Computer Crashed

[Jacksboys]

I just wanted to let everyone know that my computer got a bad virus and crashed last night, so I will not be on here for a while.        I am using a friend's computer to type this.

If I have sent you an email recenty, please run a virus scan on your computer just in case.   

I will try and check in every once in a while, but I am not leaving.   

[dougs bs23]

ewww virus' spam, worms, phishing attacks,,, i can relate,,,, one cost me a new hard drive last winter, I figured it came thru somehow on one of the kids myspace accounts

[whitesatinmopar]

We too had such a situation recently, appears it came through a non suspecting e-mail with an outside link attached. Our virus protection caught it but it was a mess for a while.

[Rare_T_A]

I had a nasty one last winter.        The only way I got rid of it was I had to use the setup disc for my hard drives and set it format the drive to X&O's. It took a long time but it also worked. I ended up having to do both desktops this way and thank god my laptop was not plugged in so it escaped the may-lay.

[Jacksboys]

Hey everone,
Still using a friends computer. 
I cannot find my setup disc, so I am out of luck to re-format it right now.
My computer was a laptop, so I am debating if I want to buy a new or have this one fixed.  Either way, it might be a couple/few weeks before I am back to normal.

Feels wierd not talking to everyone daily.   

[Carlwalski]

Mine is unplugged too!?!  I'm using our secondary one, not bad to use just weird. Not sure what was going on but it said one of the main software pieces that creates start up had been removed or was no longer available, big red x's everywhere, turn off at the wall, try all the tricks I knew but nothing....waiting on our PC guy to come have a look. Hopefully all is good because I had thousands of photos of Lucy and cars and the registry etc on there and I was planning to copy them all to disc this weekend.......perhaps one weekend too far. 


#$%& Eh, what-can-ya-do. 

[Moparal]

Hey everone,
Still using a friends computer. 
I cannot find my setup disc, so I am out of luck to re-format it right now.
My computer was a laptop, so I am debating if I want to buy a new or have this one fixed.  Either way, it might be a couple/few weeks before I am back to normal.

Feels wierd not talking to everyone daily.   

I build computers for a pass time to stay occupied at night.  I just built this one for my shop.  Want me to send you a copy of xp proffessional corporate?  Just for you tho. It can be registered and it will reformat you back to a clean start. You'd loose everything you had on the disc tho.

[jeryst]

Don't buy a new one, unless you want a new one. Your computer is not broken, it is just corrupted. Once you reformat the hard disc, and reinstall windows, it will be as good as new. Before that, you may want to take it to a service that extracts data from bad disc drives and save your pictures. It might be a little pricey, but only you can put a price on the photos and other documentation that you might lose forever.

In order to keep this from happening to me, I bought a cheap portable hard disc. I keep EVERY file that I create (documents, pictures, etc) in the "My Documents" folder. That way, once a week, I plug in the portable drive, and copy the "My Documents" folder to the portable drive, preserving my information in case of a problem. Then I put the portable in my safe deposit box (backup is no good if a fire destroys it along with your computer). Also, since the portable is not always connected to the PC, it can't get trashed by a virus, and it's unlikely that it will get corrupted from a file in the "My Documents" folder.

[Street_Challenged73]

The best thing to do is purchase a cheap external HD case, without a HD installed, pull out your old HD and place it properly into the case, then run a 2.0 USB cable from that to another system to extract any important information from your HD.  Then if the HD itself isn't corrupt (unfortunately mine was toast), pull it back out of the external case and reinstall it into the system and reformate and reinstall Windows.  You should be able to save all your data that wasn't within the corrupted sector of the HD, so you shouldn't loose too much info.

http://cgi.ebay.com/2-5-External-Hard-Disk-Drive-Enclosure-Case-USB-2-0-bm_W0QQitemZ200111005894QQihZ010QQcategoryZ130860QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
That's the standard size of 2.5" used in laptops.  If you need a 3.5" for whatever reason, they're about the same price.

