Monday, November 26, 2001		Dr Tribune

Q. I have a PC with the following configuration - Celeron 700 MHz, Azza motherboard, 64 MB RAM and Windows Me as operating system. My problem is that whenever I run scandisk on C: drive, it takes a lot of time and after that message appears which reads "Scandisk has restarted 10 times. A program may have writing on your disk." Whereas I am able to scan the D: drive efficiently. I shall be thankful if you solve my problem. 

— Gauru, Fatehgarh Churian.

A. The problem mentioned by you is similar to the one answered above. Please take into consideration the points mentioned above in order solve your problem. However, you may also try this solution for your problem. Go to Start > Run and type msconfig in the Open: box. Then, on the General tab, uncheck all items listed under Selective startup (make sure that Selective startup is selected). Now hit apply, click OK and then restart Windows. Now the Windows will start with only the basics running; insures nothing will interfere with ScanDisk and Defrag. Now you can run Scan disk successfully. After you have run scandisk successfully, go into msconfig and select Normal startup and restart Windows again. Alternatively you may also restart Windows in Safe Mode and then run the scandisk in thorough mode.

Q. I have a Wipro P-I with 166 MHz Processor, 16 MB RAM, 2 GB HDD, 52x CD ROM, Operating System Win ’98 with loaded, Office ’97, 3D Home Architect, ACD see 32 Browser and Viewer, Adobe, Autocad, Winamp, WinFax, WinZip, Adobe acrobat, Macromedia Ffash (Demo) and two-three big games, some MP3 and MPEG songs. Thus I have 1.96 GB full disk and 210 MB free disk space. My problems are:

1. Whenever I defrag my Hard Disk it starts successfully. But during the process, it restarts after a while and shows status: "Restating…Disk contents changed". Then hours pass and it repeatedly restarts and proceeds very slowly.

2. My Print Screen command is not working properly. When I use this command and paste the copied image in Paint application, it pastes only a black image of the same size, no picture, no graphics, only a jet-black image.

3. I’m unable to access my online visited pages in offline mode. I use only "Internet Explorer."

4. While chatting in mIRC, can we send a massage same time to all online users of a single room.

Sarabjit Singh, Ludhiana

A. Regarding your first problem, it is essential that you disable the screen saver and all other program that runs in the background before attempting to defrag your hard disk. Having enabled these programs, the chances of errors like the one you are getting are substantially high. Though this error may also occur due to many more reasons, one of them is the presence of any anti-virus software installed on your system. In this case, you must first disable the anti virus software before running defrag in order to avoid such kind of problems. You should also turn off the power management. If despite taking all the above-mentioned precautions the problem still persist, then you should set a static pagefile/ virtual memory (i.e. min and max at same value) and stop all other background applications from running by ending the task by pressing Ctrl +Alt +Del. You can also remove ‘find fast’ from the startup group if you have MS Office installed as in some cases, it also creates the problem. Last, but not the least, you must always disconnect the PC from the network while defragging. This will certainly solve your problem.

Regarding your second problem, there could be two possibilities, 1) Your system has very low resources in terms of RAM, video memory and cache memory also lesser space on hard disk could be another reason for the problem mentioned by you. 2) The program that you are using for printing the print screen images is set to low resolution. Please check your computer for above-mentioned reasons for the possible solution of your problem. Regarding your third problem, you need to first enable offline mode in order to access the web contents browsed.

Q. I have an assembled PC (Pentium III processor, 710 MHz, 52x CD ROM drive, 3.5 floppy drive, 64 MB RAM). I have Windows Me installed. My problem is that my system became slow, after installing Windows Me for 2 or 3 months. Whenever the system becomes slow, I reinstall Windows but after some days it gets slow. What could be the problem?

A. Reinstalling Windows is not the permanent solution of your problem. You must try to pinpoint the area of the problem. From your question it is not very clear how and when your system gets slow. Please elaborate your query for a concrete answer to your problem.

Q. I have Celeron 810 motherboard, Win ’98 OS and my problem is when I start my PC, it gives the following error: "Boot from ATPI CD ROM: Disk boot failure insert system disk." I have tried my best from the SETUP of Computer by changing the all boot sequences in each case. But I didn’t get the desired response. Please help me.

