Perhaps off topic, but I am a little lost.

Got the Windows Recovery deal going on my PC. Sucks big time. Probably picked it up on a site I should have not been on. Can't even start up the computer without getting the "warning".

I am asking this on my Mac. Would hate to lose everything on my PC because of this.

Any advice?

No problem. Wish I had better answers for you though.

Now this I can definitely help with.

Reboot into safe mode with networking. (Press F8 repeatedly while the machine is booting until prompted with a menu. Choose safe mode with networking on that menu.)

Download MalwareBytes and install/update it. Run a full scan. The scan may take several hours so be patient. When the scan finishes remove all it finds.

If it does not let you run or install malwarebytes then download RKill and run that. The file name is iexplore.exe. When you run this it will kill active malware processes. DO NOT REBOOT after running RKill. Now try to run Malwarebytes and see if it removes it. A good followup scan is SuperAntiSpyware Portable. Run the full scan on that and remove what it finds.

If all that fails, let me know and I will walk you through running ComboFix, but that should only be used as a last resort as it is very powerful and not user friendly.

Much appreciated. Will try in the morning and let you know.

I put up a post on MajotGeeks and got only 1 response: do a factory reset that comes up for a split second when I turn on the computer. It was suggested that I back up all of my personal files and try that.

That kind of scares me - especially if it doesn't work. Wouldn't I have to go get a second hard drive in order to do that? Or at least get a ton disks?

Factory reset isn't really getting to the bottom of the problem, it's just a restore of the machine to factory condition by wiping out everything and restoring the default image. Sure that would fix the problem but it is overkill for just some driver issues. That's why I suggested downloading all the drivers from Lenovo for your model and try to install all of them to see what fixes the issue. Sometimes the descriptions they put up may make it sound like it isn't the driver you want when it really is. And this way you get the most up to date drivers for all your hardware anyway.

As for needing a second harddrive, you don't need one no. You would just need some place to backup your data. It could be a flash drive, online backup, or an external harddrive.

OK, so I realized that I did download the driver that Lenovo had (the HD Audio Bus that I mentioned yesterday). What I am realizing now, something that didn't really click, is that in order to install it I need a cd-rom. At the end of the hardware wizard telling me some thing was wrong, it has this line:

Click back if you have installation media such as a CD-ROM...

I thought that I uninstalled it, but it is still listed - with an exclamaition point inside a yellow circle - and I still have the option to "uninstall" or "disable". Should I try this: lenovo?

Yes you can certainly try that. The Regedit trick they link to is a good one as well and can't hurt. Just be careful when dealing with regedit, always follow instructions exactly(and be sure the instructions are reputable. That post is accurate though so go ahead and follow it.)

Hi Rick,
I was at my cousin's house today and my 12 yr old niece told me her several month old Acer laptop running Windows 7 Home Premium wasn't working. So, I checked it out. When booting up it takes me to the sign in screen where I put in her password. From there it loads to a black screen. All I see is the mouse pointer, which lags quite a bit, and the task bar along the bottom. Clicking on the start icon does nothing. I only get the "spinning circle" next to the pointer.

I tried booting into safe mode and restored to an earlier point. Got a message stating the restore was successful. However, I have the same issue. Black screen, can't click on start. Eventually, a message pops up that Windows Explorer is not responding.

Any ideas on how I can fix this for her?

Thanks!!!!

Could be a million different things, but the key to me is 12 yr old. That tells me spyware. Boot into safe mode with networking and run both Malwarebytes and SuperAntiSpyware. Full scans on both. Let me know if it finds anything or if it could be something else wrong.

The regedit didn't do anything. I'm going to contact Lenovo and see if they still have, and can send me, the Installation CD that comes with the laptop.

Thanks Rick! I ran Malwarebytes and Super. They both found and fixed a ton of stuff but did not alleviate the problem. So, I decided to reset the whole thing to the factory default.SpyWare As I was doing that the damn battery died. And, of course, my niece handed me the wrong charger.

So, this repair is on hold until I can get the right charger.

I'm making some progress. I got the problem with the CD-Rom resolved, so it is properly operating. Now it's just a matter of the driver. The same thing is happening with each one that I install...except now it's a "code 28" rather than a "code 39". Have I made progress, or should I still look around for the installation disk (I say search because it seems that the manufacturer no longer produces the one I need)?

