Computer Troubleshooting Thread

[Glen]

uhhh i have an eMachines computer i got in 2005. i arrived home to find thst it was off (i usually leave it on, which i assume isnt too good for it) and that any attempts to turn it on resulted in the tower booting up, but then just making a repeated beeping noise and not actually starting.

any ideas guys?

 

[Konrad]

uhhh i have an eMachines computer i got in 2005. i arrived home to find thst it was off (i usually leave it on, which i assume isnt too good for it) and that any attempts to turn it on resulted in the tower booting up, but then just making a repeated beeping noise and not actually starting.

any ideas guys?

Something similar happened to my computer last year. Any attempt to turn it on made it try to start up and beep - but it got no where. It turned out, that the video card had fried and I needed to replace it.

 

[Ancax]

Can someone help me in my search for a successful way to change .avi files to .wma files? I have tried, but to no avail.

 

[Marix]

Can someone help me in my search for a successful way to change .avi files to .wma files? I have tried, but to no avail.

http://www.download.com/WM-Converter/3000-2194_4-10726409.html

 

[Ancax]

Thanks, Marix, I really appreciate it.

 

[Bologo]

Alright, my comp needs a bit of help with the USB ports. The USB ports on the back of my comp work perfectly fine, they detect USB keys and such.

However, the ones on the side of the computer don't for some reason. My bro checked its BIOS and it says that all the USB ports are enabled, and it's not exactly letting us add new hardware to download them if they're not installed. It's very odd because it's only these particular USB drives on my computer that aren't detecting, but the ones on the back of my comp are, so I really don't understand.

Please help me, and I'm not all that good with computers, so yeah. :]

 

[ncsbert]

uhhh i have an eMachines computer i got in 2005. i arrived home to find thst it was off (i usually leave it on, which i assume isnt too good for it) and that any attempts to turn it on resulted in the tower booting up, but then just making a repeated beeping noise and not actually starting.

any ideas guys?

On many motherboards, 3 quick beeps means there is no video card present, one long beep means the RAM is either non-existent, or has gone bad, and continuous beeping means the CPU is overheating.

These are the typical hardware related things that keep you from booting. Most of the cases I've seen (80%+) involve one of these three issues.

If you Google the model of your emachine, you might be able to find out what motherboard it has, and look for the manual for it. It should have info as to what type of error beeps mean what.

 

[timw06]

@Bologo: Check Device Manager (press Windows + Pause|Break and look under Hardware) if there are any yellow warnings or red crosses next to items then you have a driver conflict, try updating (or rolling back) drivers for the hardware involved.

However, the most likely cause of the USB ports' death is that an internal USB cable has got itself disconnected. You will need to open up your computer to see if this is the case. Try and follow the cable back from the side ports - it should lead into either the motherboard or join up to a cable coming from the rear USBs. If it is broken or disconnected then, unless where it goes is really obvious, you probabaly need to consult your motherboard manual and find out where the internal USB plugs are (go to the BIOS and google the motherboard make you find there if you haven't a paper copy).

Hope this helps!

 

[Ben.]

Right,I've had a quick look on google but have ended up very confused... I'm not good with computers!

I've followed the XChat Tutorial on the smogon main site, and it all works fine till I try and connect I get this message:
* *** Looking up your hostname...
* *** Found your hostname (cached)
* *** Checking ident...

A few seconds later:

*** No ident response; username prefixed with ~
* :Erroneous already in use. Retrying with "Second choice of nickname"...
* :Erroneous already in use. Retrying with "Third choice of nickname"...
* Nickname already in use. Use /NICK to try another.

Obviously there is my choice of nickname Instead of "Second choice of nickname". but this occurs regardless of what nickname I choose, even ones that clearly couldn't be already in use (Such as random series of numbers/letters)

Then about 30 seconds later a red line appears. Which from what I gather means I'm disconnected...

Then I reconnect and the whole cycle continues.
Any help would be great, as I said, computers really are not my strong point.
...Ben

 

[ryubahamut]

From what I've been able to gather, a firewall or something of that sort is disabling the X-Chat Identd from starting up (hence the No Ident Response message). While this should not be a problem (a lot of users log on with ident disabled), a starting point would be to let X-Chat act as a server on whatever firewall you are using.

 

[kamikaen]

I have a weird problem, and I didn't know whether to put it the web browser software thread (that doesn't look like it offers help for these types of problems), this thread (that looks more geared towards the actual computer than the web browser software), or to find another site. Anyway, this is a screenshot of my wide screen laptop using Firefox. I used to view something like this a while ago, while I still had IE7 (though it changed long before I got Firefox). Of course, it wasn't as squished, but that was the best I could do with Paint. :( The problem with the way I'm viewing the internet now is that big paragraphs sometimes come out in just two or three lines. I don't know, I just liked it the way it was before. Is there any way to change it back to the way it was? I'm working with Firefox. it's not a huge deal, but I thought I'd ask, because I'd like to see what other people see when I read a paragraph. :P Yes, I've checked the options on Firefox, and it says nothing about "condensing the screen"...

