Date: 12/11/07     Keywords: no keywords

EDIT: I discovered that Vista does NOT store data in the "Documents and Settings" folder, but in the "Users" folder. I can access this folder using the Bart PE live CD and from Ubuntu. I am now copying the files to the server for short-term swap space.

This post only exists now for reference to others that may need it.


I have a user.
That user uses MS Vista on their laptop.
That user claims that the machine was shut off properly last night after a evening of normal use and that nothing else was done to it.... it was just shut down normally.
The machine would not boot this morning.
It gets to the black screen with the mouse cursor in the middle and then reboots. It gets to the same point regardless of boot mode (safe mode, safe mode with networking, normal mode, last know n good and even safe mode with command prompt).
The last known file to load successfully in each case is \Windows\Systems32\drivers\crcdisk.sys
Obviously a critical file is corrupted (I suspect the machine was shut off during a de-frag or something similar.... but I am not sure).

I have tried running a windows repair from external MS windows boot disks and the internal restore partition.
I was able to run checkdisk from the install disk and several errors were found and corrected.
I have tried an upgrade installation (but I cannot do that unless I am actually running windows).
I checked the memory (2 sticks, two slots) by removing a stick and playing musical slots. Each and every time (each stick, by itself, in each slot and in both dual-stick configurations) I stalled at the same spot.
I called the manufacturer and after a couple of quick troubleshooting items (basically stuff that I told them I had already done and resetting the BIOS to default settings) they said we needed to do a system restore (not acceptable until I have tried EVERYTHING I can think of to recover the user data).

I moved on to less conventional techniques:

I first examined to see if I could easily access the drive physically. I cannot. It is deep inside the chasis somewhere and the dissassembly would void the warranty (the laptop is less than a month old).

I have tried to boot into Knoppix, but that locks up.
I ran a memory test and everything checked out 100%.
I can boot to a Bart PE recovery disk...
I ran checkdisk and everything checked out.
I can load the explorer and I can see the C drive, but I cannot get into the "Documents and Settings" folder.
I have tried to load the upgrade installer from inside Bart, but when I eject the BART disk (even using the "Eject" command) the system locks up.... so much for loading everything onto the RAM disk.
I tried to access the data through Ubuntu Live, and received and error that, through its details, told me what I needed to know to mount the drive properly. I got it mounted and, alas, the "Documents and Settings" directory is showing 0 files. Vista has hidden the files well.
I had hoped to mount the drive and dump the "Documents and Settings" sub-folder for the user onto my file server for temporary storage... no such luck.

When I mounted the drive in Ubuntu the logfile for the volume said that the NTFS volume was in use and that there was not a proper shutdown.


If I knew which file was corrupted (any way to find out?) I would replace it from a Vista system that is working.... at least long enough to recover my user's files.




Is there ANY way at all that I can recover this user's data? Is there anything I have not tried?

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/847992.html

Date: 12/11/07     Keywords: no keywords

Say that hypothetically, someone was idiotic enough to delete an important file from a USB stick and the file didn't go into the recycle bin.

Would there be anyway possible to get it back?

Thanks in advance.

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/847364.html

Date: 12/09/07     Keywords: browser, virus, spyware

I use McAfee and lately I have been getting this notice a LOT. I tried running a scan for virus and spyware. (came up clean) I also deleted my temp net files. It seems to pop up randomly. I'm not even connected to the net or have any programs running when it comes up sometimes. Can anyone tell me what is causing this and how I can stop/fix it? I know what a buffer overflow is (when a program writes information a buffer other than the memory space allocated for it) but I don't know why it is happening or how to fix it.




I have a dell dimension and using windows XP. I use firefox usually but still have IE has the default browser.

Thank you in advance!

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/847208.html

Date: 12/07/07     Keywords: no keywords

Two things

1) I have a 6 month old Sony Vaio (please, I don't need comments about how other laptops are better, this is what I have and I'm stuck with it). Lately, the left touchpad button doesn't seem as reponsive as normal..........I'll have to click two or three times before it responds. :( Is this common and how to I remedy it?

