What Is My Problem, Besides Vista?

reply to post by TheLoony


Can you tell us the model number of your Acer Aspire ?

Can you describe the problems you are having with greater detail ?

Do you have the capacity to do a Restore of your system as mentioned by cybertoy ?

Do you know how to use System Restore that came with Windows ?

What level of experience do you have with computers and the OS ?

How long have you been using the machine ?

Did you install any software just prior to your problems ?

Do you have antivirus software running and are your virus definitions up to date?








[edit on 10-6-2009 by The Utopian Penguin]

reply to post by The Utopian Penguin


This should answer some of your questions.

EDIT- Too much sensitive information.


[edit on 6/10/2009 by TheLoony]

[edit on 6/10/2009 by TheLoony]

Originally posted by The Utopian Penguin
reply to post by TheLoony

 

Can you tell us the model number of your Acer Aspire ?

Can you describe the problems you are having with greater detail ?

Do you have the capacity to do a Restore of your system as mentioned by cybertoy ?

Do you know how to use System Restore that came with Windows ?

What level of experience do you have with computers and the OS ?

How long have you been using the machine ?

Did you install any software just prior to your problems ?

Do you have antivirus software running and are your virus definitions up to date?








[edit on 10-6-2009 by The Utopian Penguin]

I quoted you so I could have your quesions here. I'm using another computer that lets me type. Mine won't, and that is my biggest problem. Many times I don't even get to type ONE character before it disappears. I get quite frustrated and my language gets quite inventive when it takes me ten minutes to type up two sentences. That's ridiculous. Sending email, posting, whatever, it's all a pain in my ass.

I've also lost the use of the keyboard for a day or so, the scroll bar/space bar function is all wonky but that may just be a part of the keyboard and how it works. I wish I could use both to browse the forums. Other times, I have lost the internet for a couple of hours and the sound occasionally goes out. I also cannot turn it off. I go Start Menu, Shut Down and it restarts. No joke. I can, however, shut it down from the sign in page.

I use Firefox and have Cyber Defender installed in it. I don't know if CD works or not, I think it is basiclly blowing smoke up my rear, just like most of those programs, from my experience at least. The browser sometimes has crashed hundreds of times in a day. I keep restarting it and it just shuts down, even when it's only displaying a simple page like Google, very little artwork,graphics and stuff to make it crash IMO.

I've had this thing six, eight months or so. I tried to take it back to Wal-Mart but they wouldn't exchange it. They screwed me, it was a joke, but I got stuck with it. This recent spate of problems has been going on for three months, off and on, or so. It's always been a piece of crap because Vista is the computer equivalent of Satan. It's just a junky OS, even a guy like me can see that. I don't know a lot, my old XP computer, I could and did re-install the OS a few times but it eventually bit it. Why, I don't really know. I don't even know if what I was doing was the right thing with it, but I think I did go in and do the partition thing. It's been a year or so since I did that and I don't remember all I did back then. I don't know a lot about computers, obviously since I started this thread, but I'm not a ignoramus either. I can learn, I just could use someone here, in my presencve to guide me through the things I don't know.

I'm going for a interview in a while here, maybe I can get some money coming in and buy a XP disc or something, without that I don't know if the restore thing will do much. Seems as I tried it a while ago but I'm not sure, that may have been the old computer. If I did, I don't think it helped. It's no better than it has been. I could try, I suppose, see what happens. There is always the chance that a guy like me, with limited computer knowledge, can really screw something up. As bad as the thing works now, it works I don't want to get in there and make it crash altogether or just get lost in the process in a bunch of computer jargon. It could happen, I'm sure.

There is a backup/restore program listed although I know not why, I haven't used it in months and it always shows up that I have used it recently. Just another weird thing it does. Unless it's using it a=without my knowledge. Like I said, I don't know if I have used it but it would have been months ago yet it keeps popping up even though I delete it from the list.

Well, thanks to all you guys, even if nothing ever gets fixed. We shall see if it pisses me of enough one evening and I chuck it off the house.

reply to post by TheLoony


ok this is the procedure to restore your Acer.

First back up your personal files (very important)
Then ...
Make sure the power is off

Start the computer, the first thing you should see is the Acer logo.

Hold the Alt key and keep hitting F10 until the Acer logo disappears.

This boots your computer up into the Acer's recovery partition, where you can restore your Acer back to factory default settings without A disk.

Then..