I'll check this thread regularly, or someone can PM me if they'd like to help.

 

[gengod]

Been having some problems with my Gateway laptop lately, I'm currently running Vista Home Premium and ive been having trouble with some programs when i try to launch them or some that are active may even shut down.

For example ive tried to run Ares and it gives the error:

Ares - Bad Image

C:\Windows\system32\DCIMAN32.dll is either not designed to run on Windows or contains an error. Try installing the program again using the original installation media or contact your system administrator or the software vendor for support.

Ares will not open at all, neither at startup nor if i open it manually

I've also had a similar problem with my Windows Live Messenger where it starts and has the same error but the program actually runs this time or no set period of time, then the message comes up again and automatically closes the program

I've tried replacing the DCIMAN32.dll file with another one downloaded from the internet, but im not being allowed to overwrite the program or even move it even though i am the computer administrator, if it means anything the DCIMAN32.dll file i have now i 0 kb while the one i downloaded was 8.5 kb

I read somewhere on the internet about having to use a program to unlock the files as i still couldnt access them being the admistrator, i downloaded an unlocker program but it doesnt allow me to unlock the file due to security restrictions that i cannot find to alter.

This is really frustrating, so if anyone can help it would greatly be appreciated Thank you.

 

[ThirstyThirstin]

I don;t know if I'm in the right thread, but I can't find where to set my signature

 

[Havak]

I don;t know if I'm in the right thread, but I can't find where to set my signature

I don't think this is the right thread, but if you click "User CP" at the top of the screen, and then "Edit Signature" in the top left also, on the next page. You can set your Signature there.

 

[sbc]

http://www.smogon.com/forums/usercp.php

Edit Signature on the left

 

[KOL40]

I am building my own PC for gaming and am thinking of going with AMD Athlon 64 X2. But is Intell duo better? Or should I shoot for the quad core? What are the pros and cons here?

 

[KOL40]

I am building my own PC for gaming and am thinking of going with AMD Athlon 64 X2. But is Intell duo better? What are the pros and cons here?

 

[Sir_Lu]

I've been having trouble with loading the Smogon forums on Firefox recently. It worked last night, but today, it just leaves a blank page. On the other hand, IE works fine. What could be the problem?

 

[Casemarqui]

Its working in FE for me now

 

[crabnebula]

I recently bought a new motherboard, a Mercury PI945GCM. The new mobo has one IDE port while my old one had 2. My hard disk is Samsung SP4002H, a PATA hard disk and I have a Sony DW120 DVD-RW drive. I want to use both my hard disk and DVD writer, and thus connected them on the same channel with hard disk as Master and DVD writer as slave. But the problem is, BIOS doesn't detect the DVD writer. No matter what I do, when connected simultaneously only 1 is detected. The drives are working fine and are detected when connected separately. Solution appreciated.

EDIT: Nevermind, fixed it myself. There was some problem with the IDE connector cable, replaced it and both are working fine.

 

[CardsOfTheHeart]

I doubt I can find an answer here, but this is the only place I know to ask.

The problem? A classic one: no sound through headphones. When I try to play MP3 through Windows Media 11 on my Vista laptop, the sound is just fine, but pop in those headphones in the analog jack and I get nothing.

It gets better, though. My CD-RW/DVD-ROM drive, a Sony NEC Optiarc CRX880A, doesn't have analog playback to be able to get sound through the headphones. (The option is not available through Windows Media Player, anyway.) The weird thing is that I used to be able get sounds in the headphones with the very same computer. But, that was before Vista got corrupted and I had to wipe the hard drive clean before I could restore everything to its original factory settings.

Since then, the headphones won't work. Multiple sets of headphones don't work. The drivers are up-to-date, though. I'm not sure where the problem is.

Any ideas?

 

[Jediment]

Sounds like you're missing the driver for your analog output (which is probable since you wiped your HD). I have no clue where you'd get a new one.

 

[CardsOfTheHeart]

Then again, I can't exactly remember when I was able to listen through the headphones. I did have a virus attack about three months after I got it which knocked out more than a few functions, including System Restore (turned off and couldn't turn on) and ReadyBoost. I'm starting to wonder if the drive even came with analog capabilities...

 

[Jediment]

Sounds like your computer has had a myriad of problems, which makes it hard to identify the source of analog output loss. Check in your drivers for analog output driver. You also may want to check devices to make sure the jack is working properly.

 

[afireohno]

The problem? A classic one: no sound through headphones. When I try to play MP3 through Windows Media 11 on my Vista laptop, the sound is just fine, but pop in those headphones in the analog jack and I get nothing.

keep it simple.
if all the other sound works i would check the jack itself first.
if you didn't install a driver to make them work originally you shouldn't need to now after restoring.
did you restore from disks and did you have to create the disks yourself from a partition?