IT Queries: Computer problems answered

I have Windows XP. I removed an Anti Virus and replaced it. Now, when i enter Control Panel and click Security centre I receive a message \”Security Essentials\” \’ The Security Centre is currently unavailable because the the Security Service was not started or was stopped. Please close this window, restart the computer( or start the \”Security Centre\” service ) and then open the Security Centre again.How can I have new Anti Virus included in ? ( I can configure \’Internet Options, Automatic updates and Firewall )

It appears the old anti virus has disabled the Security Center Service. To fix this it should be a matter of enabling the service again.

To do this, open the Control Panel, go to Administrative Tools and open Services.

Go down the list until you get to Security Center, click on it and select the Startup Type as “Automatic” and click “Apply”. Then click “start”.

Many services rely on other services to run and the Security Center Service relies on the Windows Management Instrumentation and Remote Procedure Call Services. You might have to check both of these are set to “Automatic” and are running.

If any of these services have a problem starting then we’d suggest taking the computer back to an earlier restore point and if that fails, call your friendly local computer tech.

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A newsletter I subscribe to had an item regarding Broadband speeds. It recommended readers check their download speeds by going to “speedtest.net“

When on that site a link was shown to products which offered access to free applications that would clean your computer and make your computer run faster. Do you know of these applications and are they safe? The applications are listed on the right hand side of the Speedtest screen

Anthony

Hi Tony,

I had a look at that site too. It’s a terrific little setup.

That said, I wouldn’t trust any broadband accelerator with a bargepole. You can slightly improve the speed of your Internet connection with various tweaks and but the risks of messing something up are high. A lot of the paid for accelerators are snake oil and many of the free ones are spyware supported.

We’d recommend you give them a miss.

Recently my computer has started slowing to a halt after a few minutes use, when it does I press CTR-ALT-DEL and find my computer is using 100% of resources. What can I do?

This appears to be a problem with the Microsoft Update service. The immediate fix is to open Windows Update, go to the Change Settings links, scroll down and the option to Stop Using Microsoft Update is at the bottom.

If it continues, you can disable Automatic Updates in the Control Panel. Choose Turn off Automatic Updates. Microsoft have further instructions at their website.

It appears NVidia drivers can cause this problem as well as discussed in this thread on the Microsoft usenet groups. We’d suggest calling a computer technician before uninstalling IDE or RAID drivers as this can render your computer unusable.

Problems like this can take some time to troubleshoot, so it’s best to start with the simplest and obvious first.

Good luck.

My Internet Explorer 7 window keeps shutting down by itself. What could be the cause of this problem? I am using Windows XP on a Centrino Duo Laptop.

Thank you!

First of all you need to clean to clean up your browser. First of all, uninstall all toolbar packages, search assistants and similar things that might be loading up with Internet Explorer.

Next, clean out your temporary files. Internet Explorer has a horrible habit of accumulating too much. We recommend using the excellent Cleanup! tool. Make sure you read the instructions before running it.

The next step is to make sure you don’t have any spyware on your computer. We recommend running the free online XScan to start with. If it detects any spyware then you’ll need something stronger like Spybot, Adaware, AVG or a visit from your local computer tech.

If the problem still persists it’s worthwhile uninstalling Internet Explorer 7 and returning to IE6.

It’s also worthwhile running the System File Checker while the computer is in IE6, you can do this by clicking Start, Run and typing SFC /scannow this does take some time and you may be asked to provide your original Windows XP disk.

If the scannow and revert to IE6 work, then reinstall IE7 and see if the problem is then cleared.

Good luck

Currently I can receive and post email however when opening internet explorer 7 I cannot display web pages unless I \”Pause\” Kaspersky.  Any suggestions appreciated

Regards,

Barry 

Hi Barry,

I assume by Kaspersky you mean Kaspersky Internet Security.

What’s happening is the firewall has blocked the program from accessing the net. If the firewall doesn’t trust the program then it won’t let connect. This is what a firewall is supposed to do and why a firewall is an important part of protecting your computer from malware.

Like all firewalls, you can manually change the settings, Kaspersky have the instructions at their website. When you click “add” to the trusted the file path should be %ProgramFiles%\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe. 

While IE7 is a good browser, we’d still suggest you use Opera or Firefox for day-to-day browsing and only use Internet Explorer for sites that won’t work with the other two.

Good luck

When I click on my Windows Explorer I get a new screen rather that the old one. This new screen warns me of a risk to my security level. I use PC-ciilin already. This new one appears to be a windows explorer security service and tells me I should download asoftware called “Spi Heal” and “Dr Antispy”. Is this a legitimate warning and should I download it. When I close it, my wndows explorer screen closes so I can’t use the internet. Should I get rid of it and, if so, how?

Geoff

Hi Geoff,

You’ve got a spyware infection.

The first step is to do a quick scan using an online scanning program like the XClean online scan. We’d recommend downloading it then restarting in safe mode and running the spyware scan.

Unfortunately these type of warnings usually indicate a fairly advanced infection. Once you’ve cleaned it, it might be worthwhile to run a system restore to an earlier point which will hopefully not be infected.

If you continue getting these messages, you’ll need to call your local friendly computer tech. Make sure you back up your important data as it might be best to reformat your computer.

Suddenly, all software programs on my computer (Windows XP) have become “.lnk” files and I am unable to open them.

What caused this? and how do I overcome the problem?

Please help!

Dennis

Hi Dennis,

What has happened is your computer has forgotten how to deal with these files, in computer languate they have “lost their associations”. This problem is usually caused by an errant software package messing with the settings. Some security programs like Lavasoft Adaware block the files with the same result.

Fixing it is awkward and might require the services of a technician. There is a simple fix you can try before getting on the phone.

