%#@$! I hate computers...need some help!

Do you have a reputable computer store near you?
You may have to take in. . . . .
My son is great with computers, but there's been a time or two when we had to let the experts deal with it.

I have 2 Gateways. Never again will I buy one!!!

We've had our share of problems. . . . . the worst was a virus that my daughter brought home from college. . . . . her computer literally died. We had to have the hard drive copied onto CD (by the comp. store). . . . and then my son had to reinstall everything. . . . if I recall he had to use DOS!
It was very complicated.

Laurie

Yeah...Norton's updates automatically for me & I just ran a virus scan which came up with nothing.

I'll try that download & see what happens.

Also-
When you get your CD Rom working again. . . . go buy yourself the latest virus scanning program. . . you have to buy new ones at least once per year because they are ever changing.

We have McAfee. . . . my son highly recommends it.

Originally posted by George'smom
Do you have a reputable computer store near you?
You may have to take in. . . . .
My son is great with computers, but there's been a time or two when we had to let the experts deal with it.

I have 2 Gateways. Never again will I buy one!!!

We've had our share of problems. . . . . the worst was a virus that my daughter brought home from college. . . . . her computer literally died. We had to have the hard drive copied onto CD (by the comp. store). . . . and then my son had to reinstall everything. . . . if I recall he had to use DOS!
It was very complicated.

Laurie

Click to expand...

Yeah, we do...but they rip people off. They're the only ones in town, so they got the bull by the horns. Plus it costs a fortune to bring it to them...$55 a hour!

Originally posted by George'smom
Also-
When you get your CD Rom working again. . . . go buy yourself the latest virus scanning program. . . you have to buy new ones at least once per year because they are ever changing.

We have McAfee. . . . my son highly recommends it.

Click to expand...

I just bought Norton's 2004 last month, so it's updated.

Thanks for your help though!

Not all reinstalles have to be done by computer store experts you just reinstall on new hard drive and then copy info from your old hard drive. Shell did you reconnect the cdrom after gateways dianoses if so new hardware wizard may help.

I reconnected it like they told me to, but I didn't get a new hardware wizard after I did that.

Shell I know quite alot about computers but im stumped on this lol hope you get is all sussed sweetie

sam

Thanks Sam! Love ya!

Ryan, I tried downloading that antitrojan thing & the site is down for maintance. I'll check it out tomorrow & see what I find.

Big thanks to Ryan & Spidey for all your help tonight!

New hardware wizard is not the only way the computer finds and installs new hardware it should find it at startup. If drive is bad nothing will reconize it. Norton antivirus 2004 was a good buy I use internet security pro it does it all blocks ad,spam control,personal firewall to keep the bad thing out and productivity control to keep unwanted websites from poping up

Ryan, I tried to download the Anti Trojan, but it's still unavailable. So I downloaded Trojan Guard & it instantly said I had a trojan on my PC. So far it hasn't locked up or anything...but it's only been a few minutes.

Sounds like you nailed it!

I've had several instances where I've had a trojan horse virus, and I never had to clean off the hard drive. I was able to delete the virus' myself, although that is a tricky thing to do. Find out the name of your virus, and then go to the Mc Afee site, and they will tell you word for word how to uninstall a virus. A virus is nothing more than a program, however it's a program that is meant to mess up your computer. To get rid of it, you have to uninstall it. The problem with these tojan horses, is that they install in your "system" files, and if you don't follow the instructions exactly, you will have some problems, and will probably have no choice but to clean off your hard drive.

If your hard drive is bad, I'd quickly try to save what I wanted to keep on floppy, since you don't have a CD rom, because it will end up crashing.

Well..this hunkojunk is still freezing up. I've finally decided I'm not going to mess with it until I get my CDROM & then I'll just wipe everything clean to start over.

I'm just tired of dealing with this....along with everything else that's happening right now! MY GOD...this stress is KILLING me!

Thanks everyone for trying & giving me suggestions. I do appreciate them all!

Hey Shell, I'm glad you got onto something there with one of the anti-trojan programs. All I can do is sound like a broken record and say, "download more stuff like it." If you have any patience left, I recommend trying more anti-trojan and anti-virus software that allows you a free trial. If possible, try to get the very latest update from the web site of the companies who make them.

Whether you wait and do a wipe, or download more stuff, I recommend a program that will help you prevent further problems: Zonealarm. The free version is the best of its kind and even better then most big names. You can download it at www.zonelabs.com Updating your browser software would be a good idea too, as some malicious programs exploit older versions. Tighter security settings for your browser may also prevent some trouble.

Originally posted by Hydroaxe
Hey Shell, I'm glad you got onto something there with one of the anti-trojan programs. All I can do is sound like a broken record and say, "download more stuff like it." If you have any patience left, I recommend trying more anti-trojan and anti-virus software that allows you a free trial. If possible, try to get the very latest update from the web site of the companies who make them.

Whether you wait and do a wipe, or download more stuff, I recommend a program that will help you prevent further problems: Zonealarm. The free version is the best of its kind and even better then most big names. You can download it at www.zonelabs.com Updating your browser software would be a good idea too, as some malicious programs exploit older versions. Tighter security settings for your browser may also prevent some trouble.

Click to expand...

I totally agree with Hydroaxe a personal firewall will keep bad thing out just be careful some antivirus software will conflict with each other. Norton Antivirus 2004 is pne of the better ones plus allways keep Microsoft updates installed

It might be your video card or faulty RAM, actually. I'm surprised no one has mentioned this.

A while ago my power supply caught on fire and it burned a whole bunch of stuff like my motherboard etc. My video card still worked but would cause my computer to freeze up a lot, especially when I looked at flash etc. However, a lot of the time it would freeze up for no apparent reason. Buying a new video card fixed the problem.

Video cards aren't extremely cheap but, depending on how old yours is, I'd bet that was the problem. If not, I'd say it's most likely RAM.

Your faulty CD-ROM should have nothing to do with this. If your computer doesn't recognize it, it won't do anything except not work. It isn't imperative to the operation of your other computer peripherals. As someone previously mentioned, it could be bad blocks on your harddrive but they tend to give more signals before the crap out and you said scandisk showed no problems.

Good luck.