A. The solution to your problem lies in the BIOS set up. First of all, make your hard disk as the primary master and detect it from the HDD auto detection. Then set the boot sequence as C, A, CD ROM. Also, please remove any disk from floppy drive and the CD ROM. Then reboot your system. This problem normally occurs when your system fails to boot from the hard disk and such other bootable medium like CD ROM. If the system boots correctly for all hard disk then this problem will not come up. However if this solution does not solve your problem, then there could be some problem in your hard disk.

Q. I have a computer with the following configuration: Celeron 500 MHz, 20 GB HDD, 64 MB RAM, 810e motherboard. My problem started when I installed a trial version of Norton anti-virus that was valid only for 30 days. After that I reinstalled the same thing from the same chip CD but after the same installing process, the software alert said that "Update from live update, which is part of software menu, since the present version had expired." So I updated from the Internet in one and half hour and then restarted my computer but the problem persists. Sir please suggests me how can I again install the trial of 30 days.

A. The shareware versions of software are only for trying and not for using them permanently. Therefore all shareware software has a working life of 15 to 30 days, after which they cannot be used and reinstalled on the same PC. Though in case of some PCs, the shareware versions can be reinstalled again, but in most of the cases, they cannot be reinstalled on the same PC again. So, ethically if you wish to use it over the period specified, you may have to buy it.

Q. I wish to configure Outlook Express 5.5 with Rediffmail account. Please help me to provide the names of the Incoming and Outgoing servers of Rediffmail plus other relevant information.

A. Rediffmail is purely a Web-based e-mail service and thus can be accessed through the Website only. Moreover like Yahoo!, the SMTP and pop 3 server address of this e-mail service is not available publicly so it cannot be configured in the Outlook Express. However you can configure other Web-based e-mail like Yahoo! and Hotmail in Outlook Express.

Q. I have an Assembled PC Pentium III, 500 MHz processor, Intel chipset motherboard, 64 MB RAM, with Windows ’98 Operating system. My problem is that when I shut down the PC then a message "It’s now safe to turn off your computer" does not appear. It shows a blank screen. I want to display the shutdown message. Kindly help me. Secondly what is Paging file size, what is its function and how to increase it?

A. This is a known problem with the Windows ’98 Second edition, that on shutdown, the system hangs and one does not get the regular message, "Its now safe to turn off your computer". As the most authentic solution to this problem, you can download a fix from the Microsoft Website, which will solve your problem. However if you are able to pinpoint the reason for this problem, like enabled fast Shutdown registry key, damaged Exit Windows sound file, TSR programs not closing correctly, incompatible, damaged, or conflicting device drivers loaded etc. Then the specific solution to this problem can be worked out. However, for more details on this problem, you can visit the site http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q238/0/96.asp. This site has a detailed causes and solutions to the Microsoft Windows ’98 shutdown problem.

Q. I have a Celeron 600 MHz, 64 MB RAM and 10 GB hard disk. I have Win ’98 as my OS. My problem is that my hard disk has developed some bad sectors (around 16,000) in my C: drive. I have two partitions (C & D). How can I remove these bad sectors? I don’t have any software CDs to install Windows and therefore I cannot even format the C: drive. Can I copy the contents to D: drive and then format C: drive? I don’t have much knowledge about computer hardware. The other problem is that my monitor screen blinks. I have a Samtel 15" monitor.

A. If your hard disk has developed bad sectors, the best solution is to get it replaced. Once bad sectors arise on a hard disk, then even if you correct them once, chances are that they will come up again very soon. Moreover, bad sectors can also spread from one partition to another easily. So it will not be a good idea to copy contents on another partition on a permanent basis, though you can do it temporarily for formatting your hard disk. There’s another solution also for this problem. You can load another operating system on the partition where there are no bad sectors and can shift all your work eventually on this partition. But if the bad sectors also arise on other partitions also then it makes sense to go for the replacement of your hard disk. However, if you wish to use software to correct bad sectors, then you can use Norton disk doctor or NDD.