MSNwar

Your PC crashes and hangs because Starband's technology is technically different from the standard internet protocol 802.1 that XP is built on. You may access the internet through your sat and surf almost like anyone else using a standard dial-up connection with limitations. The limitations are listed at starband.com in the FAQ sections for your reference. Switching user accounts sends a string of scripts to your sat system that cannot be authenticated using the 802.1x protocol. For now you have to live with it until starband applies a software patch in XP and the modem's firmware. The good news is Microsoft is one of the three major shareholders of StarBand meaning a solution may be forthcoming. Maybe! http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?...&ID=KB;;q311787 is a Microsoft Knowledgebase Article with a brief technical explanation that may be of help to you. Your system may also need more time to shut down processes when switching user accounts. How-To is found here http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;;q305788 Keep in mind that XP executes an automatic restart in the event of a system failure. This is logged in a file and you are asked if you would like to report it to Microsoft. Disabling the “restart on system failure” feature may permit the exact cause to be isolated: Right-click on My Computer, click Properties, click the Advanced tab. Under “Startup & Recovery,” click Settings. Under “System Failure,” uncheck the box in front of “System reboot.” Hope this helps. MSNwar - The FatMan

http://modemsite.com/56k/connectoid.asp?sc=10%3A44%3A13+AM Hope this helps. The key is in the properties of the DUN. Just remember to configure each work stations settings. MSNwar - The FatMan

Defrag with Diskeeper went a lot faster this time. On a FAT32 it took about 15-20 minutes to defrag about 5 Gig of data and 5 Gig of empty space. The results were zero defragmentaed files. This was the third defrag of this drive and it was in pretty bad shape before the process. I think Diskeeper gets faster with time. I still plan to convert to NTFS within the next day or two. MSNwar - The FatMan

Fixed. Turned out to be a bad stick of RAM and a bad power supply. Thanks for all the help. MSNwar - TheFatMan

All the answers are in the Help File. Just click the Help button in the Config Utility. The content is then related to the config applet. I use the System Restore Utility when I make changes to the registry so I can go back to the original settings. You may also want to create a unique user account just for making changes to your system wherein the unique settings will load automatically. This feature is not found in WinME and Win98 and is worth the effort. When you are content with the changes simply impliment the changes to your admin account. MSNwar - The FatMan

Welcome to the board Strat4Play. Hey Big Booger, just mail your HD to me, I'll defrag it for you, and have it back to you in less than 9 hours, lol. Yea, I have the same prob with defrag (slowww). Today I might convert it all to NTFS and see if that makes a real difference. Originally, the HDs were NTFS, but the slowww defrag was p***ing me off, so I switched back to FAT 32 when I reformatted. Maybe thats my problem, too many formats from FAT 32 to NTFS and back. But, I gotta play! Something to do anyway. MSNwar - The FatMan So many women...so little time.

http://gamespot.com/gshw/stories/flat/0,12...2842650,00.html GameSpot has an excellent step-by-step article with nice photos and instructions for beginners interested in building your own PC. MSNwar

I agree with Conan. Also consider that many of the posts are made by experienced computer users that use tweaked browsers as well as tweaked systems. Nothing really surprises me more than to hear from someone (private emails) that their system is slow when they installed a heavy laiden application (Microsoft Office with everything on it) on a PII 266 or less. Web surfing is not only slow when lines are busy but also when a the PC cannot keep up with an open browser, three or four web XXXsitesXXX loading, messenging, and a game session. All connected to a scanner, printer, running on a system with a video card that uses system RAM, etc. A minimal of a 1 GHz system with 256 Mb RAM running XP is my recommendation if/when a person decides to do all of this at once. If the specs are out-of-your-budget then consider the XP User Interface options. Configure at least one User configuration with only bare bone resources running on a low end system by excluding M$ Office (Use Wordpad instead for saved notes), disable the scanner and other external hardware devices in the User configuration for starters. Replace any video card that relies on system RAM and graphic sites performance will improve to your benefit. The list could go on and on but you get the idea. MSNwar - The FatMan

My SB 16 works okay. I hear her say ooh and ahh. What else is there? MSNwar - The FatMan

I start my browser (IE) and it loads fast. Everything works not matter what. After paying $200.00 for XP I think the broswer should be free anyway. Wouldn't it be another pain in the backside if we had to install a browser after installing an operating system considering the money spent on the operating system. Not to mention the time it takes to install a browser and all the personal selections like skins, search engines, etc. MSNwar - The FatMan

