Bobtista Posted April 28, 2006 Share Posted April 28, 2006 Hey guys,Sometimes when I am using a full screen program (like, for instance, EverQuest) and IAlt+Tab out of the game, my computer restarts itself. This only happens once in awhilebut as you can imagine, it gets pretty aggrivating.Also, if I am using Limewire, and I exit the program, my computer also does the wholerestart itself thing.. once again, only once in awhile..Anything I can do to stop this?Title edited -- Please, use [TAGS] in your topic's title.Please follow XP Forum Rules from now on.--Sonic Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cluberti Posted April 28, 2006 Share Posted April 28, 2006 Is the machine simply restarting itself, or is it bugchecking (bluescreening) and rebooting? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thunderbolt 2864 Posted April 28, 2006 Share Posted April 28, 2006 You may have viruses or spyware. If not, then its a hardware related issue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobtista Posted April 28, 2006 Author Share Posted April 28, 2006 Why would it be hardware if it only reboots itself upon closing a full window program or LimeWire? By full window, I mean no other program can run ontop of it, it stays on top and takes up the whole screen so if you alt tab out of it, it minimizes...And no, no bugcheck.. just straight reboot... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trickytwista Posted April 28, 2006 Share Posted April 28, 2006 got pc set to auto restart on errors? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cluberti Posted April 28, 2006 Share Posted April 28, 2006 Follow these steps to enable complete memory dumps on your machine:1. If you have a feature like Compaq's Automatic System Restart (ASR), please disable it. This setting is usually found in the BIOS. With this feature enabled, if the BIOS does not detect a heartbeat from the OS, it will restart the machine, and this will interrupt the dump process.2. Create or set the following registry value:Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\i8042prt\ParametersValue: CrashOnCtrlScrollType: REG_DWORDData: 1Refer to the following Knowledge Base article for more information on this registry key:244139 Windows Feature Allows a Memory.dmp File to Be Generated with Keyboardhttp://support.microsoft.com/?id=2441393. Right-Click on the "My Computer" icon on the desktop and select "Properties"; this will open the "System Properties" window. Go to the "Advanced" tab and click "Performance Options". Click "Change" under "Virtual Memory". Set the pagefile to be located on the partition where the OS is installed, and set it to be equal to Physical RAM + 50 MB, for both min and max.4. Also in the "System Properties" window, click on the "Advanced" tab, then click "Startup and Recovery". Make sure "Complete Memory Dump" is selected (see 4a if this is not in the list). You can change the location of the memory dump file to a different local partition if you do not have enough room on the partition where the OS is installed.4a. If the "Complete Memory Dump" option in step 4 is not available, you will need to manually set this registry value:Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControlValue: CrashDumpEnabledType: REG_DWORDValue: 15. You will need to reboot the machine for these changes to take effect.6. The next time that the server crashes, if it is bugchecking it should create a bluescreen message, and a memory.dmp file on reboot. After the machine comes back up, wait for the disk activity to stop before logging in. Once the disk activity has stopped, please log in and find the resulting memory dump file (again, located by default at %systemroot%\memory.dmp).7. Please compress the resulting dump file and then PM me for instructions on how to upload the file to me for review. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobtista Posted April 28, 2006 Author Share Posted April 28, 2006 I followed all your steps except one of the first ones that asks for me to create or edit a registry.. When I run 'regedit', the DOS black screen window comes up and disappears and nothing more happens...I think this may also coincide with none of my Microsoft Office products no longer working. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cluberti Posted April 28, 2006 Share Posted April 28, 2006 You sure your machine is clean of infestation? That sounds VERY odd... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobtista Posted April 29, 2006 Author Share Posted April 29, 2006 Well, I wonder if it has ANYTHING to do with my Norton saying it has expired... half a year early...Let me reactivate it and do a scan... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
