IT Queries: Computer problems answered

I’m using Firefox and finding it keeps freezing up on me. I have to restart it everytime.

 Can I fix it?

System freezes are a pretty common complaint in the current version of Firefox. A good free program to fix it is FireTune. We recommend downloading this program and installing it on your computer.

When you run it, make sure Firefox is closed. Click the “Create backup of configuration” button so you can undo things if they go wrong.

In the first window, you’ll be asked what combination of computer and Internet connection you have. There’s an explanation of what is a fast computer and Internet connection at the bottom of the screen.

In the Other Useful Settings tab, click the Optimise Firefox memory usage button.

Click the Tune It! button and close the program.

Restart Firefox.

So far, trials on our machines have seen a good improvement. Give it a go and see how it works for you.

My anti virus program says it’s detected a Trojan on my work computer, and then requested delete, but the computer is still behaving strangely and the warning keeps happening. Is there another program that may help?

Simply deleting the Trojan probably won’t work. The problem with these programs is they are designed to hide in system files and reappear at the first opportunity.

Fixing a Trojan infection can be a very difficult process. The first step is to backup your data. It may be necessary to wipe your computer and reinstall everything.

Once you’ve backed up all your data, download as many spyware removal tools as possible to remove the trojan. We’d suggest starting with Malware Bytes, Spybot and Adaware.

A good anti-virus is also important. We’d recommend installing one of the free virus protection tools which we discuss at Which Free Anti-Virus is Best.

Each of these programs should be installed and their update routines run so they are fully up to date. DO NOT SCAN YOUR COMPUTER OR TRY TO REMOVE THE TROJAN YET.

Shutdown your computer and restart in Safe Mode. This will start the computer with the basic settings and, hopefully, without the Trojan starting, this is essential if you want to remove the trojan from your system.

With the computer running in Safe Mode, run all the anti virus and anti spyware programs you previously installed. Do one at a time and be aware this will take many hours.

This will clear all but the worst Trojan, virus or spyware infections, but what you should be aware of is modern malare is very good at hiding itself and if the problem persists you either have to call a technician or wipe the computer. This may be necessary to remove the Trojan from your computer

After any spyware or Trojan infection, you should be aware that any online services you’ve accessed might be compromised. We highly recommend you change all banking and other sensitive passwords and monitor your financial statements closely after finding an infection.

Safe mode is Windows with the bare minimum features. It is used for troubleshooting or to prevent viruses or troublesome programs starting with the computer.

In safe Mode you can’t access the Internet, hear any sound and the colours look dreadful.

To get into Windows safe mode you hold down the F8 starts. Timing is important and it can take a few attempts to get it right.

If you hold the key down too early you may get a key stuck error from the BIOS. Hold the key down too late then Windows will start normally.

In Windows XP and Vista you will get a menu. Normally you should select “Start Computer in Safe Mode”.

Once in Safe Mode you can navigate, remove files and uninstall programs. Scanning for viruses, running scandisk or defragmenting are common reasons for starting in Safe Mode as they won’t be distracted by other programs or locked files.

Running safe mode is not something you should do every day, but it is a useful tool when faced with a troublesome computer. Because it starts only the functions that Windows needs, it isn’t suitable for day-to-day use as you can’t use printers, CD’s or the Internet.

If your computer regularly starts in Safe Mode then you should back up your data and call a technician.

Hi,
I am running the latest version of Mozilla Firefox(it’s great). But after the latest update the toolbar link to Thunderbird (Email) has vanished.
Any thoughts about why and can it be reinstated?

It sounds like a recent upgrade has lost your email toolbar.

One of the features with Mozilla is the sheer number of add ins available for it. The add in you need is the Thunderbird Biff addin. There’s a lot of other addins you can install to make Firefox easier to use. We’d encourage exploring the packages available.

“In my computer when I double click on any of the drives I am getting the “open with” option to “choose the program you want to use to open this file:” & when I right click on the Drives I am getting “Auto” as  first option instead of  “open” what should I do?”