Slowww. Like 3 hours plus for 5G. When I ran Win98SE I used the defrag app from WinME and that was really fast. Got that lil tip from nagbusterscom. I defraged my 5G in like 30 minutes. Now It takes 3 to 3.5 hours. I started using Executive Software Diskeeper and it takes the same amount of time ( 3 to 3.5 hours), but does a better job. Does anyone else experience slowww defrag on XP? MSNwar - The FatMan

Creative Labs...any flavor will do. They always work and work and work. Reminds me of my first girlfriend. Never stopped sounding off till I ...well found a way to keep her mouth busy. Seriously, I like the green cards with all the chips on em. MSNwar - The FatMan

All good answers from some very experienced techies! Heres what I would do (he): 1. Prepare for some hardware and software work (roll up your sleeves and grab a six pack). 2. Install only one stick of RAM in the Number 1 RAM slot (refer to the mobo book or just place it in the slot closest to the CPU). Remember, you can add the other stick later. Take long slug of that beer. 3. Power-up that bad boy and see what happens. If it crashes again, power-down and replace that stick of RAM with another one in the same slot. Power-up once more. Take another long slug of that beer. 4. If the machine crashes again start saving data and anything else important to you saved somewhere other than on the dard drive (to the best of your ability). Forget the error messages at this point because we are going to eventually wipe the hard drive and start all over with a clean installation of Windows. More beer and start thinking about pizza delivery. 5. That was a long stressfull process. So take a break with the first available babe and release some tension. 6. You already updated the BIOS so ... Grab that hard drive utility and fdisk/format using the auto options to install Windows on NTFS (recommended) or 32bit file structure. Now we have a nice clean hard drive to work with. Pizza should be there by now and that six pack needs replaced! 7. Now install WinXp. You have a few installation choices depending on your edition of WinXP. a. If it is the full version then you can boot from the WinXP CD. Power-up and enable boot from CD-ROM in the BIOS setup, i.e. CD-ROM, C, A or CD-ROM, A, C. Your choice. Remember to change it back later. Save and exit the BIOS setup. The PC will eventually message out that an operating system is not installed (something like that). Insert the WinXP CD into the CD-ROM drive and power-down the PC. Power-up again and the WinXP CD will start the installation. Have Fun, Have More Beer, and get back to us. b. If your WinXP edition is the upgrade you can either install your previous operating system and upgrade to WinXP (NOT RECOMMENDED). You already know how to do this. c. If your WinXP edition is the upgrade you can perform a Clean Install. BIOS boot sequence should be A, C, CD-ROM. Boot from a Win98SE boot disk with CD-ROM support, Run setup.exe from the CD-ROM, and have your previous windows operating system CD handy for varification. There are other ways to perform a clean install and these forum members know them all. Wait for them to expound on the methods and maybe you will choose something else. Don't forget to install the extra RAM. But wait after 10 boots or so to see if the error messages plague the system. If so, replace the bad stick with another of the same specifications. Now install you applications - but defrag after you install any major mellons. Keep the hard drive tidy. Your page file was corrupted previously and running system clean-up and system tools as previously suggested sometimes has its good points. Keep that in mind. WinXp on an Athlon system is very picky about RAM so don't mis-match or use cheap RAM. Cheap women cause fewer problems and I highly recommend them. MSNwar - The FatMan Note to forum members: Please take it esy on me cuz I learned most of it from you anyway:D

What about hackers? I kind of stay away from open source code products that allow a hacker to "customize" open source code applications. Could a person slip a customized floppy into a PC that invokes mayhem with open source browsers? Could WinXP Remote Assistance be an avenue to "customizing" open source applications? About the dialing thing. Any good Internet Service Provider (ISP) provides a "Dialer". It is usually downloaded from your ISP Support Site and is used to connect directly to the internet. Telephone or surf to your ISP web site and obtain the dialer if available. For me, this is the easiest method. MSNwar - The FatMan

Time to clean the pizza and beer outta the keyboard? Look closely at the keys and see if anything is lodged in between the board like a paperclip or something like that. Is it a new board? Just bought it? Try connecting another board and see if the problem exsist. If another board works fine use it and return the other for a replacement or refund. If you bought it from a retail store have the sales person connect it to a PC to make sure it works before you pay for it. Been messing around with windows accessibility options? If so, revisit the options and check to make sure you did not disable any keyboard functions. MSNwar - The FatMan

