Monday, April 7, 2003		Dr Tribune

Q. I have a problem. Hope you will solve it in the next edition of Dr. Tribune. I have a PIV, 1.5 GHz, 20 GB HDD, 128 MB DDR RAM , 56 KBPS internal Motorola modem and Win ‘98 in C: and Win XP Professional in the D: Drive as an OS. My problem is whenever I wish to connect to the Net my modem does not detect or accept dialing tone. To connect to the Net, I have to pick the receiver of telephone for as much time as I work on the Net. What should I do? Please advice.

A. Please check the telephone line connection to your modem, and make sure that line is plugged in properly. Secondly, under the properties of the modem, remove the check mark against the option, ‘wait for dialtone.’ I am sure this will solve your problem.

Q. I am facing many problems. My computer configuration is P III 600, 20 GB, Sony CDD, 810E and 128 RAM:

1. At shutdown time, my computer does not show, "It is now safe to turn off your computer." But in safe mode shut down it shows this message.

2. I have a mail account at Yahoo.com. My mail password changes each time when I log on. This happens even if I log off for a minute. I scanned my PC with Norton 2002 (updated). I open new Yahoo! id but the same problem occurs with this new account.

3. I forgot my Microsoft Word document’s password. How can I retrieve that password to open the file? Please solve my problem.

Puneet Madaan, Subhash Nagar, Hansi (Hisar).

A. Regarding your first problem, first of all load default settings in the BIOS feature setup in order to solve this problem. You can open the BIOS feature setup window by hitting ‘Del’ key when your computer boots up. If this solution does not solve your problem, then the next solution could be a little longer. Under this solution, you would be required to close all running programs/process manually one by one by pressing Alt + Ctrl + Del once and then shutdown your system to see, which program/process is causing the problem, in shut down. This way you can work out the trouble-creating program and solve your problem. Alternatively, you can also change the existing sound file, which is if corrupted, can also lead to this kind of problem. Regarding your second problem, I have not fully understood, how your password is being changed automatically and then how do you come to know of the changed password. I think you should report this matter to Yahoo! support for necessary solution. Regarding your third problem, there is no legitimate solution for password recovery, and Microsoft gives the warning that the lost password could not be recovered when you try to password protect your file. However, there are some programs available on the Net, which can help you recover the password.

Q. I have an assembled computer with the following configuration: Intel Celeron, 1.7 GHz with Intel 845 GLAD desk board motherboard, 128 MB DDR RAM, 20 GB HDD @ 7200 rpm HDD with Windows 2000 Professional Edition OS. The problem with my PC is whenever I play a game or music on my machine within few seconds it stops responding (mouse and keyboards does not work) while the music continues to play. Otherwise it works well. I have inbuilt Sigmatel ‘98 sound card.

A. In order to solve your problem, load the latest Active X driver on your system and if possible, move the slider of hardware acceleration a step lower from the maximum. This will not conflict with the Direct X driver also and I am reasonably sure that this will solve your problem. If the problem persists, then you may have to reinstall the AGP driver, after uninstalling it first.

Q. My PC configuration is P 4, 1.7 GHz, Intel D850mv based computer with 40 GB Seagate HDD (7200 rpm) 256 MB RD RAM, 52 X CD ROM drive (Samsung), OS, Windows ‘98 SE, Microtek P 4 cabinet with model aspire ATX 7 A2F .My problem is sometimes when there is a power cut, my system reboots and performs scan disk check with displayed error message, "Windows could not shut down properly. This happens sometimes but not always. I thought the problem was because of faulty UPS hence tried over nine different such devices. But the problem continues.

A. This problem is related to UPS only. Since at the time of changeover from the normal electricity mode to UPS (inverter mode) a very brief switching occurs. If this switching period, which is in microseconds, is long it can reboot your system. I suspect that it has to do something with the quality of the UPS you are using. It may also happen that it is passing sudden spike, which is causing the problem. The best solution is, first of all, check your power connections and also power supply, to be sure, that they are not loose and then check some other brand of UPS, other than the one you are using. I am sure this will solve your problem.

Q. My PC configuration is Celeron 866 MHz, Vintron motherboard, 128 MB RAM decibel speakers, LG monitor 15" screen, LG 52x CD ROM, Mercury cabinet, Safe Power UPS (500 VA), 2000 professional OS. My problem is my computer hangs. A blue-lined screen comes and it hangs or restarts. Again if I restart my computer sometimes, the monitor doesn’t start while the CPU remains on. Sometimes on Vintron logo, it restarts and this often happens. I got my cabinet changed because I thought there might be SMPS problem. I formatted my hard disk and again loaded the same OS. But the problem persists.