It sound like the drives has some files that Windows wants to run when it first looks at the drive.

The quickest way to fix this is to move as many files as possible into folders. This way Windows won’t assume you want that drive to run programs or videos. It’s good computer practice to keep what we call the root directory free of junk for this reason.

One of the most common culprits for this is an autorun.inf sitting in your root directory. Make sure you move any files that finish in .inf into another folder.

If your “c” drive that’s doing this then be very careful about moving files out of the root directory. It might be best to get a tech who knows which files are important to the Windows system.

“I am having trouble synchronising ipod shuffle with windows XP error message of ‘Cannot find required disk’ are you able to help”

What’s happening is iTunes cannot find the correct disk.

Windows handles disk names by giving each drive a letter. When you plug in an iPod or anything else that has some sort of storage in it, Windows will allocate a letter for that device.

What we usually find with this problem is that you have some removable and network drives connected and Windows has messed up the drive letters so the iPod is now a different letter to what iTunes is looking for.

The simplest solution is to unplug all the external drives, scanner, cameras, printers and anything else that might have been connected since the iPod last worked.

If that doesn’t work, Apple have instructions on fixing this at their website. We’d suggest giving the drive a letter further down the alphabet so it doesn’t get mixed up, “P” for “Pod” might not be a bad one.

I’m using Windows XP Home. When i hit the space bar (no programs open) a window pops up with ‘search results’ and below this search companion and then asks what does she want to search for……pictures/music/video.

… documents…..etc

On your system you have a shortcut key setup so the space bar is associated with the search function. You’ll need to look on your desktop, toolbars or start menu for a “Shortcut to Search” function.

If you find it, right-click it and choose properties, click the Shortcut tab and delete anything in the Shortcut key box.

It might turn out that you can’t find the errant shortcut. You may have to take the computer back to an earlier restore point which we’ll discuss in the next IT Query.

Over the last couple of months, my outlook has become very slow — so slow that when I go to type a reply – I have to wait for the letters that I type to appear on the screen.
I have XP Pro SP2 and have even gone to the trouble of doing a clean install of all my disk. I have Norton up to date and running as well as using Window Defender and Spybot with no viruses etc found.
I don’t seem to have the same problem at different times of the day or even on weekends.
Any clues??

The quickest way of finding what is tying up your system is to press the Ctrl, Alt and Delete keys at the same time to bring up the Windows Task Manager.

In the Task Manager box, there is tab marked as Processes. The two right hand columns on that list show what is using the memory and the CPU processes.

Once you’ve identified what processes are hogging the system, you can then search the net for those processes to find if they are legitimate and what the problem might be.

One problem we have encountered is the Windows Update service which we have covered previously. It might be worthwhile checking this is not affecting you.

I have a 802.11g network with my two grandchildren. (Windows XP Home) I keep getting the message System Error. “There is an IP address conflict with another system on the network”. This doesn’t appear to cause any problems, but please can you tell me how I can find out what the conflict is and how to correct it.

What’s happening is two computers have the same Internet Protocol (IP) address on your network. This can cause problems, but if you’re just surfing the net with these machines then you won’t notice them.

As part of your network you will have a router. Its the router’s job to give out addresses and for some reason one of the computers is holding onto it’s address and confusing the router.

The simplest way is to open the Control Panel on each computer and go to Network Connections. You will find all the different network connections listed, right click on the wireless connection and choose Repair. This will force the computer to get a new address from the router.

It is also possible one of the computers isn’t set up to get it’s address from the network. We’ll look at resolving that in another query.

When I try to open outlook express a box comes up which reads outlook express could not be started because MOSE.DLL could not be initialized

Are you sure the file is MOSE.DLL or MSOE.DLL?  We’ll work on the assumption it could be either.

The first step is to re-register these dll files.

Click Start, then Run and type regsvr32 msoe.dll.  Then click okay and a confirmation box should appear. Repeat this process for mose.dll.

Reboot your computer.

You might find the Outlook Express files are damaged. If this is the case, refer to our fixing Windows installation files tip.