[thechat] Not webdev related** Dell w/winME startup problems
Jorah Lavin
madstone at madstone.net
Sat Sep 27 17:49:27 CDT 2003
**I hope that computer-related but non-web subjects are accepted here. This
didn't seem like a "thelist" type topic.
If it is, tell me so gently and I'll take it there.
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My WinME Machine... two problems
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I've got two things going on with my ME machine, and I'm getting fed up.
One problem has been going on for about two years, or maybe since I got the
machine.
I dial up using the internal modem. I'm going along, uploading,
downloading, visiting sites, getting and sending email... boom, my
connection drops. Local provider claims it must be noise on the phone line.
Sometimes happens after an hour, sometimes not for 7 hours. Well, can't be
helped, thank goddess I'll be moving to RR cable soon. Problem is, I can't
re-connect to the Internet until I restart my machine. The "My Connection"
process goes fine, it LOOKS as if I'm connected to the 'net, but I'm not.
Oddly, if I deliberately disconnect, I can then re-connect with no problems...
Anyway, that is a pain, but a minor one. My machine just gets restarted a lot.
BUT...
In the last couple months, the machine has started hanging part way through
the restart process. It will start fine in Safe Mode, and will start fine
about 1-in-4 tries for normal startup, but the other 3-of-4 times, it hangs
partway through; not the same point! Sometimes, the Quicklaunch toolbar
stops loading 2/3 of the way through, othertimes the Start button never
shows up and it hangs with the desktop wallpaper showing, mouse pointer in
the middle, nothing else happening. And so on. I do maintenance every
Saturday, downloading patches, defragging with the built-in defrag software
in safemode or with Diskeeper Lite. I have tried running various Registry
cleanup tools, with no noticeable improvements or degradation in status,
and a few months ago I even re-installed the OS using the OEM disks. I've
looked at WinME sites online, nothing...
Can any of you help? Restarting and re-restarting can take up to 20
minutes... the only other symptom I can tell you about is that the machine
has almost never been happy about shutting down. When I do Start>Shut Down,
it is about 3-in-4 chances that it won't power down... the screen goes
blank but the power never shuts off.
-Jorah
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