I don't know if I'd consider that progress or regress. Code 39 means the driver can't initialize for whatever reason. Code 28 means the driver is not installed.

See here for explanations and possible fixes

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310123

Yeah, already did that. Shit. Oh well, I guess I can live without sound...but it's sure gonna ruin the porn!

So I am resetting up xBox live, but its on a different router. I already installed Tomato Firmware on a linksys router, but I forgot where the instructions are. Any help?

OK, here I am again. I think I'm just inches away, with help from the guys at MajorGeek. I'd like you to take a look at the thread.

I WANT SOUND!!!

It's the last post (which is actually the top post - and that makes no sense to me) is where I get a little confused. I have an enabled modem with a modem driver - although not the most up-to-date one as evidenced by the link provided - and now I'm paranoid to uninstall the current one and reinstall the updated one (I think it's obvious as to why). Then, if I even have to take it that far, how do I check to see if the modem is enabled in BIOS?

This is driving me batshit insane, but I won't stop until someone says "OK dude, you're just shit outta luck"!!!

If the modem shows up in device manager then it is enabled in the BIOS.

What does it mean when regions of my screen are in soft focus while others are sharp? (Mostly noticeable with text and it seems to be in vertical bands.) This is a new PC and our IT guy has already tried three different video drivers. I'm guessing we need to try a forth? This monitor worked fine with my old PC and my neighbor's monitor works fine with this PC. (I'm worried I'm going to get downgraded to a shittier monitor as a result of this.)

You need to update your optical drivers - I'll get a USB drive and a power drill. Start taking Vicodin now.

And... Nevermind. New monitor (same model) seems to have fixed the issue.

So, what does it mean when YouTube videos are just black screens? Do I have to reinstall a player or something?

Are your eyes open? Often, closing then re-opening your eyes will fix this issue.

Seriously, often it means that the video's been taken down.

No, it's not that. I can view YouTube stuff when they're embedded here but they don't work on the actual site. This is what it looks like:

Click to view attachment

I would reinstall flash

Yeah, I thought of that too but when I try to download via the website, it tells me that Google Chrome already has it installed and will update it when a new version is available. Is there a way that I can access it another way or maybe through the browser settings?

Use the uninstaller to remove it first, then reinstall.

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/141/tn_14157.html

Well, this is weird. I uninstalled Flash the way the site recommended and restarted the computer. However, when I tried to reinstall, I got the same message I did yesterday. And, to add to the weirdness, I just clicked on YouTube and the videos work again. GAAAAAAAAH.

There is supposedly some issue with Google Chrome and YouTube.

You'd think that google's browser would work with google's video streaming website.

I may have asked this uestion before but now I am hopefully asking it a little more coherently.

I'm running Windows 7 and I am using the default bakup uility to back up my C drive to an internally mounted backup drive of the same size (both 250GB) once a week. Every week I get the following error message:

"Windows backup failed while trying to read from the shadow copy on one of the volumes being backed up. Please check in the event log for any relevant errors."
And in details:
Error code: 0x8100000037

It bears noting that it does actually seem to be backing up my files.

Looking around online I find the following "solution" from Microsoft:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/973455#workaroundissue12

Now, I don't have natural technical aptitude but I'm generally capable of following diretions when something is spelled out. But this one loses me between steps two and three. Step two says the following:



Okay. The first part of that makes perfect sense. The second half mostly makes sense. I see the entries that say junction but which is the junction point? The actual place that it points to? I.e., in the following example:

<JUNCTION> My Music [C:\Users\Cliff\Music]

Is the junction point "My Music" or C:\Users\Cliff\Music? This sentence seems to suggest that the reparse point is the virtual bit:

"When a program tries to write to a directory that is really a reparse point, those files are sent (completely blindly to that program) to the other directory instead."

Step 3 makes no sense to me:



For one, I'm still not clear on which bit is the mounted volume reparse point. Also, where is this reparse point icon they speak of? Finally, when I ran the command to locate reparse points, I came up with 17 of thm. Am I really supposed to go in and inidividually fuck with all of these?

Rick, are you able to translate this into English?

Another page further down in my initial search says this has to do with MSE 2 and doesn't mention reparse points at all:

http://www.pagestart.com/win7br0x8100003701.html

I would try to disable your antivirus fist and then backup. (Don't forget to re-enable it when done!). If the backup fails still then I can look further into it.