Check to see which programs are trial software.

uninstall them

If Cyber Defender is trial software, you need a new AV proggie
This is AVG,there are two versions,one is FREE
it works well,updates often,and does scans and updates automatically
Free AVG


Then get all the updates from Microsoft.
There should be a link
Pay attention to the drivers first.

I hope this helps

Originally posted by mrmonsoon
Actually, you are incorrect.

Since I have loaded the linux os, I do know.

It can't use windows fat or ntfs partion's.

Linux uses it's own proprietary formatting/partion's

Thanks for the offer,personally, I like win 7.

Pretty sure that Ubuntu can read ntfs and fat filesystems just fine, in fact I've done it quite often. It can't boot of them unless you use Wubi, but most people don't need to boot off NTFS because their disc isn't fragmented to hell.
One thing is for sure, Linux's partitions definitely aren't proprietary. Linux might be the only thing that uses them, but that is probably because Microsoft and Apple would never want their software to be compatible with something that isn't theirs.

Oh, and later on you say that you had some interesting thing happen with a partition formatted by a Mac. well, my current USB flash drive was formatted by GParted, and it works perfectly with the computers around the University I go to. They all run XP.

And yes, I like Windows 7 too, but Ubuntu can run compositing window managers with considerably less power than windows 7 does. Also, windows 7 kept stopping my USB randomly.

As soon as I get a new computer though, I'll dual boot some sort of Linux and Windows 7. I say some sort because I'll be feeling adventurous and it will probably be Sabayon or Mandriva...

This boots your computer up into the Acer's recovery partition, where you can restore your Acer back to factory default settings without A disk.

I understand a partition in a closet, but what exactly am I doing by partitioning my computer? Am I putting part of it away, partitioning it off so to speak, so it is not accessible?

Then get all the updates from Microsoft. There should be a link Pay attention to the drivers first.

Updates, like the updates that I have turned off right now? That junk that always pops up and seems to be more of a problem than is needed? Sorry if I sound like a idiot, I just want to cover as many bases as possible and I might also learn something - maybe - so where am I going to find said link? Will it just pop up like MS updates do? Go to their site? Would I then have to download my drivers? What all drivers do I have? Audio/video, what else?

I am probably more confused by this conversation than I need to be. I have been told and read bunches of times to use Linux. I looked it up and still know nothing. What are the pros/cons of linux?

The best way for me to learn anything is to do it, but if I do something to this computer, as bad as it works, it may not work at all and I need it right now to look for work. I did get a temp job, enough to by a little food and pay off one bill but not enough to get a hard drive and use my friends XP disc, just go that route. That would be the easiest as far as my knowledge goes but I have been hearing this linux talk for years and now, since I have this conundrum and it needs to get fixed, it sounds like a interesting alternative. The learning curve is a little scary because I have enough knowledge to do some things, fix some problems and what not but I don't have the advanced computer knowledge to possibly hack using linux right now.

I will ponder some more. Read some more. Listen to you guys some more. The damned thing is working right now - it's let me post this with no problems and a post like this would usually take me hours to type up. At two or three characters a shot, it takes loads of time. My alzheimers patient is having a good day. Although, I did just download a couple of pictures and the browser crashed each time. That doesn't seem to be too difficult a task yet it crashed Firefox both times.

reply to post by TheLoony


In computing partitioning refers to your harddisk; each harddisk is divided into partitions and stores that list in its so-called partition table. For instance if you have a C:\ and D:\ drive, those are two different partitions. Some computer brands like to deliver their computers with a small recovery/rescue partition that does not show up as a drive in Windows, so in a way that would be a hidden partition. It would still show up on the harddisk's partition table, though. If your Acer has such a partition, you should be able to use it - it would contain the same kind of stuff an XP rescue CD would, I think.

Now onto Linux \o/ First my apologies for not even attempting to adequately explain what Linux is supposed to be. Linux itself is just a term for any OS that uses the Linux kernel. All operating systems use a kernel (Windows' is named kernel32.dll) - the heart of the OS if you will. The linux kernel is claimed to be very robust/stable. But since Linux' kernel is free, a lot of people have made their own operating system around it; all those different versions are called distributions. Some of the most popular are for instance Ubuntu, RedHat, SuSE and Debian. Ubuntu has had an explosive growth since it started a few years back as offspring of Debian; nowadays it has quite a huge community with an active forum and is therefore a great place to start with Linux. Even when I need to look up something for Debian, I often end up on the Ubuntu forum because they have way more people asking questions and giving answers. Because this has been going on for years and keeps growing, Ubuntu itself got easier and easier to maintain and is imho getting very near 'mainstream' if such a word is applicable.

