Years ago I was really good on computers, but that was the days of the Commodor 64. I just got this one in Feb. and now I think it is possesed. I just don’t know what is going on. It is a Gateway computer and it has windows 98, for the first few monthes it ran fine, now it’s a mess. When you turn it on it is supposed to make music, sometimes it does, sometimes it dosen’t, sometimes if I restart it 4 or 5 times it will begin to make music, stop and then do it again. Sometimes it will freeze up completly, it won’t respond to anything, I hit ctrl-alt-delete, nothing, I can’t get it to shut down, and then even though I know I’m not supposed to I push the button to turn it off and IT DOSEN’T TURN OFF. At that point I have to crawl behind the thing to pull the plug. Other times I will try to shut down and the windows screen will come on to tell me it’s shutting down but it never does, I once waited an hour and it didn’t do anything. So is there anyone that can tell me what is wrong ?
Usually problems like you described come from either
botched driver updates, or a piece of software that alters something it shouldn’t.
Can you be any more specific on the problems you are having?
Call Gateway their tech support is very friendly. I got my computer through them and I’ve never had any problems. I’ve know people who have used their support and they say it’s pretty good. So you should really get ahold of them and maybe they can straighten it out for you.
I’m not really sure what a driver update is. The problems started with some CD’s for my kids. After that it just seemed to get worse. I’m not sure what kinds of details you are looking for, if you tell me I’ll let you know what I can. I really don’t understand computers much.
Most computers nowadays require you to press and hold the power button for a few seconds before it’ll turn off. Just pressing it once and letting go immediately doesn’t do anything.
WIndows 98 Second Edition has shut down problems sometimes.
There is a patch available from Microsoft. After installing it, my PC shuts down properly about 75% of the time. I just wait a few minutes to be sure that disc drive acitivy has stopped and pull the plug.
START
SHUT DOWN
RESTART
and then back to
START
SHUT DOWN
SHUT DOWN
is a major pain in the neck but never fails.
You probably have a lot of temporary files since you’ve had to shut down that way. They are bad. Go to
MY COMPUTER
C:
PROPERTIES
DISK CLEANUP
and get rid of them.
You can also run TOOLS from there and check for errors.
There are a lot of things that can make a computer go funny after a while. You can lump them into two catagories, software and hardware. So, the question you need to answer is whether the problem is in your chips or your dip.
Software problems can be caused by a number of things, such as an incorrectly installed driver, a piece of software that got corrupted for whatever reason, the presence of a virus, etc.
Hardware problems could be as simply as the memory or processor has become slightly unseated, and taking the little buggers out and putting them right back in might just fix the problem. Could be a similar problem with the disk drive cables, or other bits of hardware in the system such as I/O cards. It could also be a problem with a component that is actually broken, like possibly a defect that has developed inside one of the many integrated circuits inside the computer. It could also be heat. If the CPU has a fan and the fan no longer works, once the cpu heats up it can do all kinds of weird things. Heat problems typically show themselves some time after startup, so the computer will run fine for a minute or two and after that may display some bizarre behavior. Heat problems with something like a graphics chip might only show up during heavy 3-D gaming. Because most of the guts of a computer are interconnected, a heat problem with just about any chip can cause problems for the entire system.
Many power supplies will force a shutdown if you hold the button for 10 seconds. For some strange reason nobody ever bothers to document this, and its only us computer weenies that are aware of it.
Just keep saying to yourself “Microsoft sucks! Microsoft sucks! Microsoft sucks!” It doesn’t accomplish anything, but it makes you feel a little better.
It’s amazing how they sell so many copies of Windows - I can only attribute it to their monopoly and their marketing effort.
It’s just astounding that I have to shut down my computer every 3 hours or so because of some glitch with Windows or some supposed Windows-compatible software.
I was just having similar problems with Windows 98. Recently they got worse, and I’m now in the process of upgrading to Windows 2000 … and probably eventually adding Linux. However, I had the case open and saw that the CPU fan had stopped spinning. The overheated CPU could be to blame for it hanging. I still think some of the trouble was Windows 98 though. My strategy with Windows OSs is reboot once a day, reinstall twice a year.
So do you think those disks the kids programs on were virus free?
To bad you did not buy a Compaq. You could insert your restore disk, sit back and watch your computer go back to its original configuration.
I am sure to be admonished for advocating Compaq. I think they make a good product.
That happens to me when I have numerous windows open in both IE & Netscape. I have to hold the shut down button for 4 seconds, it seems. (Feels like an hour).
Also had that problem in the halcyon days of Napster.
Most PC companies provide software to do that.
Consider yourseld admonished. Compaq fellates with great allacrity. I’m getting ris of them as fast as I can.
At the office, we’ve discovered this little gem of knowledge. But I’m not at the office now, nor am I on a win98 machine (I’m on Win2k, which makes things a bit different. Plus the machine is locked down pretty tight) so I’m going to do the best to remember how to fix the problem.
ah, nevermind, I’m going to go to Microsoft’s support article and tell you what to do from there.
Right click on your My Computer Icon. Select Properties. Click on the Device Manager Tab. Click the little plus sign next to System Devices. Look for a device labeled PCI Bus. Double click it. Click on the IRQ steering tab. Unclick the box labeled Use IRQ steering. click ok, and ok, and as many other oks or closes as you need. It’ll finally ask you to restart. Do it.
When the system reboots, you’ll see it finding a bunch of devices. Just let it. It may ask you to reboot again after it does that. If so, do. If not, right click on My Computer, click on the Device manager tab, and see if it looks right (ie, there are no devices with an exclamation mark next to them. Also, if everything’s cool, you shouldn’t see any of the drop down menu’s open.)
Occassionally, this procedure will create an IRQ conflict, but most of the time it doesn’t (like it’s only happened to me once, and I do this procedure a lot). If it does, you’ll probably have to play around with the IRQ settings in the bios or just in device manager.
I thought people bought Gateways because of their great, personal tech support plans. Since the computer is less than a year old, you should definitely take them up on that offer. They might end up telling you to format and reinstall, but at least they will be obliged to walk you through it.
be careful doing things like what tattva suggested (not that tattva is wrong in the least) because not all machines running Windows are running Windows in the same way, especially companies that pre-package everything like Gateway.
Most of the tech support people I know say over and over that the people who are hardest on their computers are the ones who know enough to try to be bold enough to screw with things. Since it might take you years to get above that level (i’d say i’m below that level). Just consider yourself a novice and call up tech support before you do some irreversable damage. That is what you paid for with your Gateway.