ardi

Oops, sorry Chilifrei64 you were the first to suggest chkdsk. And BTW, I don't use anything with Semantec on the box. It used to be that Norton was a good program, but the greedy people at Semantec ruined all that. I have had to format and rebuild an entire system because of the registry tricks those morons played on me. Never again. Now Partition Magic is gone like Norton, but I'll use an old version till something better comes along from someone else.

Hey, Press Any!!! I think chkdsk fixed it. After your suggestion I ran chkdsk, but the files were still in there (invisible and unrestorable, but still ready to be emptied.) I thought nothing had changed. After reading more of the links you sent, I emptied the bin then tried again. Voila! Anything I put in there is visible and can be restored. Many, many thanks! ****, the people on this forum are amazing.

Good suggestion chilifrei64, I ran chkdsk, no errors. And the problem is not drive or partition dependant. I used to have Norton running on this machine. I wonder if that %&$# Semantec product may have messed with my registry with their "Norton Protected Recycle Bin." If you have ever seen the manual edits needed to remove their crap you will understand why I hope that is not the problem.

Thanks, Press any, but it seems to be set right. Funny thing is that there is stuff in there, it just doesn't show what and nothing can be restored.

If I put something in the Recycle Bin it disappears. Open the bin and it shows no files, but if I go to empty the bin, it says "Are you sure...delete these xxx files?" I checked the registry tweak for "Nuke on delete" and it is set to all 0's which I think is correct to leave them in the Bin. If I try to restore, nothing happens, even though it has files in there that it can delete. I'm stumped. Any suggestions?

You guys are really helpful! Thanks. I have one RD with a new LAN/router so I have to open port 3389. On another I installed SP2 and just learned that the SP2 firewall closes 3389 by default. Another one has not installed SP2, and RD is still working (the old windows firewall apparently isn't blocking RD). So one by one I'll get them all turned on again. Even though I haven't actually got them running, I'm confident that the problem is just the closed port. Unfortunately, some of these machines are a long way away and I have to either go there or talk the users through the process (groan). OK, New Question: Can I use RD with a dial up ISP? I have an old gentleman who needs a lot of help, but he is on dial up. Does his IP change every time he gets online? Could he get on, find the IP, and then let me know what it is at that time? Anyone have any experience with dial up IP's? ardi

Not stupid at all, gamehead200. Like checking that the computer is plugged in. And chilifrei64 that is a good checklist. In one case I set up a LAN and it could be that the router's firewall isn't letting me in. Some of the other machines don't make sense yet, but thanks for the suggestions. ardi

I have been using Remote Desktop for several years, and it has saved me countless hours and miles of travel. I use it mostly to help other friends with their software problems. Now I need help. The feature just stopped working, but only in one direction. I can log on to my computer from their machine, but I can't get on to their machine from my own. I have tried switching my computer, bypassed my own LAN, checked all the settings I know about, even called the Roadrunner help to see if they had done something. I'm really stumped. Could I have a problem with the operating system (XP-Pro), and would a "repair" fix anything? Since none of my other computers can connect either, it doesn't seem likely. TIA, ardi

I was already using Giant and loved it. Now MS has the muscle to maintain it with updates. They need to make it free, just like an antivirus should be delivered with the OS free. Why should users be burdened with buying all this add-on stuff that is needed on every machine. It's like buying a car, then figuring out what safety systems to add on. BTW Messenger Plus caused me all kinds of grief because they used to install hijackers by default. I was one of those unwary, trusting fools that didn't read the small print. They have cleaned up their act now, but I think it serves them right. They are still a risk.

I did a search for that program and it only exists in the Windows/System32 directory. Also ran a virus check on the C drive. Negative. If I turn off the process in the task manager, then run tcpsvcs.exe from the directory it runs for 10 seconds and shuts down. That sounds right. If I reboot it runs continuously and uses 99% of the CPU. The user is SYSTEM. Looking in msconfig, it is not in the startup tab. Those were helpful suggestions Flashcore, and I don't know anyone who has even heard of this program, but I'm still stumped.

My computer became agonizingly slow (an Athlon 2100 with 512mb RAM, Windows XP Pro with SP2). In Task Manager it shows the cpu running at 100% and something called "tcpsvcs.exe" accounts for almost all of it. I presume it is some TCP utility. If I shut off the process everything seems fine, but if I reboot it starts all over again. Disabling the network doesn't help. Checking for pests and adware didn't help. I reran the network setup wizard. The Help files don't mention it. I'm out of ideas. Anyone know what dumb thing I did and how to fix this?

Oh Hotdamn that did it! I thought you were crazy. IcemanND you did me a favor! Thanks.

thanks tguy, that looks promising, but... The command tries to connect me to the guest account (which is grayed out) and asks for the password. The guest account is turned on but there is no password or any way to add one. Is there an option in the command string that would let me in the main user account?

I find it very annoying that file sharing blocks sharing of many harmless files on the C drive. For example, if I put a document on the desktop and try to retrieve it from another computer it won't let me do it. Same with anything in the Documents and Settings folders. A workaround is to put stuff I want to share on another partition or drive, but that is a lot of trouble and I don't always know in advance what I will be looking for. There must be better ideas out there. Is there a hack or a better strategy to give file sharing more flexibility?

