Monday, April 9, 2001		Dr Tribune

I have an assembled four-month-old PC, with Celeron configration (566 MHz), 64MB RAM, 56 Kbps Motorola Internal modem, ATX Cabinet, Priya motherboard, LG CD ROM, 10.2 GB hard disk with two partitions (C: 7.04 & D: 2.34) and using Windows ’98 operating system. My problem is that many times during opening of a new file it gives a message "This program has called illegal call, will be shut down." The details run as under: "IExplorer caused an invalid page fault in module Kernel32.dll at 0167:bffndb61." After that I have to restart my PC. What should I do?

Dr Tribune: Please write it back to me clearly in what program you get this error. You have not written clearly in which program this error is generated. Commonly these errors are associated with the password list (.PWL) file. If this file is damaged, then these errors are being generated. As the first solution to this problem find all files with a .pwl extension, and delete them. Restart the computer; the files will be recreated automatically when you log on to Windows ’98. You can find these files from find files dialouge

— Rahul Khanna, Chandigarh

Dr Tribune: There is a site called http://www.go2call.com, where you can make free PC to phone calls to US, Canada and Europe. You can log on to this site and check out for more details.

I have an assembled computer with AMD Athlon, 750 MHz Processor, 128 MB RAM, Seagate Barracuda ATA II 30.6GB Hard Disk. Whenever I switch on my computer, HDD makes a lot of noise like that of a grinding machine. Please tell me is there a defect in the hard disk.

— Harpratap Singh Chhina

Dr Tribune: There does not seem to be any problem in your hard disk from the description you have given. The hard disk creates some noise, which may vary on models. However for further confirmation, you must check up with your hardware vendor.

Dr Tribune: Regarding your problem, please make sure the disk is centred in the drive’s tray. Also check your autoexec.bat file. It should have an entry for "lastdrive=xxx" this setting might be set too low. Change it to lastdrive=z and reboot. By all probabilities, these changes will solve your problem. However, if it does not solve your problem, then you must check the IDE cable connection etc of your CD ROM drive. Regarding the Win Changer, mere installation should not cause this problem. However, if you have changed you registry using Win changer, then this problem could be related to the Win Changer.

— Rupinder Singh.

Dr Tribune: The rated capacity of the hard disk reflects the pre-formatted disk space, whereas after formatting some hard disk space is being utilised for storing system and formatting information. Therefore after formatting your hard disk when you look at the hard disk capacity it shows below the rated capacity. Thus there is no problem in your hard disk and also there is not much unclaimed space.

Dr Tribune: The AMD Duron has a front speed bus of 200 MHz, thus it supports the 133 MHz RAM. So, if you want to upgrade your system, you should install this RAM, though the other RAM i.e. the one with 100 MHz speed is also compatible with your system but RAM with 133 MHz will give you better performance. As far as your other problem is concerned, you must first uninstall the drivers and then reboot the system. When the system recognise the hardware again then you may choose to install the driver of the scroll mouse being provided to you by the manufacturer. This should solve your problem.

Dr Tribune: The advice of your friend is partly correct. Normally games available on the Internet for downloading are shareware versions of the product, which not just enlarges the registry but also add a lot of system files. This eventually makes the computer very slow. Some of these games also change the system settings that could cause further problems in your computer. However, if you are downloading games that have received good rating from the rating agencies, there is lesser risk of these kinds of problems.

— Kashmir Singh, Ludhiana

Dr Tribune: It is not practical to partition your floppy disk, as partitioning requires quite a large amount of disk space to store partition and other information. Regarding your second problem, you have not mentioned whether the speed before was less or more than what it is now. The speed of the Internet, besides your line conditions and few modem settings also depend upon the bandwidth of your ISP. Moreover the state of telephone exchange and the distance of it from your house are also critical for satisfactory Internet speed. However, the most important is the bandwidth of the ISP. Regarding your Hyper Terminal test, you must first set you modem to dial in pulse mode, in modem properties. Since, the tone mode is the default setting so you will have to change it to pulse mode from Properties. Regarding overclocking, I would like to say that you should not unnecessarily bother too much as it is a difficult task to perform and cannot be done so easily. Since it requires special arrangements to keep your CPU cool so you can make out simply by looking in some cases. However, if you wish, then you need to check the manual of your motherboard and CPU and set check from your motherboard and CPU settings whether it has been overclocked or not.

Dr Tribune: Unusual hanging of the computer is normally related to the problem of motherboard. Thus in your case I suspect this problem again. Therefore you need to get your motherboard checked again with your hardware vendor. However as a possible solution, if you are using Zonal Alarm software then please uninstall it and check for this problem and upgrade the Norton Anti virus that you might be using on your computer. If these measures do not solve your problem, then you may get the motherboard checked.