Calling AlienRik!

onejontwo

Rik Rik Rik,:A Having read many of your posts and threads, having experienced your help with many of my pc issues, I regard you as one of the most computer knowledgable people on this very helpful forum. (Now I've done the creeping here comes the question!)
Bearing that in mind and also the past history of my pc problems (of which you were a big part and saved me a fortune) could you give me a honest opinion as whether my pc is posessed by some gremlin, I am a jinx, I'm pressing all the wrong buttons, My pc is due for retirement or something else entirely?
The reason I ask is that after following the advice given on here which includes Uninstalling Mcafee, installing and un installing Avira, installing and un installing Avast, running cc cleaner, glary utilities, Spybot, Malwarebytes, Superantispyware, posting countless log hijacks, running Combofix, purchasing and running Kaspersky to name but a few, which got my pc to run as sweet as a nut, two days ago the f#####ing thing wouldn't boot up no matter how many different ways I tried.:mad:
Once again I was forced to reformat the drive and do a fresh install and now everything is fine again. But for how long???
Do you think it's time for a new one as It's about 7 years old (although it's great when up and running) as I've got a big hammer ready and waiting for the next time it won't boot up!
I know you must be sick of the sight of me, but surely you like a challenge!!!
Thanks once again in anticipation.

Marty_J

If something like this happened to me on a 7 year old computer, my first suspicion would be that the hard drive is on its way out.

Buying a new hard drive is certainly a lot cheaper than buying a new computer, but it may or may not fix the problem.

DatabaseError

even a computer that "won't boot up" leaves clues as to it's problem, whether a nice bsod message, a bios fail message, a beepcode..something...anything...
After 7 years I'd be dumping it...but...if it normally behaves for you, and you are happy with its performance, just hope it doesn't breal again...and if it does, report back with more info on the error.
As Marty suggests...after 7 years components may be beginning to fail

antispam246

Try running an eror check/disk check on your hardrive.

Right click your Hard Drive > Properties > Tools > "Error Checking" Check Now > Tick both boxes and see what it finds.

There's better 3rd party programs to check this but you may as well start with the windows one. You can also run it through a command prompt. This should atleast let you know if your hard disk has bad sectors, in which case you'll definately want to follow the advice above of replacing it.

Edit: Sorry assumed you were running windows xp

If you open a command prompt window (Start > Run then type "cmd") in the command prompt window type "chkdsk /r" (without quotes)

If it does report bad sectors check if your hard disk is still under warranty, I think most hard disks are 5 years so you'll be eligble for a free replacement.

flossy_splodge

onejontwo wrote: »

Rik Rik Rik,:A Having read many of your posts and threads, having experienced your help with many of my pc issues, I regard you as one of the most computer knowledgable people on this very helpful forum. (Now I've done the creeping here comes the question!)
Bearing that in mind and also the past history of my pc problems (of which you were a big part and saved me a fortune) could you give me a honest opinion as whether my pc is posessed by some gremlin, I am a jinx, I'm pressing all the wrong buttons, My pc is due for retirement or something else entirely?
The reason I ask is that after following the advice given on here which includes Uninstalling Mcafee, installing and un installing Avira, installing and un installing Avast, running cc cleaner, glary utilities, Spybot, Malwarebytes, Superantispyware, posting countless log hijacks, running Combofix, purchasing and running Kaspersky to name but a few, which got my pc to run as sweet as a nut, two days ago the f#####ing thing wouldn't boot up no matter how many different ways I tried.:mad:
Once again I was forced to reformat the drive and do a fresh install and now everything is fine again. But for how long???
Do you think it's time for a new one as It's about 7 years old (although it's great when up and running) as I've got a big hammer ready and waiting for the next time it won't boot up!
I know you must be sick of the sight of me, but surely you like a challenge!!!
Thanks once again in anticipation.

If it's any consolation, I'm experiencing almost exactly the same and have done the same things!
Am still persevering!
It was also suggested to me it may be a PSU problem as older psu's may struggle to do all the work we put on computers these days. (My computer is even older, 10 years or so).
If you get there before me, please post here so I can try what you do, and if I succeed I'll do the same. Good luck.:T

aliEnRIK

erm

Impossible to say as I really have no clue WHAT was running at the time

But as Marty says, a 7 year old hardrive is probably on its way out. Id be thinking of replacing that at least (Or better still, a whole new computer)

You do mention COMBOFIX though. You really SHOULDNT be running that if your not sure what your doing. Ive found if its runs ona computer thats highly infected before trying to clear some of the mess via Malwarebytes etc then it can leave the computer in a mess (Sometimes unbootable mess)

Kasperskys the best bit of software you can use to my mind but did you use the proper REMOVAL tools for Mcafee and Avast? If not then they could be a contributing factor too

Pie123

Bit random but how loaner did you manage to get
Post Count: 7
Thanked 1,006 Times in 836 Posts

onejontwo

antispam246 wrote: »

Try running an eror check/disk check on your hardrive.

Right click your Hard Drive > Properties > Tools > "Error Checking" Check Now > Tick both boxes and see what it finds.

There's better 3rd party programs to check this but you may as well start with the windows one. You can also run it through a command prompt. This should atleast let you know if your hard disk has bad sectors, in which case you'll definately want to follow the advice above of replacing it.

Edit: Sorry assumed you were running windows xp

If you open a command prompt window (Start > Run then type "cmd") in the command prompt window type "chkdsk /r" (without quotes)

If it does report bad sectors check if your hard disk is still under warranty, I think most hard disks are 5 years so you'll be eligble for a free replacement.

Ran a disc check and it found 2 bad clusters which it said it replaced, does this mean that the hard drive is repaired or does it mean it's on it's way out?
Now that you mention the hard drive, I've noticed it's getting slightly noisier than usual, is this a big job to replace if needed and how do you transfer all your data (or am I jumping the gun?)

Marty_J

Run another check in a few days and see if any more bad clusters have appeared.

If you have a desktop, replacing the hard drive is dead easy. You basically unplug the old one and plug the new one in.

As for transferring your data, I assume you have all that backed up already?

Browntoa

I with a failing hdd , had one do thos for months befpre finally giving up

onejontwo

aliEnRIK wrote: »

erm

Impossible to say as I really have no clue WHAT was running at the time

But as Marty says, a 7 year old hardrive is probably on its way out. Id be thinking of replacing that at least (Or better still, a whole new computer)

You do mention COMBOFIX though. You really SHOULDNT be running that if your not sure what your doing. Ive found if its runs ona computer thats highly infected before trying to clear some of the mess via Malwarebytes etc then it can leave the computer in a mess (Sometimes unbootable mess)

Kasperskys the best bit of software you can use to my mind but did you use the proper REMOVAL tools for Mcafee and Avast? If not then they could be a contributing factor too

Ahem Rik~


"Cant see anything wrong with it

FIX this using hijack (Just a dead file) ~
O2 - BHO: (no name) - !!7E853D72-626A-48EC-A868-BA8D5E23E045} - (no file)

Run COMBOFIX

I personally think theres been a problem with the install of Kaspersky somewhere. But lets see if combofix finds anything first"

I know youv'e got a lot of fingers in a lot of pies, plus having had your hands full with tomcats! but I was following your instructions and ran combofix as a last resort as everything else had been tried. (Now I'm off to sulk in a corner after being shouted at in public!):o