Posts by dmcaarlson Contributing to Articles being Marked Solved

I gave up on WET after trying for several different machines. I only had it work effectively once -- it screwed things up twice more.

I backup files to an external drive, get favourites/bookmarks, save email with a utility that will save account info, and use that. I generally find it smooth.

Have you tried running a scan with your anti-malware suite? An additional scan with Malwarebytes? Sometimes this is a malware message and not one from Windows.

A couple of things --
Can you boot to a last known good configuration? (Try first)
Have you tried Ctrl-Alt-Del twice (two times) to see if you can start the logon manager (sometimes this will work)?

As an aside --
Backups aren't just important, they are essential before using tweakers.
Tweakers can provide a GUI to those who really know what they are doing, but they can get others in real trouble.

If you don't have two open USB ports to do what David suggested, buy or borrow a USB hub to give that a try.

If someone is reading this post before using Easy Transfer, however, my anecdotal suggestion is that Easy Transfer seems to work more consistently machine-to-machine than machine-to-disc-to-machine in my experience. An alternative is a good backup of personal files and taking the opportunity to redo personal settings on new operating systems (assuming this is an OS upgrade).

I almost forgot, in best practices, particularly if you can get more RAM, MS no longer supports XP SP2 but supports SP3 (extended support) into 2014. You will find better security and more application support if you do this upgrade.

I suppose the first thing I would say is if your machine is running ok and you intend to keep it a while, go onto a site like www.4allmemory.com or www.crucial.com, run their configurator, and see how much is would cost to upgrade to at least 2GB of RAM. 512 works for SP2, but it is really a minimum (thank you M$).

You could go into your Programs list and uninstall components you are not using of your HP Print package. Unfortunately, disabling the ink level indicator, in example, on their newer printers can also cause communication interruptions that stop the printer from working. The only things I can think of disabling that haven't caused problems for me on some machine are: The Yahoo Toolbar they load, SmartWebPrinting, and the HP Store. I have had mixed results with the HP Feedback.

This is not an AIO, but if you get those machines, the default scanning software, etc, do have a serious resource load. To get around the memory issue on those machines, there is usually a driver-only install on the HP website (designed for businesses) that will allow printing only and minimize the pain.

First, there is no 'Windows 2007'. There is Windows 7 or MS Office 2007.

Second, have you looked at how files are displayed in your Documents Library? If this is Windows 7, right under the 'Documents library' heading in the viewing windows, you should see how many locations are aggregated in that window. While I understand why MS chose to make our viewing pleasure 'easier' with this, it can make finding actual files for people accustomed to navigating through previous exploration methods (like me) crazy with the duplication. If you are not familiar with this, you might want to read up on the 'folder view' and its settings in Vista and Windows 7.

If this is occuring in MS Office, that is a different question.

I know you were having trouble setting it up on 64-bit Windows ... I was wondering if you downloaded the setup designed for 64-bit (the link I provided has it)? I found that if I did the free link from the AVG site, it sometimes tried to install the 32-bit version of the app rather than the 64-bit version.

I may have missed it, but I don't recall seeing anyone talk abou the 64-bit install for AVG free here. Did you try that? Here is an easy place to download it http://www.filehippo.com/download_avg_antivirus/. I have found that using the 32- or 64- but install from a full download has worked much better on the 64-bit home systems I've worked on ... though I can't explain why.

Yup -- that's one of terms that was used. It means the indexing and size was confirmed.

Have you checked on your machine to see how many Quicken backups are on your machine? It is possible it found a maximum number of backups in the previous file location. It is safe to cull the number you save if you are confident of the current database ... and it has the advantage of giving you additional hard drive space. I don't recall if that was a problem with the 98 edition, but I do remember it sometimes caused a problem with 2004, not allowing additional backups until the oldest ones were deleted. It is at least something worth looking at.

Intuit changed the location of them and I don't have a copy of Quicken 98 for reference so I'm going to punt here. You might look in the help menu for "database repair" or "index repair", or "compress database". Any of them would do the same thing. I would look first under the file menu near the manual backup area.

For grins, did you try changing the location on your C drive for the backup?

Also, while you will want a backup first (chicken and egg here), when did you last run the maintenance utilities on the database? This is to make sure it is correctly reporting the size during the backup process.

Nuance has a PDF converter that does pretty well http://www.nuance.com/products/pdf-converter-professional7/index.htm

Outlook tends to have trouble if it can't make the connections it wants, even if the user doesn't.

Disconnecting Outlook from Exchange generally needs to be initiated from Exchange.

Have you tried setting the Exchange box in Cached Mode? At least that would make it stop looking for the server until online status is reinstated.

1.From the Tools menu, select Email Accounts... .
2.In the window that opens, under "Email", make sure View or change existing email accounts is selected, and then click Next.
3.Highlight your Exchange server account, and click Change... .
4.To turn Cached Exchange Mode on or off, under "Microsoft Exchange Server:", check or uncheck Cached Exchange Mode. Click Next, and in the window that opens, click OK.
5.Click Finish. Restart Outlook for the change to take effect.

Advise if this helps.

Have you tried running SCANPST to repair the PSTFile? Sometimes, it will help clear this up.

Another issue can be connection quality with the email server -- if there is an interruption here, it can compromise the PST file and repair will be necessary.

What Toolbars and other add-ins do you have installed? Do you open one tab or more than one (look in internet options for the default window)? Is your IE set to restore the last window on open or open default?

Yes, this can happen with rootkits, etc, but these other areas can also cause the issue.

Just for grins, while you are checking configurations, do you have anything you don't recognize in your startup (I like CCleaner/Tools/Startup rather than MSConfig because I can disable and re-enable line items easily)? Using the CCleaner (www.ccleaner.com) to address the startup and letting it do a good clean of your tempfiles, etc. might be a good additional step (on the theory that a tempfile may be re-launching when you open the browser).

Hmmm. To rule out OS vs username, have you tried adding a different variation on her name as username? Just leave it administrator first, log in with that username so it creates the profile elements, log out, then change it to limited.

I would try creating her account one more time. For the troubleshooting period, leave it as an admininstrative account. When you have created it, see if you have the switch option -- and if you do, log in to it so the default setup is created. Now log out of her account and re-enter yours. Change her to a limited user and log out of your account. See if her name is shown on the screen. If you cannot --

Go into the registry (caveat -- always backup first)
Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\SpecialAccounts

If her account is listed, it should not have an entry for DWord with a value of 0 (this would hide the account). If it is creating accounts as hidden, try changing the DWord to 1, then restart.

Have you tried clearing your browser cache and cookies and trying again?

There are reports of SP3 machines being unable to update further ... something to do with WGA corrupting. Sorry I don't have an answer, but maybe it will give you something to google.