IT Queries: Computer problems answered

I run Windows Vista Home Basic. Around June, I could no longer view my emails using Web Access for Outlook. All toolbars and folder trees were visible but the main area to view the list of emails in any folder is empty with the statement across the top saying – There are no items to view. Using my desktop, I don’t have a problem. Seems to be a change to my laptop in recent months. Our IT dept is unable to suggest a fix after many hours of review. Can you make a suggestion?

The obvious problem is a security patch or update to your system has blocked something on the laptop. You may want to ask your IT department to have a look at the security settings on your system and add your organisation’s server address to the “whitelists”, the list of sites trusted by your laptop’s security programs.

It may also be that your server address has somehow got onto a blocked list in your program settings. If you are using Internet Explorer on Windows Vista, follow these instructions from Microsoft on how to resolve the problem.

You many also want to try another web browser, although  Outlook Web Access works best on Internet Explorer.

please list current free anti virus software downloads that are thorough and efficient for windows 7 home?

The free anti virus programs we’d suggest for Windows 7 Home users are the following;

AntiVir: Will offer to give you the Premium edition for free as well, but we don’t like the sign up process
AVG Free: The sign up will also try to steer you towards the paid for package
Avast!: Avast is one of the longest standing free products

While AVG pushes their paid for version the hardest during the download process, all of the free versions are loss leaders for their paid versions.

The paid versions are good value for money compared to the bigger brand name products and give you more features than the free version and tech support for when there are problems.

We’d recommend the paid versions of all of these programs as well.

Note that all of these programs are free only for personal use; if you want to use them in a business you have to shell out for the paid versions.

I notice you advertise companies that provide registry cleaners on your site. I used a uniblue registry cleaner on my small notebook and it completely destroyed the operation of windows. I was able to recover normal operation through system restore. I would like to keep my computers running quickly and efficiently. Do you recommend the use of registry cleaners. I have Windows XP on both our laptops, Dell and Fujitsu.

The short answer is that we don’t recommend any registry cleaners as most are snake oil and the benefits of running a registry cleaner are not that great for the majority of Windows computers.

We discuss this in more detail, along with why we don’t recommend registry cleaners on our registry repair tools page.

Overall, save your money and time.

In regards to the adverts on the site, they are provided by third party companies and we unfortunately don’t control every advert that appears.

Hi, I need to reinstall my Win XP OS to get rid of all the junk I’ve accumulated;  I’ve burnt a DVD with my documents on it, but will my emails be there as well ?  if not, how do I preserve them ?

Your emails probably won’t be in My Documents unless you’ve specifically told your system to save them there.

Finding your emails on a Windows system is particularly irritating as the different programs dump them into different folders. In Outlook Express and Windows Mail the address books are also saved in a completely different location.

The best thing is to back up your entire profile, this sits in the Documents and Settings folder on your C: drive and the profile will be either your log in name or something close to it.

By backing up this entire folder, you’ll save your My Documents folder, desktop, web browser bookmarks, address books and email. Just take care that your email folder isn’t so big it won’t fit on a single DVD.

I have received a fraudulent email from a bogus UPS parcel delivery site. As I have been expecting a delivery, I mistakenly opened the email and clicked on the attachment.

My AVG 9 program promptly detected 2 viruses which I thought I had then successfully removed. However now, when I boot up, I get the following 2 error messages:
C:\\WINDOWS\\rhstap.dll – Specified module could not be found
C:WINDOWS\\olamobel.dll -Specified module could not be found

1. Does this mean the registry is damaged?

2. How can I repair the registry and avoid getting these error messages … can you recommend a safe registry repair tool?

It’s good your antivirus picked up the problem and removed the malware. Just to be safe, we’d recommend following our Removing a Trojan instructions as well.

Once you’re happy you’ve cleaned the computer out, you can fix the missing .dll issues. The registry itself isn’t damaged, it’s just trying to find the files the malware installed and told it to run on startup.

The best tool for cleaning out the errant registry entries is CCleaner and running that after making sure you are free of viruses should give your computer a significant performance boost.