Open the computer in Safe Mode by pressing the F5 key as the computer starts. You should press the key just after the black and white screen but before the “starting Windows screen” appears. You might have to do this a few times before you time it right.

Once in safe mode, click “Start” then “Run” and type “CMD”. A command box appears. In the command box type the following:

“%systemroot%\system32\restore\rstrui.exe”.

The System Restore function will start and you can take the system back to the point before this started.

If this doesn’t work, Doug Knox has some tools to fix it on his website, you can download them from his web pag. Be warned that these are not for the inexperienced. If you don’t understand what you are doing, you need to consult an experienced technician.

When I try to run Windows Update it comes up with an error page. I can’t log onto my Internet banking either.

The fact you can’t open secure sites sounds like Internet Explorer has hit a problem. If it were just Windows Update, then it would be a different fix. Secure website issues are usually due to the Windows XP cryptographic service.

Click Start, and then click Run.
In the Open box, type cmd, and then click OK.
At the command prompt, type the following commands, and press ENTER after each command, you might be asked to click OK after each command

regsvr32 /u softpub.dll
regsvr32 /u wintrust.dll
regsvr32 /u initpki.dll
regsvr32 /u dssenh.dll
regsvr32 /u rsaenh.dll
regsvr32 /u gpkcsp.dll
regsvr32 /u sccbase.dll
regsvr32 /u slbcsp.dll
regsvr32 /u mssip32.dll
regsvr32 /u cryptdlg.dll
exit

Restart your computer.
Click Start, click Run, type cmd in the Open box, and then click OK.
At the command prompt, type the following commands, and press ENTER after each command:

regsvr32 softpub.dll
regsvr32 wintrust.dll
regsvr32 initpki.dll
regsvr32 dssenh.dll
regsvr32 rsaenh.dll
regsvr32 gpkcsp.dll
regsvr32 sccbase.dll
regsvr32 slbcsp.dll
regsvr32 mssip32.dll
regsvr32 cryptdlg.dll

net stop cryptsvc
ren %systemroot%\System32\Catroot2 oldcatroot2
net start cryptsvc
exit

Now click on start and reboot your computer.

I’m trying to copy data from my old Windows XP machine to my new Vista computer. It’s really slow and I’m worried there’s something wrong with my new system.

The slow copying to Vista computers has upset a lot of people. It’s certainly messing up a lot of computer techs who’ve agreed to a set price for a new computer setup. What used to take at most an hour on an XP machine can take a day on a Vista system.

There’s a number of theories for this, some report changing the network adapter settings can resolve the problem, others blame the Indexing service while a few posters are suggesting Digital Right Management as being the culprit.

If it’s the DRM then right now we have no solution, that’s been pretty well protected so far. So we’d suggest starting with the easier stuff.

Disabling the Indexing service

Type Services at the Start Search bar, right click on the Windows Search service and select Properties. In the start type choose Disabled for the start type. Then stop the service by right clicking on it and selecting Stop.

It’s worthwhile leaving the Indexing service off as Microsoft’s indexing service has had problems in the past. If you do find it is affecting some software, then you can turn it back on later.

Changing the network adaptor settings

Some techs have found changing the network adapter speed from “Automatic” to whichever setting is suitable for your network has worked.

When changing this setting, it’s important to check what the speed of the device at the other end of the network cable is. Most switches and routers are 100 bps and newer computer are usually gigabit. If in doubt, assume it is 100.

To change the settings, type “control” into the start search bar. In the control panel click Manage Network Connections. The next window will bring up your network adapter connection details and right click on the adapter then choose Properties.

In the properties page, click the “configure” button underneath the adapter name. In the advanced configuration, choose “Media Type” and set it to the correct speed for your network. If in doubt, set it to 100/Full Duplex.

Disable thumbnails

It is possible the way Vista handles thumbnails are responsible for these problems. To disable this, go to the Control Panel, click on Folder Options and change the “Always show icons, never thumbnails”.

If none of this works, it might prove quicker to copy data to an external drive and then copy across over time from that drive. You should have a copy of all your data on an external drive as part of a data protection strategy.

I had problems with the free Norton antivirus on my new computer and I installed another antivirus. This caused more problems and I couldn’t uninstall Norton. I ran the Norton Removal Tool to get rid of it.

Now my Sidebar gadgets are all white boxes and the clock is a strange orange color and stuck on midnight. How can I fix this?

This is a problem with a lot of the bundled software on new machines. Apple’s “fat PC” ad is pretty close to the mark. It’s best to remove all trial and bundled software from a new machine before doing anything else.

It appears the removal tool affects Vista in a way that Symantec and Microsoft haven’t anticipated. In this case the scripting functions have been damaged. There’s three potential fixes.

1. Repair the Windows components.

Click the start button and in the Start Search box type CMD

A black box will appear with the “>” prompt, type the following.

regsvr32 scrrun.dll

Click enter. You will get a confirmation that registration succeeded. You may be asked to enter the Administrator password after clicking enter.

Type regsvr32 jscript.dll

Type regsvr32 msxml3.dll

Click okay. You will get a security warning which you should agree to and you might get a confirmation that registration succeeded.

Reboot the computer.

2. Install the Vista scripting shell

If that hasn’t worked the next step is to install the new Vista scripting shell. You can download this from Microsoft as we describe on our Windows Scripting page.

The website may not work in Internet Explorer if your scripting functions are damaged so you may have to access it in Firefox and go through Microsoft’s silly authentication process.

Reboot the computer.

3. Reinstall Java.

A few people affected by this have reported, Java fixing the problem. I’m sceptical, but the latest Java engine is good idea anyway.

http://java.com/en/download/index.jsp

Reboot the computer.