[Andrew]

I build computers for a pass time to stay occupied at night.  I just built this one for my shop.  Want me to send you a copy of xp proffessional corporate?  Just for you tho. It can be registered and it will reformat you back to a clean start. You'd loose everything you had on the disc tho.

I personally wouldnt use any wondows OS other than 2000 professional, I have found its the most stable and has the least number of viruses for it out there. Another alternative is to change to linux - its free and IMO the best operating system out there (unfortunately my current PC cant run it). A lot of people will tell you to swap to Mac - because "it just works." But thats just mac owners out there, who are generally the people who will spend half an hour repeating reasons their mac is better than your PC that they heard from some other mac owner who didnt know what they were talking about either.

Im not trying to be rude or anything, but generally computers get viruses when people do stupid things. Normally its best to remember that if something seems odd, its a viruis (like a 4 minute song that is only 722kb)

[duodec]

I personally wouldnt use any wondows OS other than 2000 professional, I have found its the most stable and has the least number of viruses for it out there. Another alternative is to change to linux - its free and IMO the best operating system out there (unfortunately my current PC cant run it). A lot of people will tell you to swap to Mac - because "it just works." But thats just mac owners out there, who are generally the people who will spend half an hour repeating reasons their mac is better than your PC that they heard from some other mac owner who didnt know what they were talking about either.

Im not trying to be rude or anything, but generally computers get viruses when people do stupid things. Normally its best to remember that if something seems odd, its a viruis (like a 4 minute song that is only 722kb)

A properly designed and written OS would be a lot more tolerant of user operating headspace errors like that.  Linux is potentially better at that (if properly and somewhat painstakingly configured) than windows but also leaves a lot more room for an incautious user to royally screw themselves (ooh! what does the 'rm -r *' command do!)

Unfortunately if you want to play games, or are lockstepped into MS apps like office and word, or have to deal with the (thankfully declining in number) websites that were written for proprietary internet explorer functions, you don't have much choice.  So you get to run a poorly designed sloppily implemented but feature-rich and glitzy petri dish just waiting for you to make one little mistake, visit one compromised website, click on one 'looks OK but who knows' link, preview one email with the zero-day-exploit du jure to get compromised by some script kiddy, chinese hacker, russian mobster, or botnet maintainer.  Go ahead, make their day.

No thanks.  There are better choices, just like with cars.

[Jacksboys]

I build computers for a pass time to stay occupied at night.  I just built this one for my shop.  Want me to send you a copy of xp proffessional corporate?  Just for you tho. It can be registered and it will reformat you back to a clean start. You'd loose everything you had on the disc tho.

Thanks for the offer.  I just might take you up on that, but I need to search my house again to see if I can find my disc somewhere first.  Maybe I will get lucky.

I was lucky with most of my files, I have an external HD that I updated about two months before the crash, so I only lost a few items.


NZ440R/T,
Sorry to hear about your computer, I hope you are able to save your info. 


The funny thing about not have a computer, is the fact that I have more time to work on my cars and house.

[Carlwalski]

NZ440R/T,
Sorry to hear about your computer, I hope you are able to save your info. 

Thanks mate, I have the new PC hard drive up and running so I've been setting up photo folders and all that jazz. The installer took our old hard drive away to see what could be retrieved, he said looks like the photos and some other bits and pieces were OK, but, I'm just going to expect everything was gone, not hold my breath. He'll be around to day to let us know what he found.

[MJS73]

The best thing to do is purchase a cheap external HD case, without a HD installed, pull out your old HD and place it properly into the case, then run a 2.0 USB cable from that to another system to extract any important information from your HD.

That's good advice.  Also, after you get your computer set up the way you want it, pick up a copy of Drive Snapshot or Acronis True Image to make an "image" of your hard drive on CD or DVD so, if there's another problem, you can pull out the image disc and restore it to exactly how it was before the problem.

Also, check out www.carbonite.com.  $50 per year for unlimited online backup so you won't lose your photos, tax returns, etc.in case of a crash or virus.

One last thing: Most viruses and spyware are spread because of behavior (clicking links in e-mails, attachments, etc.) and no virus scanner or anti-spyware software can overcome that.

Mike