A. The problem in your case seems to be related with either faulty RAM or VGA/AGP card. This does not seem to be a case of faulty SMPS. However, before you start taking up any solution, you should run scandisk in thorough mode first. This will help in solving some critical problems. Also you will come to know, if there are any bad sectors in the hard disk as bad sectors are the most common cause of the kind of problem mentioned. If you find any bad sectors after running scandisk, you can blame it for this problem. But if you do not find any bad sector, then you should first remove and reinsert the RAM in your system. Then restart your system. If it boots properly, then your problem will be solved. But if the problem still persists, reinsert AGP card and also reinstall driver. However, before this you should also make sure that all PC connections are properly put in, which means all cables, including the monitor cable, is fitted properly in its socket. Hopefully, this will solve your problem.

Q. I have Pentium-II PC with 64 MB of RAM, 20 GB hard disk, 52X CD-ROM, 56 KBPS ace modem. My problem is whenever I try to open a window, either it be on a folder or Internet explorer, an error is shown on the status bar "load: com.ms.activeX. ActiveXComponent can’t be instantiated" and Windows takes a lot of time to open. Now computer has started giving many other problems like a program or IE stops responding very frequently and also active desktop is frequently turned off. I have recently upgraded my hard disk.

A. Your computer seems to be affected by a virus called mIRC/ Momma.565505. This is a medium-risk virus. You should get the computer cleaned by some latest anti-virus software, remove this virus and also quarantine the files, which have been infected by this virus.

Q. Whenever I pick my cabinet and place it upright (the way it normally should be) my system starts hanging. Strangely, when I put the cabinet back to sleeping position (i.e., horizontally), it starts working properly. I am facing this problem for over a month now and I have P- 4, ATX cabinet. Please tell me what to do.

A. Please check the hard disk for bad sectors and also check the alignment of the hard disk. If the hard disk is not mounted properly, then this kind of errors may crop up. Firstly, after running scan disk in thorough mode, find out if the system has bad sectors. If you have bad sectors, then you may need to low-level format your hard disk or wipe it completely to get rid of bad sectors. In any case you should also check the alignment of the hard disk and if possible put it in some other slot.

Q. I have a Zenith Celeron C, 466 z/128K/32M/1.44/6.4G/48x/AX(MR)SND(OB)/ AGP OB/P-810 and with Win ’98 OS. My problem is when I click the Internet Explorer, the computer flashes the following message on screen, "Please check your content advisor setting for missing information. Click the tools menu and then click Internet options. On the content tab, check the content advisor setting. OK." After clicking OK, the computer opens Internet explorer and it does not open any site. When I adopt the procedure given in the computer message, it demands password. After giving password, I OK the settings and disable the Content. But when I restart, the problem persists.

A. From the description of your problem, it is clear that there is a password set for screening and filtering the site as per the instructions of the password supplier. If you have done it yourself to block out the unwanted sites, you should review the contents, which should be allowed by the password. Or if you wish to get rid of these problems, then you will have to remove the password and remove any restriction or blocking of sites.

Q. I have 7IXE4 motherboard, AMD Duron 700 CPU, 256 MB RAM and the latest revised BIOS with "Fast Boot Enabled." My O/S is Windows ’98. When I switch on the PC, it takes at least a minute to perform the memory check, which is far too long. Pressing the Esc key does nothing. After that it detects various masters and slaves and then it takes at least another minute before it proceeds. After that everything is fine. Any ideas would be welcome.

A. This is a classical case of wrong BIOS Settings. Please reset the BIOS settings and load default setting. This will solve your problem. However, if this does not solve your problem, then it could be attributed to some incompatibility of the BIOS on your system.

Q. I’m using Aazza motherboard that has mem slots for 3/256(133) RAM chips. When I install 256 chip in all 3 slots (for a total of 768RAM), my computer develops several problems. I’m using AMD 1800+ processor chip. Someone told me I’m using too much RAM for that chip? I’ve changed RAM with other chips and it always comes down to Slot 3. When I put RAM chip in Slot 3, I get problems. And when I use just two slots (512 RAM), my computer stops having the problems. I don’t know if there’s a board problem or if I’m using too much RAM. Can you assist me please?

A. The best assistance you could get is from the manual of your computer’s motherboard as it could be mentioned clearly, in which combination, and how you should place RAM in each bank. It may be possible that there is a specific combination, which would work optimally and the rest might create the problem. So, the best solution is to refer the motherboard manual.