indy_dba Posted April 29, 2006 Share Posted April 29, 2006 Well, I wonder if it has ANYTHING to do with my Norton saying it has expired... half a year early...Let me reactivate it and do a scan...I dealt with a particularly nasty virus/worm/monster thing on a co-workers computer that sounds similar. He told me about strange things his computer would do and asked if I could look at it while I was setting up his broadband connection. (I figured it was just user confusion, but was I ever wrong! )It was the scariest piece of malware I had ever seen (so I dubbed it a "monster" piece of malware), here is what it was doing:1.) Random pop-ups from Internet Explorer2.) Home page in IE constantly changed, no matter what we set it too3.) Sometimes mysterious high CPU usage4.) Couldn't open Task Manger (the sneaky thing disabled this somehow, so no way to find the offending process)5.)a) Regedit and RegEdt32 would open, but closed immediately when the mouse moved over any are of the Regedit window5.)B) MSCONFIG would not run...*** Darn, no way to get to the registry to disabled this thing from auto-starting on reboot ***6.) Sometimes the PC would reboot itself (totally unexplained, no crash dump, probably some hacker controlling the PC and installing software that required reboot after all this PC was definately a part of a "bot" network)7.) Every AntiVirus web site I could think of that had an online or free scanner would be automatically redirected in IE (Symantec, McAfee, Trend, AVG, etc.) I would get redirected to a porn site or dead link. (I couldn't even enjoy the porn sites because this monster malware had me sooo p***ed off )Now I didn't have all my PE tools with me that day, in fact I didn't have much of any recovery disk in my Bat belt, so I gave one last ditch effort. I had been using Microsoft Antispyware Beta1 for a while and was recommending it to everyone and gave one last chance hoping this malware wouldn't redirect my link to download it....and wa laaaa I was able to find and remove a couple of "highest threat" malwares and many more "medium" and "low" threat buggers and after reboot the system was fine. This tool is now in Beta2 and has been renamed Windows Defender get it by clicking this link.Also check the Control Panel / System applet / Advanced tab / Startup & Recovery section / Advanced button and look for the "Automatically restart" box. You can uncheck this to prevent the auto-restart; however, if you have a virus or real hardware problem the Windows kernel may still freeze up and the only difference will be that you have to restart the PC manually with the power button.Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sonic Posted April 29, 2006 Share Posted April 29, 2006 Try to update your video drivers in first. If the "regedit" open a cmd prompt you have a spy/virus/troy. Try avast antivirus free edition, and schedule a scan at boot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobtista Posted April 29, 2006 Author Share Posted April 29, 2006 Oh wow, this time an error popped up when I tried using regedit...check it out...The cmd title says "C:\WINDOWS\system32\regedit.com"and the error that popped up with the cmd is:_________16 bit MS-DOS Subsystem_________C:\WINDOWS\system32\regedit.comThe NVIDM CPU has encountered an illegal instruction.CS:014b IP:007f OP: 8e 8f 90 92 92 Choose 'Close' to terminate the application.|Close| |Ignore|I installed and used Norton Antivirus, only one piece of adware was found fromSaveNow.. got it removed... still cant do regedit it seems though...Will try updating video drivers and trying that freeware and post again.Okie dokie... video drivers changed nothing, still getting that regedit error... will try freeware antivirus now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobtista Posted April 29, 2006 Author Share Posted April 29, 2006 Wow, well... I didnt install that free antivirus yet... but I just tried using Word and Excel (my Office programs werent opening either without freezing) and they work just fine now... let me try regedit.. Okay regedit still doesnt work, but MSConfig does (and I've already had it set up so nothing starts at start-up)dxdiag works...Everything but my regedit... and I showed you the error I got.. Shall I post a new thread for that seperate error or can anyone help me here? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cluberti Posted April 29, 2006 Share Posted April 29, 2006 (edited) Check your Windows folder - if you have both a regedit.exe and a regedit.com, you've likely got yourself a virus (usually Win32.Navidad or Win32.Dumaru, depending on which A/V vendor). Edited April 29, 2006 by cluberti Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bobtista Posted April 29, 2006 Author Share Posted April 29, 2006 If I do Run> regedit.exe it works!However, just regedit makes it want to do regedit.comHowever, I did not find a regedit.com file, so maybe a virus changed the command from perceiving it as .exe to .com... tricky little buggers... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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