oooops! (mucked up computer)

[5614]

hmmm, i really screwed up my computer.... but i was playing around with it so what should i expect?

 

im in safe network mode, so i can surf the net and use my computer, as soon as i try to run it in normal mode, it loads windows and i get the blue screen of death.

 

hmmm, oh well... the only way to learn with these computers to experiment and learn from it.... im just backing up my files and then im in for the full format....

 

so i'll post here tomorrow or sometime what happened so that others can learn from it too.

[Callipygous]

soooo, are you asking for help? or just letting us know that you messed up your comp? if your looking for help telling us what you were playing with might help. now im kinda curious : )

[Jordie]

hmmm' date=' i really screwed up my computer.... but i was playing around with it so what should i expect?

 

im in safe network mode, so i can surf the net and use my computer, as soon as i try to run it in normal mode, it loads windows and i get the blue screen of death.

 

hmmm, oh well... the only way to learn with these computers to experiment and learn from it.... im just backing up my files and then im in for the full format....

 

so i'll post here tomorrow or sometime what happened so that others can learn from it too.[/quote']

 

5614,

 

Have you tried doing a system restore? You should always attempt to fix the problem before doing a format. Also you didn't by any chance add or remove any drivers to your system right before this problem occured did you?

 

Jordie

[MulderMan]

if hes getting the bsod, i dont think older os's can do restore.

[Jordie]

if hes getting the bsod, i dont think older os's can do restore.

 

All Windows Operating Systems have the blue screen of death. Even Windows Longhorn!

[Callipygous]

yeah, but at least they are getting better with it. its only happened to me with XP once or twice.

[mtong]

But when XP BSODs you know somthiing is very wrong

[Jordie]

yeah, but at least they are getting better with it. its only happened to me with XP once or twice.

 

Now all you have to worry about is the huge security holes found in Microsoft Windows!

[5614]

no i wasnt asking for help... i was telling you lot so that you can learn from it, after all, what is the point in mucking up your computer if people dont learn from it?

 

also the format makes my computer go faster, as most of you should know, it is a good thing to format a computer occasionally as it makes the computer go a lot faster, my hasnt been formatted since i got it (almost 2 years now) so it was well over due for one.

 

right, i installed a program which decided to over write some system files (.dll) so that the system ran how the program wanted it too.

 

(it was a viglen classlink network program)

 

anyway, i had to uninstal it as my other computer is a win98 and is therefore not compatable with the program so it was therefore useless to me at home.

 

so i uninstalled the program

 

BUT it didnt un-overwrite the system files it had over written during installation.

 

i didnt like the new system file so tried to manually remove it.

 

well, you have to remember that at the time i had assumed that it had added this .dll file and therefore it was fine to remove it.

 

it was only ONCE i had removed it (and it was a right hard one to remove as it was being used!)... well, id removed it and all was fine.

 

then i restarted my computer at which point it said that pcigina.dll (the .dll file i had removed) was a windows critical component and it couldnt start... so crashed!!!

[5614]

So now i had a mucked up version of windows which couldnt start.

 

from the error message i got i realised that this pcigina.dll was a graphical component so guessed that i could start in safe mode... which i could.

 

so starting in safe mode i backed up all of the files on my primary or master HDD onto my secondary or slave HDD, as i knew that when i re-installed windows there is a possibility of having to format... but i'd only need to format the windows partition, this is on the master HDD, so to be safe i backed up.

 

then i rebooted and booted from the XP CD and selected to repair the windows.

 

this went fine until windows had 99% fixed (which is actually a re-installation with a different name) and then i got the message:

 

"has not passed windows logo testing to verify compatability.... the software will not instal"

 

WHAT THE HELL? how can windows XP not pass its own compatability testing?????

 

i dont know... so i did it again... and got the same message!

 

anyway, so i thought, lets try starting windows... this time it loaded windows and i did not get the missing pcigina.dll file warning.

 

good that meant that windows fix (actually re-installation) had replaced the missing file, which is what it is meant to do.

