Okay, so the MP3 player idea worked great...for me. Not so well for my mother-inlaw's computer. Apparently i must have inadvertenly (my sotry, sticking to it) loaded Firefox and maybe Mozilla (maybe they're the same) and it messed up the free AVG antivirus software we had installed.
Now AVG won't update, can't be unistalled (in order to re-install it) and the video siaplay will not accept a change to it's display parameters, back to the original settings. Currently the resolution is set abysmally low, and Internet Explorer is painfull slow, and hangs up consistently.
My wife will be contacting DELL again today for more help...
Anyone able to get me out of the doghouse with some suggestions...
Louis? Bueller? Anyone...
Hasta luego...mis amigos
JD
Compuer display hooped
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Rotten Apple #1
- Rank 8
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- Joined: Sun Mar 06, 2005 5:34 am
Hello,
Sorry to hear your mother-in-law's computer is giving you trouble...
Depending on when these problems sprang up and how old the latest system restore point is, this might be a good idea. (Thanks JakeYYZ for reminding me of those.) (I could make a lenghty post or two about my computer setup and backup strategies...)
But if there is no suitable restore point (ie: recent enough without any major changes you can think of, except for the current kerfuffle), keep reading for some other ideas.
Now, I have no idea as to how Mozilla could have messed with AVG, but then again, I've seen stranger things happen. Keep in mind, I've never used this anti-virus before, so I'm not completely familiar with its features.
Have you tried running the AVG installer without uninstalling it? It might work and fix the problem. Uninstalling a program to reinstall it isn't an absolute prerequisite. Just make sure you install in the current installation's directory.
Take a look at the video card drivers, they might be the reason behind the abysmally low resolution and could be updated/reinstalled.
(Especially if its something like 640x480 256 colors; if 16 colors, could you be in safe mode?)
Reinstalling IE (perhaps sticking to 6, if pika's problems mentionned in another thread are any indicator of 7s current state) might be another lead, since its possible AVG uses some libraries provided by it.
By the way, there are three different programs that might be called Mozilla:
Mozilla "Suite" (older branch, contains a web browser, email/newsgroup client, and HTML editor, all in one package)
Mozilla Firefox, and Thunderbird, the newer branch and likely what you're referring to, being a web browser and an email client respectively. Both being stand-alone programs.
Feel free to tell us which versions of Windows, IE, AVG and Mozilla you're dealing with, as well as some hardware specifications on the computer itself (mostly the graphics card in this case).
These kinds of problems aren't always easy to troubleshoot, and you might have to resort to some sort of restore CD that came with the computer (which Dell provides iirc), but I would keep this as a last resort, given the software on it is probably outdated by a couple of months if not years, and depending on how this particular utility works, it might require you to make backups prior to use due to a hard disk reformat.
Good luck,
Louis
P.S. JakeYYZ, I like to see where the links I click on point to before using them, and services like tinyURL prevent that. Would you mind using the [url] BBCode tags instead? Such as [url=http://www.blah.com/blah]Some link[/url]
Sorry to hear your mother-in-law's computer is giving you trouble...
Depending on when these problems sprang up and how old the latest system restore point is, this might be a good idea. (Thanks JakeYYZ for reminding me of those.) (I could make a lenghty post or two about my computer setup and backup strategies...)
But if there is no suitable restore point (ie: recent enough without any major changes you can think of, except for the current kerfuffle), keep reading for some other ideas.
Now, I have no idea as to how Mozilla could have messed with AVG, but then again, I've seen stranger things happen. Keep in mind, I've never used this anti-virus before, so I'm not completely familiar with its features.
Have you tried running the AVG installer without uninstalling it? It might work and fix the problem. Uninstalling a program to reinstall it isn't an absolute prerequisite. Just make sure you install in the current installation's directory.
Take a look at the video card drivers, they might be the reason behind the abysmally low resolution and could be updated/reinstalled.
(Especially if its something like 640x480 256 colors; if 16 colors, could you be in safe mode?)
Reinstalling IE (perhaps sticking to 6, if pika's problems mentionned in another thread are any indicator of 7s current state) might be another lead, since its possible AVG uses some libraries provided by it.
By the way, there are three different programs that might be called Mozilla:
Mozilla "Suite" (older branch, contains a web browser, email/newsgroup client, and HTML editor, all in one package)
Mozilla Firefox, and Thunderbird, the newer branch and likely what you're referring to, being a web browser and an email client respectively. Both being stand-alone programs.
Feel free to tell us which versions of Windows, IE, AVG and Mozilla you're dealing with, as well as some hardware specifications on the computer itself (mostly the graphics card in this case).
These kinds of problems aren't always easy to troubleshoot, and you might have to resort to some sort of restore CD that came with the computer (which Dell provides iirc), but I would keep this as a last resort, given the software on it is probably outdated by a couple of months if not years, and depending on how this particular utility works, it might require you to make backups prior to use due to a hard disk reformat.
Good luck,
Louis
P.S. JakeYYZ, I like to see where the links I click on point to before using them, and services like tinyURL prevent that. Would you mind using the [url] BBCode tags instead? Such as [url=http://www.blah.com/blah]Some link[/url]
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Rotten Apple #1
- Rank 8
- Posts: 915
- Joined: Sun Mar 06, 2005 5:34 am
Well, yes...had the local rent-a-geek guy come by.
Right off to bat he checks to see what it's doing, and it's logging messages every couple of seconds.
The hard drive was hooped, and therefore the display driver was probably located on a bad part of the drive.
It's in the shop now.
Thanks for the suggestions guys...and taking the time to write them. (Unfortunately Missus Dangerous thought it best I not mess with anything more, figuring I was the cause).
(I'm going to buy my own laptop, then no guilt issues with destroying grandma's computer).
JD
Right off to bat he checks to see what it's doing, and it's logging messages every couple of seconds.
The hard drive was hooped, and therefore the display driver was probably located on a bad part of the drive.
It's in the shop now.
Thanks for the suggestions guys...and taking the time to write them. (Unfortunately Missus Dangerous thought it best I not mess with anything more, figuring I was the cause).
(I'm going to buy my own laptop, then no guilt issues with destroying grandma's computer).
JD