2) I really have no idea how the keyboard controls work for this, as in I know that I have the option to autoscroll pages or whatnot. Currently, when I press, say, an arrow, it goes back a page rather than navigating on the current page. I'd like to disable all the keyboard shortcuts that navigate the screen, if that makes any sense. I just want to do it the old fashioned way..........click and scroll and what not. How do I disable all the fancy keyboard shortcuts?


Thanks.

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/846605.html

Date: 12/07/07     Keywords: yahoo

Ok, in a moment of complete idiocy, I deleted the cookie folder entirely. Instead of just deleting certain cookies. I cant login to yahoo or ticketmaster (which I REALLY need to get into to print tickets that i bought!). Please please help me! Thanks so much in advance! 

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/846339.html

Date: 12/02/07     Keywords: software, browser, security, web

Firefox churns to version 2.0.0.11

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/846038.html

Date: 12/01/07     Keywords: virus, spyware

I am wanting to reformat my computer, but i have a bunch of questions I wanna ask before I go and end up screwing my computer up, lol.

1) So when I reformat it, it deletes everything that I have installed on there, correct? It wont delete the pre-installed programs that came with my computer when i bought it about a year ago?

2) My computer should have came with a windows disk, right? I have a dell inspiron b130. I bought it in september of 2006.

3) Once i reformat it, it'll run just as fast as it used to when i bought it, right? I scan my computer on atleast a weekly basis for spyware and virus' as well as defragment it. So I dont think thats why its been a slower lately.

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/845806.html

Date: 12/01/07     Keywords: web, google

Recently, I've been posting on my journal about my problematic hard drive, which seems to have had troubles getting itself read. I found out that the hard drive was dying, and so Im looking to buy a new one.

So one question I want to ask is how a hard drive dies, exactly. In my case, I have two drives, one with the OS, and another without. When I boot up the computer, I get a message saying Disk Boot Failure (and something about inserting my boot disk). The technician was telling me it was dying already because the thing doesn't seem to want to be read, but then... I don't know, I guess I just want to know why my hard drive died after only a year and 11 months. :(

Second, Can you guys suggest a hard drive brand for me, or better yet, help me weigh the pros and cons between a Seagate type and a Western Digital type? The shop near my house basically sells those two brands, and I'm not sure what the differences are, besides price. Expect both to have a year-long warranty, if that makes any difference to you guys.

Note: I live in the Philippines, so prices are a little different here. For the sake of weighing the pros and cons, assume I can afford a 320 GB hard drive of any brand.

On the video card side, I was hoping someone could direct me to the website for the Device Drivers for my ATI Radeon X550. I'm not sure what I'm looking at when I check google, and I heard something about a Catalyst driver, whatever that means.

Hopefully it'll make my gaming experience with NWN2 a lot smoother.

(xposted to the computersupport community)

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/845321.html

Date: 11/25/07     Keywords: no keywords

Hello everyone.

I guess I should start from the beginning. I had recently downloaded iTunes, and whenever I had tried to import a video onto iTunes, it failed each time. On the second try, my computer suddenly froze up with a blue screen that mentioned something about the system shutting down to save the computer from something. After a few days, from the advice of a friend who is more familiar with computers and iTunes than I am, I tried to import a video file again.

Once again, it didn't work, and the blue screen showed up. I restarted the computer and logged in. When I was on the internet, I was deleting my browsing history when the blue screen showed up AGAIN. Like it had instructed, I restarted my computer and attempted to log in.

Well, my log in to my account didn't work.

Instead, it logged me into a temporary account without any of my user profile info on it (but it's still my account - just without all of my information). I tried logging out and logging in again, and also shutting down my computer, but nothing worked.

I've tried the troubleshooting advice that the system provided (something about copying files from my account to a new account), but it didn't work. Or maybe I just didn't do it right.

None of my documents are on this "temporary" account right now, but all of my music is. None of my downloaded programs are on this account either.

I desperately need to get this fixed; I have my term project on here, school work, newspaper articles, and a whole plate of other things that I cannot afford to lose.

PLEASE HELP.

Information:

Windows Vista: Home Basic
Account type: Adminstrative

I would like to try and get this fixed without having to go to Future Shop and pay money, especially if it has an easy solution and I could do it myself.

