Jeremy

Could you please provide a screenshot?

What software are you trying to use? Use WinDV anyway. 92 KBs, doesn't require installation. Make sure your videocamera is in playback mode. While it's playing back, WinDV will tell you whether it detects the device (providing that you have it properly setup in Windows).

Welcome to MSFN. And you didn't make a backup because? You can try and use some payware programs under trial mode to see if they can recover the data. R-Studio (many swear by this) FinalData (may take a full 24 hours but will be very thorough) RunTime GetDataBack (Many great things heard about this) I've used all 3 and they all do an excellent job. Your best bet after reading this post and proceeding immediately to grab a trial of one these programs is to install it on a seperate HDD or partition and stop everything you're doing... anything that would result in a write to the disk. The more times data is overwritten exponentially decreases your chances of recovering the data. For example, if you download an image and then that area of the disk is overwritten with temp/cache files over the next few days then you likely will not be able to recover it. However, if you were to have an episode of your favorite TV show (say 350 MBs worth) that gets written near the end of the drive, then is deleted but nothing is written to that area of the disk from that point onwards, then you try to recover it after maybe... 5 formats, R-Studio will likely recover the entire file for you. It's a common misconception that the larger the file is the less likely you'll be able to recover it once it's deleted and for an image you should be able to recover it a month later. It's actually the opposite in most cases depending on how many re-writes are done to that area of the disk. When I used R-Studio, it recovered Star Trek episodes I had deleted months ago on my storage drive after half a dozen formats. I had almost an entire season recovered before files started showing as being corrupt. I was flabbergasted. That's how you know. Oh, and for future reference: Make Backups!

Test the RAM with MemTest to make sure it isn't faulty.

That's why. If it happens again, just copy that file over from your source.

Slightly-more-solidifiedware. Lame? Well, I'm off to bed then if that's the case.

Article This was posted on Digg.com. I read through it and have a basic understanding of what it's implying. Pretty interesting stuff. This stuff fascinates me.

Try connecting to the PC from the PC as a loopback connection and see if you encounter the same thing. It just strange how the keyboard can trigger the connection to terminate like that.

Using RDC, yes. Have you tried UltraVNC or RealVNC?

I recommend Acronis Disk Director.

Use either FinalData, R-Studio or Runtime GetDataBack to recover the data on your flash drive. As long as you haven't copied any files to it since then the files should be recoverable. Also, the files you were copying from your flash drive in the first place should not have disappeared after you clicked Cancel. Did you try unplugging it then back in to make sure they didn't just vanish temporarily for some reason? Either way, none of the software I mentioned is freeware but you should be able to run them under a trial period. They are the only programs I know of that will scan such a device thoroughly enough to give you results.

Does the machine have any power saving settings enabled? Turn off HDD after 15 minutes? Go into StandBy after 15 minutes?

Heh. You're technically "logging in" when you RDC to a PC. Once you login locally you are terminating the RDC connection. To do both, I suggest using a third party freeware alternative such as UltraVNC. Many here swear by it. The great thing about it is if you're going from PC to PC, you can carry the UltraVNC Viewer executable with you on a flash drive and use it to connect wherever.

Sister was hot on the webcam, though. His sister, that is...

You should have checked on appwiz.cpl in system32.

If they are not there, then create them. Have a look in your screenshot you provided, directly under the one you highlighted.

Welcome to MSFN. To solve your first problem, start the LDM Administrative Service. As for your second problem, Google found me this page. For future reference, when in doubt... use Google.

Symantec Norton Removal Tool Then download Avast! Anti-Virus and Comodo Firewall. Both freeware and extremely effective. Norton is crap and causes too many problems and annoyances.

1. Burn the DVDs onto blank DVDs. DVD burners are dirt cheap nowadays. 2. Don't encode them to MPEG-1, that's an insult quality wise. Encode them to XvID AVI with AutoGordianKnot (freeware). Absolutely brilliant software! 3. Your CPU is what goes to 100% usage when encoding video so if you're unhappy with the time it takes, either get a faster CPU or schedule the encodings for when you are not at the PC.

Remove your hardware from your case and place them either on the floor on on a nearby desk/table on anti-static wrap. Do a barebone setup. PSU, mobo, CPU, RAM, boot drive and video card. Take something small made of metal like a screwdriver and find the two pins on your motherboard that are used to power the mobo and thus the rest of your hardware. If this works then it's your actual power connector. If it doesn't work, try a different PSU. If that doesn't work then it's your motherboard. It's likely just the power connector or PSU. Anything else wouldn't cause it to do nothing. You'd get beep codes.

If all your PCs have the exact same hardware, then I don't believe it will be a problem. As far as I know, even SysPrep can't bend that rule. I'm not up to par on all those security settings myself but that's how they have it setup at my workplace and I've seen our Administrator in action. When he's working you just see all kinds of access permission boxes fly by because he's so used to doing it.Either way, this file should show you more info.

When I was hired 8 mnths ago the guy who interviewed me was telling me a story how he spent 2 hours on the phone with a woman who couldn't figure out why she wasn't able to get into the Start Menu with her mouse. Turns out she was literally picking the mouse itself (physically) and tapping it against her screen on the, obviously, bottom left corner. Yeah, Ad-Aware only ever finds MRU entries and a cookie whenever I do a scan. I should try this Beta 2 out.

Doesn't the school have an Administrator that could take care of all that for you? Anyway, yes DeepFreeze would be the best option to make sure no changes can be made on the systems. HDD cloning could be done with Acronis or Ghost, though I've heard better things about Acronis and personally use this myself. MAC address and "unique PC number" is called IP address. Upon plugging them into the router or switch or whatever you use at the school, they would attempt to obtain an IP address from the ISP. As for security, if the OS is XP Professional then you can use the Group Policy Editor (gpedit.msc) to limit their access. Only allow them access to My Documents, remove Run and Control Panel from the Start Menu, disable Task Manager and Right-Click on the Desktop. Only allow launching of the shortcuts and only able to view specified websites/content. There are already enough security measures built-in to XP so you don't need extra software to work with, many people think you do and it's unfortunate because many people spend a lot of money for programs that say they do this and that when all you need is a reliable source to help you learn the OS itself.

Ah, I remembered Vundo showed up in spyware scans with Ad-Aware and Spybot. Thanks for the instructions, I'll see if that fixes it. Cheers. Edit - I downloaded the VundoFix v6.3.15 from SoftPedia and didn't even have to go into Safe Mode. It detected the following files: C:\WINDOWS\system32\pqstv.bak1 C:\WINDOWS\system32\pqstv.bak2 C:\WINDOWS\system32\pqstv.ini C:\WINDOWS\system32\pqstv.ini2 C:\WINDOWS\system32\pqstv.tmp C:\WINDOWS\system32\vtsqp.dll Come to think of it I did see those in FileMon. Anyway, it removed them and no malware has been recreated since. Thank you very much TechType.

So after a few years of going without any malware I've become infected with several dozen harmful files. Kaspersky cleaned out the lot of them except for one .DLL in system32 called vtsqp.dll. It doesn't detect it. I zipped it and sent it to Kaspersky already. However, it has a hidden attribute that I am unable to change and to my surprise I do not see it in Safe Mode or while booted to Knoppix. Unlocker shows that its tied into winlogon.exe and explorer.exe. I believe it is the main culprit as each time I reboot, new .DLL trojans are found in system32. FileMon doesn't show anything very useful. I tried MoveOnBoot, that didn't work. Sure I could format my drive or use Acronis but I want to conquer this thing old-school. Anyone have any ideas?