...there was ONE place that MIGHT facilitate a telephone cord, but everything we stuck IN the hole fell back out. Joy. Joy.

I'm in Houston right now...it's my Aunt's birthday (actually the birthday bash was yesterday...suffice to say I have a cousin who should forget basketball and try out for the Chippendale dancers and lets leave it there, shall we?) and I managed to dragoon her into letting me use her computer. Now all I have to figure out is what the heck I'm going to do when I get back home.

CW

McDuffies · Post by **McDuffies** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 7:02 pm

[AlmightyPyro] wrote:I think your cute... and I'm the future Dictator of the world!

I think you wanted to say:
"I think your cute eyes want me to be the future dictator of the world!"

Vorticus · Post by **Vorticus** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 7:55 pm

christwriter wrote:Well...

I'll suggest that to her. I think my brother managed to get it to boot, so it's doing SOMETHING right--and my music teacher/computer builder suggested we take the thing apart to see if the fan's dirty or not...it might be over heating.

Oh, and the reason why I've been out of touch so long is that MY computer, my precious, artwork tool, DOESN"T HAVE A FRIGGING MODEM!!! Or a place to plug one in, as far as I can tell...there was ONE place that MIGHT facilitate a telephone cord, but everything we stuck IN the hole fell back out. Joy. Joy.

I'm in Houston right now...it's my Aunt's birthday (actually the birthday bash was yesterday...suffice to say I have a cousin who should forget basketball and try out for the Chippendale dancers and lets leave it there, shall we?) and I managed to dragoon her into letting me use her computer. Now all I have to figure out is what the heck I'm going to do when I get back home.

CW

All the suggestions so far have been good. Be warned, my advice only applies if the computer entirely ceases to work. Large blunt objects (baseball bats, two by fours) are your friend, use liberally when 'repairing one's computer. You may not have a computer, but at least you'll have vented your frustrations.

Patch · Post by **Patch** » Mon Jul 19, 2004 9:48 pm

Yeh..i know about that, last week i bought a new video card for watching DVD