Monday, January 7, 2002		Dr Tribune

Q. I have PC P-II 433MHz., Samsung 15" colour monitor, 128 SDRAM, Windows '98, FDD, 1.44 MB, HDD Samsung 20 GB, 48X CD ROM, Acorp international internal modem HSF 56000 bps data/fax/voice modem, Printer deskjet 695Cci, HP Scanner. KOB 620 AT mother board supporting SiS620/SiS5595 chipset, processor upto P-III 450 MHz, clock generator supports 90, 95, 100, 112, 124, 1333MHz, VGA shared memory 2/4/8 MB, expansion slots 3x PCI Slots and 1x ISA Slots. I have the following problem: I want to upgrade my HDD to 40 GB but my motherboard does not auto detect it in BIOS setting. To upgrade HDD, is it necessary to upgrade motherboard or is their any other alternative? Since I have an assembled system, whenever I want to format or want to do changes I always do through A:\ floppy drive. I had not earlier booted through CD-ROM and I tried to do this once by changing setting in BIOS, booting sequence CD-ROM, C, A. With this setting, I have not been able to boot from ROM with bootable CD of Windows. I had to insert a bootable disk in FDD with that. I consulted a computer expert on this issue and he said that I'll have to change the motherboard. Is this problem solvable? Is there any problem with motherboard jumpers? 

— Navtinder

A. From the description of the motherboard provided by you it appears that it is quite limited in capacities. If under HDD auto detection, the hard disk is not detected at all, then it means that in the given settings the higher capacity hard disk may not work in your system. If it does not detect the hard disk correctly then it may work in some cases. However, in these cases all you need to do is upgrade the BIOS installed on the motherboard rather than replacing the motherboard. But in your case it appears that the BIOS must be fixed on the motherboard and is not flash BIOS. So, you will have to consult your hardware dealer to upgrade the BIOS. I am sure that upgrading the BIOS your problem will be solved and you will be able to upgrade the hard disk to 40GB. Regarding your second query related to booting from the bootable CD ROM, if you select the CD ROM as the first boot sequence, then your system must boot from CD ROM only. However, if there is any problem with the CD ROM driver, then it may opt for second or third boot sequence option. However, it has nothing to do with the motherboard. Check the CD ROM driver and this problem will be solved. Apropos of your third query, the motherboard jumpers are for setting the processor clock right and has nothing to do with booting sequence.

Q. I have P III processor, 933 MHz, 815chipset Azza motherboard and Win '98 SE installed on my assembled computer. You have been giving a solution that disk cleanup software should be used but I don't know how to use this property of Win. Also please guide me on how can I talk on the Net with friends as I have a dual function 56 KBPS voice modem & mediaring talk software installed on my computer. Thirdly, does reinstalling (running setup of windows from CD) windows help in fine tuning registry or does it add more junk to that. Please help.

Nishu, Delhi.

A. For running disk cleanup utility, click on Start and then click on Program. Now click on Accessories and then from the drop-down menu click system tools. Now from the subsequent window choose the option disk cleanup. This utility will search for all junk files present in your system and will also give you the option of removing them from your system. This is how you can use disk cleanup utility. For voice communication on the Internet, you will need to put mic in the appropriate socket in the sound card along with the speaker also inserted in the sound card and not into sockets of your modem. Now when the other person, with whom you wish to speak, is also online then you can initiate a PC-to-PC chat. Regarding your third query, reinstalling Windows does not add more junk to the registry, however in some cases some corrupt Windows files are restored by such reinstallation, which actually helps. However too frequent reinstallation of windows is also not desirable and could lead to some other problems.

Q. I have a PC III 800 Mhz, 128 MB RAM, 20 GB HDD, 56 K Internal Modem and working system as window ME. My problem is when I connect to the Internet, the computer hangs up and monitor shows a black screen.I reinstalled windows twice. I also reinstaled the modem but the problem has not been solved. Please solve my problem.

Geetanjay Ghai, Kapurthala

A. Please elaborate your problem in order to help us solve it. Also mention any error messages or any other particular program where this problem normally occurs. However generally speaking, you can try running ScanDisk in thorough mode followed by disk defrag. This exercise will take care of many of probable problems and can thus solve your present problem also. However if the problem still persists then send us all necessary details.