 

THEN.... i got the BSOD (blue screen of death).

[5614]

i could still start in safe mode... so i knew that now i had got the BSOD... the ultimate death symbol of any OS i would HAVE to format the whole of my primary (where the OS is) HDD.

 

i further backed up everything and then formatted.

 

to format an XP machine (its similar on all OSs but here's exactly how to do it on XP)

 

boot from XP CD

select instal

select instal new copy

delete all the partitions

select format NTFS (NOT quick)

and then is does it all for you (you need to select computer language, name etc) but its all straight forward.

[5614]

all of my intergrated software... ie. the network card and the audio need their drivers re-installled.

 

i used the dell resource CD (i have a dell computer!) to reinstal that lot.... note that the dell resource CD instals a installation file for the drivers, so if you click on say the NIC (network interface card) and click instal, not the directory where it is being installed to and then go there and run the 'setup.exe' file to instal the drivers.

 

now thats all fixed and im all fine.

 

NB: i also have to reinstal program for my printer / scanner but the rest of the hardware e.g. graphics card etc is all set up by windows.

[5614]

on my computer primary HDD (C:\) had the OS and not much else.

my secondary HDD (E:\) has all the programs on

 

so, if i format C:\ (which i had to) would i loose the registries?

yes (if the specific program has registries, which 99% of progs do)

 

so can i still run the program?

YES... so long as i directly run the .exe file i can still run the program even though it no longer has any registries.

[5614]

I've learnt about formatting XP

 

I've learnt about safe mode and semi safe modes (which allow you to access internet/network whilst in safe mode)

 

My computer runs a lot faster

 

There's a lot of rubbish removed from my HDD... not that i instal rubbish, just that rubbish accumilates on HDDs over time.

 

I've learnt not to play with system files!!!!!

(i mean i still will, just i'll be more careful when deleting them!)

 

so while you may be there laughing at me for screwing up my computer, im laughing back at you because ive learnt something (which you now know!) and my computer runs faster... noticeably.

[5614]

on my computer primary HDD (C:\) had the OS and not much else.

my secondary HDD (E:\) has all the programs on

 

so' date=' if i format C:\ (which i had to) would i loose the registries?

yes (if the specific program has registries, which 99% of progs do)

 

[b']so can i still run the programs?[/b]

YES... so long as i directly run the .exe file i can still run the program even though it no longer has any registries.

well i'll just expand on that:

 

some programs install files to your primary HDD, even if you set it to instal on another HDD, for example, some games, especially microsoft games such as halo, freelancer and others like max payne all instal their saved games file to your 'my documents' which is on the primary HDD, if this is the case then the program will have some files missing.

 

other more simple programs like adaware, spybot s & d etc which instal all their files in the directory you tell it to instal to will not have this problem.

 

and this computer does not run a lot faster... i knew it would speed up, but not this much... some people say they format their computer twice a year, which i thought was bit over the top, but i can now see why they do it.

[YT2095]

Nice Monologue dude

[5614]

thanks man.

 

yeah i know, its like one of martin's threads!.... still, it was fun!

 

nah, its for others to read if they want to....

 

[YT2095]

I would contest the one point you made though.

 

"and this computer does not run a lot faster... i knew it would speed up, but not this much... some people say they format their computer twice a year, which i thought was bit over the top, but i can now see why they do it."

 

Formating the `puter is madness unless it REALLY needs it.

 

why not just de-frag the HDDs instead?

 

less faffing, faster and safer to do, and with the same if not better results!

[5614]

"less faffing, faster"

yes

 

"safer to do"

only if you dont trust yourself to copy/paste backup a file!

 

"and with the same if not better results"

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

it is not the same results.... defrag compresses the files on your HDD (hard drive disk) into one area so that your computer doesnt need to get data from all over the HDD.

 

formatting removes all data. now think of it this way which is quicker, to search through nothing or to search through everything in one place?

 

sure you have to instal programs, but only ones you need.