I’m told my copy of Windows Vista is “at the end of support”. What does that mean?

Being at the end of support is Microsoft’s way of saying they won’t help you with that version of Windows any more and other people will probably stop writing programs for it. Microsoft explain it in a bit more detail on their website.

If your system is legitimate and working well, you can upgrade Vista or Windows XP to their latest Service Packs through the Windows Update site.

For most people though it doesn’t mean much. As long as your system is working fine, there should be few problems and experience has shown Microsoft will still provide important updates over time.

You should ask your computer tech to upgrade your system to the latest Windows service pack though at the first opportunity.

Would it be possible for me to install a new video card in desktop pentium 4 cpu 2.66ghz windows XP? The system shuts down then shows message thread stuck in device driver.The video card is nvidia gforce.Thanks.

It would be if you could find the right card, which in the case of this machine is probably an AGP card. The problem you will hit is finding a card is going to be expensive as these aren’t common any more.

You may find replacing the card isn’t necessary and it’s a software driver problem. This can be fixed by booting the computer into Safe Mode, deleting the existing video card drivers and copying the latest software across.

This isn’t a simple task though and it’s best done by a computer technician. You might want to speak with your local tech or computer store to see what the options are. It may be replacing the computer is a more cost effective option.

Hi Paul,
Unfortunately you had run out of time on the excellent radio program last night when I called. Wondering if you have any idea what has suddenly happened to my pc, XP o/s, HP9002.
1. All of my Inbox in Outlook Express disappeared. The 400 emails had been sent to the Deleted folder. This always happens when I first go in to Outlook
2. The Delete keyboard key no longer works.
3. When I click on the task bar Start menu a pop-up asks me if I want to send the Start Menu to the Recycle bin. This only seems to happen intermittently.

Hope you can help.

This certainly is very suspicious behaviour and the first step would be to follow our Removing a Trojan instructions. Before doing that, make sure all your data has been backed up.

Both free versions of AVG and Avast! are good programs and you should use whichever one you find easiest to install.

If no malware is found, it might be best to have a technician look at the system and your security settings.

I am using windows XP. I am on Microsoft Outlook for my email and I have gmail as my default email.

What should i do? should i go to control panel, firewall, and go to advanced and press return to default? i am scared to as it said some things could be lost. I think at some point last week I pressed a button somewhere saying ‘reset’ but i can’t remember what i did . thank you so much.

Email error 554 really doesn’t tell you much except the message has been rejected by the recipient’s server. It could be for any of a number of reasons which could lie on your system, your Internet provider’s servers or a problem at the other end.

One common problem is time and dates. If the clock on your computer is seriously out, then some servers will reject emails sent from it. So checking your computer’s time and date is a good first step.

You should also check your return addresses are correct; for instance if you are sending out emails saying you’re with AOL when you are really with Comcast will be another reason for servers to reject your emails.

If the problem continues, call your Internet provider and get their support line to walk through your email settings to ensure they are correct. Beyond that, the problems are either with the various mail servers or your ISP.

I am trying to upgrade from XP to Windows 7 and I’ve purchased a Western Digital external Hard drive so that I use the Windows easy transfer but I cannot save anything to this drive as it doesn’t appear as one of the available drives.

In Device Manager it shows as working correctly. It uses Windows USB drives so I have checked these. I have also used WD Help and they initially thought I had a faulty or damaged drive but I have the same problem with the replacement drive.

The likely problem is Windows has given the wrong drive letter to your external disk which is already in use by another device. This is a common problem on networks.

To fix it, you need to tell the system to change the drive letter. To do this, right-click My Computer, then click Manage and select Computer Management (Local)

On the right hand side of the screen (pictured above) click Disk Management then right-click the new drive and select Change Drive Letter and Path(s).

Click Change, and in the list, select a drive letter for the external drive that isn’t being used by another drive. It’s usually best to leave a few letters spare so this doesn’t happen again, for instance if the existing drives are C:, D: and E:, choose H or I. A good choice is R for “Removable Drive”.

When you’ve selected the new drive letter, click OK, and then click OK again.