Q. I have a PC with P III 700 Mhz, 64 MB RAM, Azza motherboard, 20 GB Seagate HDD. Firstly I have Windows '98 installed on my PC. Then I upgraded it to Window Me, then again I upgraded it to Windows XP professional edition. After few days I uninstalled the information of Windows Me and Windows '98 from Add and Remove program. Now the problem is regarding the appearance of my desktop. While working on my computer after a few minutes, my window XP style changes to window classic style. Please tell me the reason behind it.

A. The possible reason for the problem mentioned by you could be that some of the system entries are still recognised from Windows '98 and Windows Me system. Therefore after loading Windows XP, it reverts back to the previous settings. Now in order to solve this problem you may need to the install Windows XP again.

Q. I have a P III system with 14"' LG monitor. Since last few days I have been observing that the colour of the monitor is not right and the problem is that red colour is predominant in every image. The colour setting is true colour 24-bit. Please help.

A. Please use the Degauss feature on the monitor panel to solve this problem. On the front side of the monitor, you will find some digital controls. Choose the Degauss options from the various options available. This will solve the problem you have mentioned. However if this does not solve your problem then please check out if there is any electronic gadget which is interfering with your computer. Also please remove all electronic gadgets, which have a strong magnetic field. Change the colour settings to 16-bit colour in place of 24-bit colour.

Q. I have a P II 333 MHz, mercury motherboard and award BIOS. I tried to use 40 GB hard disk but the system does not detect it. What could be the problem? If it's of BIOS, then can I upgrade and use 40 GB hard disk on same configuration.

A. You have diagnosed your program correctly. The problem mentioned by you is basically related to the BIOS. For upgrading the hard disk, you will need to update the BIOS. However early motherboards did not have flash BIOS, and BIOS was rather fixed on the motherboard. Thus you will need to take the help of your hardware vendor to upgrade BIOS.

Q. I have P III (650 MHz) processor, 20 GB hard disk, Tomato 810 chipset motherboard, 64 MB RAM with 2 partitions on hard disk C: and D: with OS Win me on C: and Win XP on D: My problem is that my Win XP is does not install any audio device in system but Win me have AC '97 sound card installed, I even upgraded Win Me to XP but it failed to respond to the sound driver. Then I uninstalled Win XP and Win Me runs normal. Also please tell me from where can I get free software for surround sound effect.

Daman, Amritsar

A. You may need to procure the drivers of your sound card for Windows XP. Since the driver required for you had not installed Windows XP, therefore sound card was not getting installed properly under Windows XP. Use the correct version of driver for Windows XP and this will solve your problem. Regarding the free software for surround sound effect, first check the capability of the sound card with the features you are looking for and then search the web site of the manufacture of your sound card for the latest version of drivers supporting these features.

Q. I have an assembled PC - P III, 500 Mhz, 52x CD ROM, 3.5 FDD, 128 MB RAM. I have Windows '98 OS. In my PC the problem is that when I use my Outlook Express 5, it takes a lot of time to open (near about 2-3 minutes). What should I do?

A. Disable virus scanner setting to check your e-mail account at the time of loading. Also you can remove the old and read mails from your mail box in order to reduce the size of your mailbox. These measures will help you in solving your problem.

Q. I have a system with Pentium III, 500 MHz proc., 64 MB RAM, 13 GB hard disk. I have a problem defragmenting my primary drive. Whenever I try to do the same, I get the message that this defragmentation can't continue because the drive contains errors. When I scanned the drive, I did not find any errors even after thorough scanning. After that I again started defrag and it took more than 5 hours but it has yet not completed. At last, I switched off my computer.

Aatish Khosla, Panchkula

A. Please run scan disk in the DOS mode that is by booting to the DOS prompt by stopping the Windows to load. Then restart your PC in safe mode and run defrag. In this case defrag would run successfully. Now restart your PC in normal mode and work normally. For performing defrag in normal mode, always disable the screensaver or any video wallpaper. Moreover, also disable the anti-virus program, as this is the main cause of the problem mentioned by you.