The pros/cons of Linux are often a point of debate, so I'll try to stick to personal experience. For me it's great not to have those MS Updates - to me it's incredible that a computer can ask you to wait for it to shut down or boot - absolutely mindboggling. Apart from that, virus scanners and anti-spy/adware software take up a lot of CPU and resources, while I run absolutely nothing on my Debian box. Ok, so that may not be a good advise but the reason I don't run virus scanners is because like most Linux distro's, Debian/Ubuntu use software repositories where you download all your programs from. It's not something like Tucows, instead it's completely integrated into the OS itself. All software is bundled in packages, and those packages are located on the distributions' servers - all you need to do is tell your OS which package you want and it's downloaded & installed for you. Personally I like to type in console, in that case I could install blender the 3d imaging software with: apt-get install blender. That's all - installed and well. The software repositories contain pretty much everything you need - browsers (Firefox), imaging (GIMP, blender, inkscape), server software (Apache/PHP/Exim/..), programming (C/Perl/python/you name it), office software (OpenOffice writer/calc(excel)/Impress(powerpoint)/..), sound software (xmms/Audacity/rose/lmms) etc.

Since most linux distributions keep everything open-source, you can do anything to it - at the most fundamental level this means being able to code and commit your own wishes to any part, but at a more user-friendly level, this means you can change anything from the background processes running to the graphical shell you're using. Sometimes you may have a lot of choices for 1 type of software, and it's up to your flavor entirely. Hope this isn't too confusing, but basically: freedom, as in free beer (serial numbers? do they kill :O!).

I'll try and do some cons too ;]: most importantly, less people know about it. So instead of asking a friend you might have to ask on a forum, and that could take longer. If you run into problems, it would mean you have to dig in a new system, while you might be used to Windows for more than a decade. Also, companies are relatively ignoring linux. A lot of games for Windows can run on linux through Wine (easy frontend: PlayOnLinux), but this usually is slower than running a game natively (i.e. on the OS it was compiled for). Small hardware companies might ignore linux completely while there aren't enough linux developers with their hardware to develop our own drivers. Bigger hardware companies might have such complicated drivers and a negative attitude towards linux that we're not able to make our own driver. In this case, you can use the Windows driver through ndiswrapper, but the same is true for Wine - it's slower than a native linux driver. However, companies seem to get more involved - ATI started to develop their own linux video card driver installers about a year ago, for instance. Companies may allow users to publicize the linux drivers on their forum (Line6 for instance, iirc nVidia before they made their own).
Shortly put, Microsoft still completely dominates the market, so they have all the support and drivers instantly - in the Linux world, there's a lot more of a struggle. When new hardware comes out, it depends on the developers (and their budget ;]) how long it takes to get it supported, even though most older hardware and common chipsets are very well supported.

While all this might be more confusing than enlightening, I'd like to come back to the content of my first post - you can easily try Ubuntu (the most user-friendly Linux available atm imho).

[..] burn a Ubuntu CD, reboot. Voila - linux without installation! Now you can try whether you like it better than Vista or not. If you do, you can install it on your harddisk - although the system booted from CD is quite fully functional, so it's entirely up to you.

If you don't have a CD writer, you can also put it on a USB key - and maybe there's even a tutorial for floppy disks ;]. If you like it and want to install, it will create a new partition for you on the harddisk, next to the Windows partition(s) - to do that, it sizes the Windows partition down enough to make room for itself. All of that should work out just fine, leaving you with a choice at each boot, to go either to Vista or to Ubuntu.

I'm running out of characters here so I guess this should be enough whoops, sorry. If you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer!

[edit on 14-6-2009 by scraze]

reply to post by TheLoony



The instructions I provided will restore your computer to the original state it's was in when you bought it.

It is better than installing XP or any other OS.
WHY ?
The image that is there is specific to your computer !!!

There is a partition on your hardrive that has the "Vista Disk" on it.
You don't need a disk !!!!!

It's what I would do if you took it to me to be repaired.
And that costs $$$$

If you follow the procedures that I presented you, your computer operating system will be as it was when you first bought your computer .

Going to Microsoft and updating your drivers and OS will make it more stable because there are 2 service packs for vista and there is most likely driver updates as well.

As for all the babbling about installing a NEW OS ... I don't think it 's necessary YET !!!!



[edit on 14-6-2009 by The Utopian Penguin]

reply to post by scraze


Scraze ...

I can understand your overwhelming desire to convert everyone to linux,but I hardly think it necessary to lose the recovery image. do you ?