Please keep in mind that I'm as far from a "computer person" as possible. If you do have a solution (please say you do!), would you be so kind as to explain it in the most precise and (simple) "easy to understand" manner as possible? ^.^; I don't want to get confused and accidently damage my computer even more.

Thank-you in advance.

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/844891.html

Date: 11/24/07     Keywords: no keywords

Hi,

My little sister didn't listen to me, and installed her The Sims 2 game on our laptop. It's a Packard Bell, and definitely can't handle a game like that. She noticed everything went really slow and uninstalled the game. This happened earlier this week while I was at college. Now everything is lagging, and she wanted me to do a system restore. But the calendar says there are no restore points.

I have done system restore before, and I don't understand why Windows XP seems to have either deleted them, stopped making them, or can't find them.

We have more than 40 GB of free disk space, so that's not it. I checked the properties for system restore, and nothing is wrong there. I tried Safe Mode but I had the same thing there.

Is there any way to fix this? And if there isn't a way to find my system restore points, is there a way to fix the problem without system restore?

Thanks for your time!

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/844743.html

Date: 11/22/07     Keywords: software

I have 3 full 500GB hard drives that I would like to backup. What is the best compression ratio that I can get with disk imaging backup software? If possible, I would like to avoid having to buy 1500GB of storage to back the drives up, so I do not want to make clones. What I would like to do is make a disk image of each drive and compress the image so I can store it in a smaller space and then unzip it if the need ever arises. If I could get say a 1-to-5 compression ration, I could make a 100GB disk image of each of the 500GB hard drives, and store the 3 100GB disk images on just one 320GB hard drive. Is this possible? What type of compression can you expect using disk imaging to backup a hard drive? Are there any other space-saving alternatives for backing up data?

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/844054.html

Date: 11/19/07     Keywords: no keywords

I said "deny" to something on Zone Alarm that MSN Messenger has installed, so I cannot access Messenger anymore anymore. Can someone help me? My email: yukikanou@hotmail.com

My MSN Messenger, I assume, cannot access the Net.

Thank you very much!

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/843662.html

Date: 11/18/07     Keywords: virus

Hey,
I have a BIG problem with my computer,my little brother is always downloading junk for his palm anyways from all his downloadings he has created problems like;
1.my desktop background doesn't show up and only allows me to pick a solid color has a background which is really annoying.
2.my limewire which i don't use alot but sometimes i download music anyways it keep opening/running when i don't want it to do and it downloads all these zips file which i cant be bother opening cause i don't want to see anything gross but i do delete them.
so if anyone recommends anything to fix these it would be appreciated.

p.s the only protection i have is the avast! Virus Cleaner Tool version 1.0.211.0 which i think does nothing and i have have windows XP

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/842687.html

Date: 11/18/07     Keywords: no keywords

So my boyfriend sent his laptop into Best Buy for repairs. When he got it back it began to tell him windows was not genuine. He sent it back to Best Buy, and they supposedly "fixed" it. Yeah, right. It stayed fine for two weeks and began spitting out that it wasn't genuine again.

Since Best Buy doesn't seem to want to fix the problem they've caused, we're wondering if we can avoid having to buy a vista product key. My school offers vista and windows xp "upgrade" CDs. Would using either of these on his laptop fix the genuine problem?

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/842401.html

Date: 11/18/07     Keywords: virus

Hi there!!

I'm so annoyed right now. I just had to re-install Windows AGAIN!!

I've had this problem for a while now: I can't switch my computer off because it doesn't boot-up again. It gets as far as loading Windows but then flashes a blue screen (so fast I can't see what the error message might be saying - if any) and it just restarts itself again, gets to the same point, and does it again.

I have to re-install Windows now anytime someone trips the main fuse box (which has happened twice recently - grr) or it has to be turned-off (like when I moved rooms).

Since the second time I had to do this (which was months ago coz it's been going on for ages now), I partitioned the drive so I could save stuff on one part, and then if/when I need to re-install Windows again, I could just format the other part so I wouldn't lose anymore of my stuff.

Incase anyone can give me advice, I'll post what I wrote in my Live Journal at the end of August about this:

"Well, my computer's on it's last legs. My hard drive once again decided it wouldn't complete the boot-up. Incase anyone has any advice or anything:

Today has been the 3rd or 4th time in about two months that I have had to reinstall Windows because the computer won't complete it's boot-up and logging-on.

