Log in ....Tribune-- Dr Tribune

Monday, May 21, 2001		Dr Tribune

I have a Compaq Presario with the second edition of Windows ’98 and I am facing problem in opening an application named Compaq diagnostics. How can I overcome this problem

— Sanket Adlakha

Dr Tribune: Please mention full details of your problem exactly as with information provided by you, it will be difficult to solve your problem.

I have PC with Celeron 533, 810 motherboard, 64 RAM and ’98 OS. The sound output of my computer went off suddenly one day. I reinstalled Windows to recover from the problem but couldn’t succeed. Kindly tell me can I insert separate sound card on PCI slots on 810 dual motherboard.

— Ravinder Singh Jassal

Dr Tribune: It appears that your sound card driver has got removed, overwritten, damaged or corrupt. Kindly reinstall the sound card driver in order to correct this problem. This normally happens while installing some program or application, which disturbs the setting of your sound card. You can get this driver from the motherboard CD and can install it from the device manager. I think you would not require another sound card for this. However, if it were due to a hardware problem, only then you would need another sound card.

I have a Celeron 600 Mhz, 20 GB hard disk, 64 MB RAM. I want to download Norton anti-virus.

— Gaurav

Dr Tribune: Please visit the site http://www.symantec.com/downloads for necessary information about downloading Norton anti-virus software.

I want to know whether the increase in data in the hard disk results in degradation of performance of the PC. I have a Pentium III processor with 20 GB hard disk capacity. My hard disk has around 4 GB of data stored in it and has only 3 or 4 games installed on my computer which barely makes up for 500 MB of hard disk space. Still I feel my computer is not giving the desired performance, as it should. I asked my vendor about the possible reason and he said it is because of the number of software and games that I had installed on my computer. Is he right?

— Sumit Vishnoi, SAS Nagar

Dr Tribune: The data in the hard disk does not affect the performance of your PC. However, if you have too many software, mainly shareware versions and games installed, then the performance of your PC may go down. Moreover the performance of your PC is also affected by the presence of more fonts and drivers in your system. Normally persons do not visualise while installing the fonts and drivers that how it would affect the overall performance of their system. However, if you do not much of these things installed in your PC, then regular scan disk followed by disk defrag would enhance the performance of your PC. Also for better performance, do not use wallpapers and screen-savers involving heavy graphics. Moreover, using a high resolution of display and high frequency of your display adapter could also affect the performance of your PC. Another reason that could affect the performance of your PC could be the temp files present in your temp directory. Remove these files periodically for better and faster performance.

I have a computer with Win ’95. I have downloaded some screen-savers from the Net. When I try to preview these a message appears ".scr is not a regular Windows operation."

— Santokh Singh,Chandigarh

Dr Tribune: Screen-saver files are not Windows standard application and thus cannot be opened like any other file. You must have tried to open it either by double clicking on it or by attaching it with some other application. If you try using them this way, then you will get the kind of message you have got. You can install the screen-savers you have downloaded by using the install or set up files.

I have Celeron 500, 64 MB RAM, 10 GB HDD with Intel 810 and AT cabinet. My first problem is that whenever I shut down my computer the message: "It is now safe to turn off your computer" does not appear on the screen and after that the screen starts blinking. When I try to restart my computer it does not restart. Ultimately I have to shut down my computer directly from the CPU without any message on the screen. My second problem is that whenever I play games the computer hangs automatically and I have to restart it.

— Yogesh Goyal, Panchkula

Dr Tribune: Normally, this kind of problem could be attributed to anti-virus software installed in your system. Generally, we accept the default software settings and which at times creates problems. Therefore in case you are running a McAfee or Norton anti-virus program, which is configured to scan your floppy disk drive when you shut down your computer. Then this kind of problem could occur. In order to solve this problem, configure your anti-virus program not to scan floppy disk drives while shutting down. By all probability your problem would be solved. Regarding your second problem, please write back specifically whether you systems gets stuck up in the DOS mode games or Windows-based games. Also please write us back details about your operating system.

I have an assembled PC with the following configuration — Intel P III, 500 Mhz, 512 KB cache memory, 8.4 GB Hard Disk, 1.44 MB FDD. My problems are:

1) When I am working on the computer either online or offline, the system hangs. I have to shut it down directly from the CPU.

2) Whenever I disconnect from the Internet, though the line is disconnected, still the window (status: disconnecting) remains on the screen for long. Because of this I am unable to reconnect again.

3) Whenever I open the Yahoo! page , another window named Microsoft window opens which has to be cancelled by doing End Task each time.

— Muskan

Dr Tribune: You have not written, which operating system you use. Moreover, in order to help us solve your problem, please elaborate the problem, stating what message do you get when your system hangs, in which program does this occur etc. There could be many reasons and without basic inputs, it is difficult to pinpoint on a solution. Your second problem also seems to relate to the first one for which I require basic inputs from you.

I want to know that how to send voice mail through MSN messenger. I have a Dishnet dial connection that usually gets terminated. Please tell me how to overcome this problem. I have a Compaq PC with 56k internal modem.

—Even, Patiala

Dr Tribune: As far as sending voice mails is concerned, it is simple and you can send it using any e-mail client, though for sending voice mails Eudora is the best. You can simply attach your voice file recorded and saved in Windows media file format. If you have necessary software then send Real Player files through e-mail and the person receiving it would receive it as an attachment that he or she can double-click on to listen. In case of MSN Messenger also the procedure is the same as your can send a voice file via e-mail. Here you must understand that voice mail and voice chat are different things.

Regarding your disconnection problem, if this problem is specific to Dishnet dial, then please contact Dishnet dial customer support staff for solution. However, if this problem is with other ISPs also, then please get your telephone line checked for any kind of interruptions, breaks, joints, extensions etc. Also please add the setting S10=50 in advanced settings of modem configuration.

I am using Win ’98 as OS. Some one advised me to perform disk defrag to increase the computer speed. I tried to perform it but after going 10 per cent the indicator again comes to 1 per cent and so on.

Karun Sachdev, Amritsar

Dr Tribune: Running defrag regularly on your computer is a good idea. However, for such problem, first run scandisk in Windows and then try running Defrag. If this solves your problem, then it is fine. However, if it does not solve your problem, then you should run scandisk from the DOS mode and then run defrag in Windows. This will solve your problem. For accessing the DOS mode, press F8 key just before Windows starts loading.