Do you believe that someone with little knowledge is going to be happy in the end,following your advise ?

Proper troubleshooting of this problem is to use the recovery image that was provided with the computer and not to take such drastic steps as you are referring to.

That is not what you have been presenting in this thread.

The goal is to resolve the issues that are present,not start Linux and computer 101 in here.

Would you agree ?

A couple of clicks and a little time downloading updates and the problems conveyed by the OP can be resolved.

Why is it necessary to confuse the issue ?

I have two things to say to OP.

1)Do what The Utopian Penguin told you to do, exactly as he told you and you will have a new computer (software-wise) again.

2) Ignore all other suggestions.
Understand everyone wants to help so much, they lose site that you just want it the way it was.

Now, for the ATS Dancers:

Originally posted by The Utopian Penguin
reply to post by scraze

 

Scraze ...

I can understand your overwhelming desire to convert everyone to linux,but I hardly think it necessary to lose the recovery image. do you ?

Nah. Also, I didn't suggest anything like it. Linux wouldn't touch a recovery partition (the first on the list).

Do you believe that someone with little knowledge is going to be happy in the end,following your advise ?

Considering his current affection with Vista, he might. Quite some people around me use Ubuntu and wouldn't even know where to shut off the Windows updates.

Proper troubleshooting of this problem is to use the recovery image that was provided with the computer and not to take such drastic steps as you are referring to.

I agree, trying to recover should always be the first step. However, nothing in my step is drastic - to the contrary. My suggestion involves three steps: 1. Download a Ubuntu CD image 2. Burn the CD image 3. Reboot the computer. That's all to get a working Ubuntu. If the recovery doesn't work, this is definitely an incredibly easy option.

That is not what you have been presenting in this thread.

The goal is to resolve the issues that are present,not start Linux and computer 101 in here.

Would you agree ?

Granted, certainly in the beginning I went a bit out of line - but if the OP asks for more information about Linux, what am I supposed to do?

A couple of clicks and a little time downloading updates and the problems conveyed by the OP can be resolved.

Even though I have done nothing to suggest the OP shouldn't try your suggestions, I will repeat: traditional recovery/rescue steps should be taken prior to trying the alternatives. If they fail, alternatives are in order..

Why is it necessary to confuse the issue ?

I realise my post was a bit lengthy, but again, the OP did ask. I don't see how such a suggestion can be taken the wrong way; clearly, the OP is having a hard time with Vista, and just broadening the horizon can't hurt in any way. As far as I know.








[edit on 14-6-2009 by scraze]

reply to post by The Utopian Penguin


Right! I did what you said, it worked. Thanks so very much for pointing me in the right direction. I just wanted to get rid of Vista but it's not going to happen right now, hence the questions about linux and all that. Scraze explained it a little better than the wiki page, so I am grateful.

I will eventually get rid of the evil that is Vista. I'm not sure what I will do but that's not a question for now. As far as I can tell this thing seems to work. So far, we shall see.

Thanks to all! The process was rather simple actually but I wanted a second(or third, fourth, etc.) on what I was doing.11

reply to post by TheLoony


Awesome TheLoony, I'm glad it worked.

Now,if you have problems,you know how to restore your system

Maybe we all will get to participate in a Linux thread as well when your ready to tackle the linux world (looks for a tux icon....)

Now your computers working, you can spend some time reading up on linux.











[edit on 14-6-2009 by The Utopian Penguin]

Yeah, there's the thing - I spend way too much time reading ATS and not reading about computers.

It's either really funny or really sad. I can tell you more than you would ever need to know about the Voynich manuscript but it means squat because no one can read the book. Meaningless crap I spent a weekend studying. Although I have taken a interest in the library being as it's so close and picking up things like Jim Marrs books to read is quite cool, so maybe a computer book is in order.

You guys know of any sites that have info that can be understood by a layman? Many sites expect a modicum of knowledge that I lack, so it can be hard.

reply to post by TheLoony


LOL you may want to start a new thread TheLoony....

The great thing about linux is there are many flavors to choose from and
some have a feature in which you can run it from the CD before installing them.


Here is a few links to get you started

...Get to know Ubuntu for beginners...

...the Ubuntu Website...

I have not had any problems with Vista, i have Vista Ultimate. You can make programs that have problems in Vista run as though they were running in XP......I just don't understand why people have so many problems with Vista. maybe it's because you bought an Acer from Walmart! I have a Dell....custom built from the factory.....you get what you pay for!