I build 'used' PCs daily and have learned a few tricks that come in handy when rebuilding a PC. Maintain at least one tower with a good power supply, a two foot power cable that connects to the motherboard, and 18 inch cables for the floppy drive, CD-ROM, hard drive, etc. Atop a work bench, place the mobo with CPU on an antistatic mat (important). Install a cheap plug-n-play video card, RAM, connect the mobo power cable, and power up the PC. You can then troubleshoot almost any configuration problem without being forced to remove or reinstall components (espically the mobo) and prevent handling damage. Cases that have been moved (transported in vehicles without packaging) are prone to loose connections, espically the power cable from the on/off switch to the power supply. I always examine the cable first when the power supply tests operational, yet there is no power to the power supply fan. A cheap 15 cents connector is usually the problem. At times the cable may just be loose and needs a solid push to seat it porperly. Important...this little connector can also be seated correctly when the case is turned upright...when the case is laid on its side the connector can come loose. That is why sometimes the system powers up and sometime it does not. Just depends on the method a technician builds his machine. MSNwar - The FatMan

I think Chris just needed a lil time to repent? Welcome back :blueteam MSN

http://www.pcmag.com/article/0,2997,s%253D...53D18410,00.asp PC Magazine reviewed some nice desktops but this one stands out. It is the SYS Cold-Fusion 1866 SE and is cooled by freon. Here is a nice photo of the interior.

This is the best I could come up with: http://www.cray.com/company/h_systems.html The Cray Site does not show any internal photos of the machines, but I do know for a fact that the plasma ran through the circuitry which was mostly placed on the bottom of the structure. The only one I have ever seen with my own eyes was stripped down in maintenance, located in a government laboratory, and studied by MIT fellows. When word leaked to me of its properties I just had to see it for myself. At the time I think I was one of maybe only 100 people with access to the area. Even then I was sneaked-in for a quick look. The only computer I had ever seen before that was old NEC mainframes and custom made beta machines and parts that NARPA would have drooled over. We are getting closer... MSNwar - The Fat Man

Didn't find a photo but here is a link with an ecerpt, http://www.ed-thelen.org/comp-hist/example-tour.html You have to scroll down and thsi is what you will find: Have a look at this machine here, the red and black one. This is a Cray-2, it came out in 1985. This costs $19 million (nineteen million dollars). And the neat thing about this was immersion cooled. So he is no longer using freon, he is actually dunking all this circuitry into this fluid - fluorinert - here is a jug of it. It weighs 44 pounds when to is full so it is a very dense fluid. fluorinert is a really weird fluid - it is used in surgery - in operating rooms as a > blood plasma substitute.< If the surgeon can't type your blood in time and you are going down, he will pump you full of this to keep your blood pressure up because it has very good oxygen carrying capacity. Also it is non-conductive so that makes it pretty unique to - there are not a lot of non-conductive fluids around. MSNwar

Ever seen the 'old' Cray's cooling system? Blood Plasma! No kidding. If I find a link I'll post it. MSNwar - The Fat Man

and what is he doing with his other hand? and which finger is he holding the CD with? and has this sighting been confirmed by The National Enquirer?

Sincerely sorry to receive this news. Thank you for your help; past and present. Best wishes to you and yours. It is easy to find a lover...but harder to find a friend. MSNwar - The Fat Man

The problem is fixed. It was the duplicate Universal Serial Bus Controller devices. We disconnected the hub and connected the modem directly to a USB port on the PC. I disabled one of each duplicate, restarted Windows, and bingo the PC now runs normal when connected to the internet. I did everything you all suggested before I disabled the duplicates. The modem speed was 42 kbs (its a 56k modem). The Task Manager did not have any applications running in the background except for the Windows Messenger. The CPU Useage before the fix (lack of better word) was kinda steady at 95% to 98%. Important...the driver was in fact 'NOT' Digitaly Signed. My bad as I reported earlier that it was digitaly signed (next time I will double-check myself), so please excuse my error. I forgot to reconnect the hub to the second USB port before I walked away from the box, erg. The hub might cause the original effect - I don't know - but if it does I'll revisit this thread. Slap me with a wet noodle. Thank you all for your help and time. I know the effort you put in this is your valuable time and I appreciate it. MSNwar - The Fat Man Women are always running through my mind...They dare not walk.

XPerties, The RAM ( One Stick) was seated correctly and in the first bank. Get this though...while I was pondering, the owner abruptly switched the power off and then immediately switched it back on again. I informed him that this could have damaged the power supply which is an ATX power supply. He said he has been doing this frequently for about a year. I think he has damaged the power supply? Tomorrow we are going to swap the motherboard and see what happens. Also, the CPU is a P3 500 and the screen reads P3 233. When the PC did boot up normally it would read the correct CPU speed of P3 500. If I remember correctly, a CPU that does not receive the proper regulated amount of power will default to the lowest or safest setting. This CPU has never been overclocked by the way. I am thinking that the power supply is not providing enough power to the motherboard? What do you guys think? MSN