Also, depending on how much data you have to backup, I highly recommend Mozy.

Just got a new computer! My HP was just getting attacked with viruses (I don't know where they came from and no matter how many anit virus/malware/spyware things I used it wouldn't go away), and was old to begin with, so I got a MacBook Pro. I'm looking for a nice external hard drive to serve as a backup for my files (almost lost them from the HP) and to be able to access those files wirelessly (I know Eric said something like this awhile ago that's where I got the idea). Any thoughts? Looking in between 500GB-1TB but under $150.

Drives are still a bit expensive because of the flooding in Thailand a while back. Best I can find for you is this

EDIT: Nevermind.

Thanks rick. I may get it.

Hey Rick! i have an XP login question for you.

My computer has two admins. the default and then the owner login that i use. I'm trying to get rid of the password login screen when windows starts up. I managed to get it to go away, but i can't figure out how to make my owner account the default admin that logs automatically when windows starts.

Should i just transfer all my preferences to the windows admin and get over it?

I did it!

I am Windows Champion!

A WINDOWS IS YOU

I got hit with a weird piece of malware on Thursday. Stupid me, going to a song lyrics site in FireFox. First time I've been hit in ages. I got rid of it, but I niked way more registry entries than I normally do (and on several occasions thought "hmm, should I just change these from no to yes?) I actually killed some (limited) functionality. So I decided an entire Windows reinstall was necessary. Given that I have that random reboot issue I figured I could buy a new HDD and see if that's the issue.

So I got a 120GB SSD.

And Windows dies immediately when Windows Update begins. So I had to disable Windows Update. Two steps closer to diagnosing this issue, but a really out of date Windows install.

A fresh install of Windows XP, on a brand new hard drive, dies when trying to run Windows Update for the first time? Seriously?

Windows 7.
It's been doing this over a year. I've noticed power options make it happen, too, in that it will rarely manage to sleep/hibernate without crashing. Occasionally it's a BSOD, but more regularly it acts just like I pull the power cord out of the wall - a complete unexpected reboot.

From what I'm gathering right now it may be an issue with the speed my RAM is clocked at. I finally found a thread of people with this issue, or one very close, and for many underclocking the RAM seems to work.

Wondering if anyone has any experience with the Citrix Plugin Client. I'm trying to do a practice test online and it uses the citrix client to send a simulated windows desktop to me. But when I tried to launch the simulation, the client looks like it's loading and then suddenly closes. No error message or anything. I'm trying to get it to work on IE9, as I can't find a plug in for Firefox or Chrome. Anyone have any idea what might be causing it to not work?

Try using the Citrix Receiver instead.

http://www.citrix.com/English/ps2/products...ntentID=1689163

Doesn't work. Same problem. The client seems to be loading, then it just shuts off. Works fine on the computers in school. I've tried it on IE9 on a Windows 7 64-bit machine. Tried it on IE8 with a Windows XP x86 machine. I even tried it on Windows Server 2003 running on VMWare. Same problem on all three. I'm wondering if maybe it's a firewall issue or something, as I'm thinking that'd be one of the few differences between my home network and the one through school.

Try adding the site as a trusted site in IE, also try the page in compatibility view.

Other than that I don't have any other ideas.

I did try adding the site I'm trying to launch the Citrix service from as a trusted site. Still didn't work. Though I couldn't get the client to work on IE8 at home, it does work on IE8 at school. That tells me it's not a compatability issue. Thanks for the help, guess I'll see if any of my classmates are having the same issue. My teacher just told me to fix it, not much help for a guy who's teaching a class on computer networking and windows administration.

So I recently bought a new USB Logitech headset/microphone, and whenever I use the mic there is a loud hum/buzz on the other end. I've done a lot of research and apparently it's a somewhat common issue and there is really no clear-cut solution for it. Many people say it's a grounding problem. I tried plugging it into every USB port and that didn't do anything. I've tried moving the power cable to a different plug on my surge suppressor and that didn't do anything either. I've tried messing around with every advanced properties setting I can think of.

I do know that if I touch my tower or cover up one of the USB ports with a finger, the hum gets quieter. I'm not really sure what that means in terms of coming up with a solution, though.

I'm hoping someone maybe knows more about how to fix this, because it's slowly driving the people listening to it insane.

Buy a different, not shitty headset.

Dude, this was a $40 Logitech headset.That's not cheap.