 

whenever you surf the internet files will be downloaded that dont go to the 'temp' folder or 'temp internet files' folder either, so dont get deleted.

instal programs, CDs and internet instal temp files that are not .tmp so do not get removed my system clearups.

 

plus, when you uninstal a program it still leaves registries and if it has installed files to anywhere but the directory they will normally stay too.

 

im telling you, rubbish accumulates on your HDD, i use defrag quite often and i dont particuarly notice the difference after one as i do it soo often... but hell this format has made a MASSIVE difference.

 

trust me, i didnt do it as i didnt wanna have to format my computer, but then i had no choice and im glad i didnt because it runs seriously faster now... you have to do it see it.

 

for example, XP loading... used to take a minute or two, now less than 20 seconds... loading my account, used to take another one or two mins... now less than 20 seconds again!

 

so sure they're rough estimates of time... but you cant imagine the difference it makes mainly when loading windows and my account.

 

defrag and format do not bring up the same results!

[YT2095]

wft?

 

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

it is not the same results.... defrag compresses the files on your HDD (hard drive disk) into one area so that your computer doesnt need to get data from all over the HDD."

 

no it doesn`t

 

it takes and gathers fragmented parts, copies them into an unused section of the hdd, uses the mem buffer to sort these from the FAT, and re-writes them in a logical sequence back to your HDD again, so your HDD head doesn`t have to sound like a police firing range when looking for a file and related items.

 

it`s book keeping equiv of "Alphabetical Order"

 

nothing`s "compressed" at all

[5614]

ok, sorry, i worded that wrongly.... what i meant is that if you think of your HDD as an image... before defrag there's bits of the image everywhere at the end its all in one place.

 

if you think of the HDD imag as a horizontal rectangle and the data as coloured parts of it... it starts of with coloured dots everywhere, by the end of it they've all been shunted up to one end of the HDD.

 

ok, it was a crap way of putting it, i assure you, i didnt mean the data was compressed... i merely meant that it is all placed into one area.

 

i thought of it as taking all the data and pushing it together to get rid of all the gaps in between it... i said "compression" thats a crap word... thanks for correcting me as i worded it badly in the first place... although i do know what i mean! but it was worded wrongly.

[Jordie]

I would contest the one point you made though.

 

"and this computer does not run a lot faster... i knew it would speed up' date=' but not this much... some people say they format their computer twice a year, which i thought was bit over the top, but i can now see why they do it."

 

Formating the `puter is madness unless it REALLY needs it.

 

why not just de-frag the HDDs instead?

 

less faffing, faster and safer to do, and with the same if not better results! [/quote']

 

If you are a Linux user then you don't have to worry about doing defrags unless you used a Microsoft file system. Only Windows users have to worry about that.

[5614]

how so?

 

does linux automatically re-arrange a HDD when a program is deleted, moved or unistalled?

in which case removing files could be a slow process

 

or does it just not include one?

which doesnt mean it doesnt need doing.

 

NB: im not a linux user... although have used it and am not aware in the way it in which it maintains the HDD, so no offense, but to me it doesnt sound like a good thing not have a defrag.

[premjan]

doesn't linux have some sort of indirection of file blocks so that the blocks for a file are not likely to be adjacent on the hdd anyway?

[Jordie]

how so?

 

does linux automatically re-arrange a HDD when a program is deleted' date=' moved or unistalled?

in which case removing files could be a slow process

 

or does it just not include one?

which doesnt mean it doesnt need doing.

 

NB: im not a linux user... although have used it and am not aware in the way it in which it maintains the HDD, so no offense, but to me it doesnt sound like a good thing not have a defrag.[/quote']

 

I didn't know really how to put it into my own words, so I copied it from http://xpt.sourceforge.net/techdocs/linuxdisk/Misc/linuxdisk13.002.html

 

Yes, but you don't need it and it can seriously mess up your filesystem. The ext2 filesystem that Linux uses was designed a bit more intelligently than FAT, and does not suffer nearly as badly from file fragmentation.