Hmmm, I’ll be walking back toward 34th tonight after work—lemme find a good meeting place. If nothing else, there must be a Starbucks or an Au Bonne Pan!
… No, it’s Manhattan. There must be a pizza joint with several of the words “Famous” “Ray’s” “Original” “Pizza” in the name, in some random order. As it happens, there is… not that I suggest we meet there.
I’m rather sure warranty will not be void if the case is opened.
Atleast I don’t think so. I build my own PC’s so I’m not upto date on the main brands and their warranty practices.
But to do so is inconceivable to me. What happens when you want to upgrade?!?
Eve, what do you use your comp for? I’m thinking Windows XP pro might be a better way to go than Win 2K.
. . . You forgot “Papaya.”
I already have Windows XP; I use it for writing and researching.
I now know what I really want to be when I grow up…
E-Sabbath.
MemTest86. Never leave home without it. Well, unless you’re going fishing or something. Then I guess you wouldn’t need it.
Can’t vouch for this one, as I’ve never tried it, but a quick search turned up Hot CPU Tester Lite, which, according to the page, “tests the CPU and motherboard for errors.”
My second computer is really finiky when it comes to loading operating systems. No problems with Windows XP, Linux, BeOS, or FreeBSD, but it BSODs or crashes on other versions of Windows. I don’t get it.
I have a friend with a HP laptop that had the same problems you’re experiencing: it would load the OS, and then stall when there wa a few minutes left in the installation. Apparently, there was a problem in the BIOS, and HP issued a recall.
There is a starbucks on 34th between Broadway and 7th or 6th ave (not sure which one). It’s right by Penn station.
I now know what I really want to be when I grow up…
E-Sabbath.
My second computer is really finiky when it comes to loading operating systems. No problems with Windows XP, Linux, BeOS, or FreeBSD, but it BSODs or crashes on other versions of Windows. I don’t get it.
I have a friend with a HP laptop that had the same problems you’re experiencing: it would load the OS, and then stall when there wa a few minutes left in the installation. Apparently, there was a problem in the BIOS, and HP issued a recall.
There is a starbucks on 34th between Broadway and 7th or 6th ave (not sure which one). It’s right by Penn station.
Worth a shot.
Yes, I know you have XP, Eve. Kinthalis does have the good point of “Are you running XP Pro or XP Home?” There’s some significant differences, mostly in reliablity.
Kinthalis: As I said I’d be wiping it anyhow, I figured I’d use the less candy-coated version of the OS to do the tests with. A different operating system also might cure the issue Eve has… we’ll see.
Neutron: By god, MemTest86 is still around! Yeep! That’s a name back from when I was using Norton Commander for a desktop and Turbo Pascal as my text editor.
Perfect, as we’ll be taking the PATH train (at 6th and 34th) to Hoboken, then NJ Transit to my place. Oh, Oxymoron may be joining us as well!
The hard drive is already back to Zero; it just won’t seem to accept the “rebuilding” CD. Everything was fine with it till last week . . .
My second computer is really finiky when it comes to loading operating systems. No problems with Windows XP, Linux, BeOS, or FreeBSD, but it BSODs or crashes on other versions of Windows. I don’t get it.
I have a friend with a HP laptop that had the same problems you’re experiencing: it would load the OS, and then stall when there wa a few minutes left in the installation. Apparently, there was a problem in the BIOS, and HP issued a recall.
I don’t know that I’d put a lot of faith in Toshiba. My Toshiba hard-drive failed awhile back. I called the company, and the guy on the phone was about 5 minutes into diagnosing my problem, when the questions got too tough for him and he admitted that he actually worked in the Appliances dept. and they were sending the overflow calls from tech support to him. Gee, that’s great - I’ll let you know when my washing machine breaks, asshole.:rolleyes:
I’ve seen this before… just can’t remember how I fixed it.
My guess - it’s not the memory or motherboard - those aren’t usually the things that break on laptops. I’m guessing either a scratched CD (does it always die at the same point?) or the BIOS power management suspending the machine because no keys were pressed in 20 minutes or something.
Try going into the BIOS setup screen and turning off all forms of BIOS power management before starting the install. Keep the laptop plugged in throughout. After the install is done you can set everything back how you like it.
Good luck!
When installing WIN98 I used to have a similar problem which drove me nuts: the computer would just hang at a given poit, always the same one. The problem was I had set the “master boot record virus protection” in the BIOS which would prevent the OS from completing installation. I used to forget and it would take me several tries until I would finally slap my forehead and remember to change the bios. Windoze would just hang and not give any error message.
Worming your computer. Now I’ve heard of everything!
Eve, do you think, just maybe, your computer took a hint from all of those obit threads you start and headed for the harp farm on its own?
I really hate to say this, but I went to M/S today, to check on updadtes, (which I had done on 8/14/03) and there were two new ones, 1 for IE and 1 for XP - both are designed to stop attacks from net turds. Then I stopped by symantes, and go figure, there is yet another worm, this one discovered 8/18/03. (this one is strange, it is cleaning up the mess of the msblaster worm???).
Anyway, you’ll better head on up to Redmond and fill up on updates, then stop by the AV place of choice and update there too.
I’m a New Yorker, but am I a Doper? Heh. I dunno.
Anyway, definately sounds like a Bios issue to me if it happened right after the virus: some worms/viruses can actually screw with bios things in Windows (don’t you just love running as, basically, root all the time?), and take great pleasure in doing so: it’s one of the hardest things for a non-tech-support person to identify and deal with. So I wouldn’t rule this out, and E-S will surely root around in there for something along those lines.
I am so depressed by technology these days: I want it to work so badly, but the more powerful it gets, the more pathetically vulnerable it is to one of millions of different problems. I just spent 4 weeks trying to get my DSL up and stable, and i THINK I’ve narrowed it down to my somewhat ditzy apartment current. I’m building a new computer for the next gen of games soon, and I just dread my thousand-dollar + creation simply not working. If so, then I’m gonna have to call it quits, maybe go dig some more wells in Nepal or something.