RESOLUTION! It's been a month, but finally the culprit was brought to justice. The C drive was occassionally tossing out bad data and the original symptom had nothing to do with the software, registry settings or anything else. The timing with the release of sp2 was just a coincidence and led me down many bad trails. New little problems started cropping up which gave me a hint. Oh yeah, natch the warranty had expired on the Quantum drive in February. Thanks to everyone who responded.

Slimbrowser. Love the tabs and flexible search tools.

That's VERY interesting, Jose. As I formatted and reinstalled, I loaded the latest BIOS from Asus, v 1011. My mobo is the plain A7V. It has Promise onboard ATA 100 sockets (I have both drives on on there) and the "conventional" ATA 66 sockets, one of which has the CD drive. ATA 100 was pretty new when I first installed this board about 5 years ago. Now the plot thickens: I formatted the C drive and loaded XP with integrated SP2. IT STILL WON'T SHUT DOWN! Even during the install, when the machine is supposed to reboot, it won't do it. Right now I'm reinstalling the old system with SP1 and it is rebooting just fine. I looked your board up, Jose, and it is a lot newer. AGP 8X, SATA, USB 2.0, etc. (And BTW latest BIOS for the A7V8X is 1014, so you are one version behind). I think I'm doomed. Maybe I'll get a new mobo, but there is not much urgency. The Asus machine is used for a specific job, streaming some data, and it is not critical to be real fast or secure. I'm just compulsive and wanted all the machines to be sp2. Thanks again.

I surrender, Microsoft. I'll format the drive and rebuild the system. It still may not work, but I've spent hours and hours already on this stinking bug. I'll let you all know if it fixes the problem. This is an old Asus board (A7V), which I've loved, and I hope that it is up to sp2. Thanks to all who responded. I genuinely appreciate your contributions. And I did more registry editing in the last two days than in all of last year.

OK, ravashaak, I enabled verbose status messages (what was I afraid of??). It gives me a little detail as it goes through the steps, but it still hangs at "Windows is shutting down." Yesterday I built a slipstreamed version of the OS+sp2 and did a complete repair. No change. (BTW the slipstream instructions on this site using nLite worked like a dream. No problems at all, and it was easy) Here is a clue: if I boot up into safe mode the software shutdown works.The problem must be in some program or hardware that doesn't run in safe mode. There is a printer, but it has been off. Audio card? There is nothing flagged in the Device Manager. Anything come to your mind that I should be looking for? thanks

ravashaak, I didn't enable verbose yet. I'm still trying to leapfrog into a solution, but that may be needed soon. I think you ae suggesting that verbose will tell me what is hanging that prevents shutdown. And MCT, your link is for repeated restarts. I just want mine to shut down, although you may be suggesting they are related, and I'll try that patch also. Anyway, first I'm going to try the MSFN slipstream instructions to integrate the XP and SP2, and then try to "repair" the OS.

Per MCT's suggestions, I set the AutoEndTasks to 1, then I found: HungAppTimeout and WaitToKillAppTimeout Changed both of them to 4000. I'm thinking these reg settings close those apps like systray.exe that stick sometimes, for reasons I can't understand. Anyway, the computer still doesn't shut down. Keep thinking guys (and gals). I need ya ardi

I haven't seen this problem reported, but maybe a Windows XP Pro expert knows what is going on here. After installing sp2, my computer won't shut down with the software controls (including keyboard power button). Restoring the machine to pre-sp2 state solves the problem. SP2 was installed with two different downloads, same result. Three other machines have not experienced this (or any other) problem. I checked the power settings in Control Panel--all looks fine. It is supposed to shut down when I hit the power button, but it goes through the "saving settings" sequence and then hangs on "Windows is shutting down." Doesn't help to go through the Start=>shutdown normal sequence. I have an Asus Mobo with AMD 1 GHz processor. Firewall is off (I have h/w firewall) and McAfee virus protection. Sure would like to get sp2 working an all my machines. Thanks. ardi

After spending a LOT of time on this, I've come full circle: I tried Ihatespam again and find it works best for me. There is a new version, 4.x, and it is much improved, catches most (90+%) spam and is easy to maintain and teach. The only thing I don't like is that it adds a toolbar that can't be shared with other toolbars. So it takes a row of real estate on my screen, but compared with the drawbacks of all the others I've tried, this is the best I can find. BTW, Consumer Reports rates spam programs this month. They like Matador best, but Spamcatcher and Norton rate highly too. You can also see what they think about antivirus and and spyware tools in this issue. While they aren't noted as the best techies in the world, at least they are unbiased.

I don't want a spam program to be intrusive, take real estate away from my screen, require a lot of settings and maintenance, be difficult to search for valid mail, or fail to catch most of the spam that comes my way. So far, the nicest programs to use have all missed most of the spam. I see ads bragging 90+% effective and have never experienced anything like that. Hope you have better suggestions and experience than I have had. ardi

Thank you neosapience, and MCT and discardme for your suggestions. I got the pop server "unstuck" by getting it downloading to a different machine. Something in the first message was hanging it. After that it is working fine again. I've never heard of Autopatcher. I'll investigate further. And before I give up on a motherboard I'll exhaust the software fixes. thanks again