Lastnight (as with the time before), everything was fine. My computer had been running fine, I had no viruses, no problems what-so-ever. I turned the computer off at about 3am because I was up late lastnight. This morning, it's doing the same thing it did last time, and the time before that. Sometimes it would get as far as the Windows loading bar, but then flash a blue screen with some text on it that I had no chance of reading because it would vanish so quickly and then it would reboot itself again.

Today I wrote down the things I tried before giving-in and just reinstalling it again:

From the Recovery Console on the Windows Installation CD, I used CHKDSK and it said it seemed to be fine and asked if I wanted to run CHKDSK anyways, so I did. When I ran CHKDSK /r and it got to 75% and said "The volume appears to contain one or more unrecoverable problem".

I tried FIXBOOT just incase. I tried again to start the computer and had the same problems as before and I didn't know what else there was I could do because I couldn't get online to check.

Any info and/or help would be great. I'm running Windows XP Pro.

Any ideas as to what could be causing this to happen so often?

Oh yeah! I think I should also add that when I have this problem, it won't start up from the last known good config or Safe Mode or anything. Just thought you should know."

To add, the first couple of times it did it, there were gaps of days/weeks inbetween when it decided it would screw-up again, but now (well, since sometime about a month ago) it's happening so recently that I decided not to turn my computer off.

I've been told by a few people that it's a problem with the hard drive itself and I need a new one. But I thought I'd continue asking around to see what other people think.

Thanks lots for reading!!

^_^

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/842041.html

Date: 11/17/07     Keywords: software

Ok, so I got an email about updating to the new and improved Zune software... so I did... and now it's screwed.

I just updated my software, everything is current windows wise, and when I run the software it's a bunch of lines and pink and grey fuzz, the page won't load and it doesn't work.

you can view it here to see what it's doing -

http://images32.fotki.com/v1048/photos/8/896632/4987028/ewzune-vi.jpg


How do I fix this?

Someone on the zune message board suggested updating my driver.. but I seem to have the most recent one for the VIA/S3G UniChrome IGP driver already. :( there seems to be a lot of problems with the new zune software but only one other person has had it do this so far and they haven't figured it out either.

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/841917.html

Date: 11/16/07     Keywords: web

I've got a new web camera, and I'm wondering if there's anyway to have it streaming on my site. Not my LJ, but my actual site (http://sarahsmidnightfantasy.com/tm2ts) Any ideas?

Right now, I'm just trying to figure out how to get it online, period.

Any suggestions?

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/841307.html

Date: 11/16/07     Keywords: microsoft

Hi again, my computer is tormenting me again. The first issue was solved, thankfully, but now I have another one. I think I pressed something when I shouldn't have and when the computer was loading and now these stuff happens:

A pop-up appears saying:

"The program you're installing for following unit:

CD-Rom

has not processed Mircosofts testing program to vertify its compatibility with Windows XP.

If you continue to install this program it can lead to the operative system being hurt or unstable, either now immediately or in the future. Microsoft recommends that you abort the installation now and contact the manifacturer to know if the program has passed Microsoft's [something] check."

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/840981.html

Date: 11/15/07     Keywords: no keywords

Hi,
I have a very sick computer (it feels like that anyway) and whenever I press something, sometimes a pop up comes up and says that "explorer.exe have come across an error and needs to be turned off", basically, and well... I've had it up to here *points to the sky* with 'explorer.exe' and I want to fix it. A part of me think that I need to reformat the entire computer but I don't have the XP discs etc anymore so I need to find a solution without doing that and... well...

Have anyone else experienced this problem? How do I solve it?

Edit: I heard somewhere about maybe it's something wrong with a codec that I have or something like that. Or maybe not. I can't remember.

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/840787.html

Date: 11/14/07     Keywords: no keywords

Please can anyone please help me this is the most stupied thing I've ever asked on the net, but how does someone remove the shadowy box color thingys on the desktop icons??? its a reallllllly big problem for me if you could help that would mean sooooo much thanks.
I'll stick it behind the cut so it won't take up space here

.

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computer_help/840321.html