Replies

Thanks Paul, for your comment.  We have in fact strongly considered just keeping Office 2003, but I do worry a little bit about security issues with old software that I often read about, although we have not had any download issues for a long time.  I do run MS Security Essentials regularly and also anti-malwarebytes occasionally.  That’s been good enough so far since we haven’t had any problems, but I’m not sure if we should be doing anything additional.  Any other comments welcome.

Thanks to everybody who responded.  I understand what’s going on much better.

Moderator note: Please use the “Thanks” button instead of creating a new reply

Problem solved !  Thanks Bill.  I pushed the cable connector in at an angle as you suggested and the cover moved just enough to allow the connector to enter, and then the wired connection worked just fine.  But I do wonder what advantage this change makes as it is more difficult to get the cable attached.  In any event, all is OK now.  Thanks again.

Bill, thanks for your response.  My ethernet cable is a standard cable with a standard connector that works just fine on my current PC.  Your picture of the ports on my new PC is accurate, but note that the Ethernet port appears to have a small cover or clip that prevents the cable connector from entering the port.  This small cover actually moves and looks like it should move down to allow the  cable connector to enter, but it doesn’t more far enough and I am afraid to push too hard and break the plastic.  There must be some way to release the cover or something but so far I can’t figure out what to do.  I’m guessing that Dell did this to save a millimeter or two of space but there are no instructions of what to do.  If anybody has a PC like this, or with a similar cover on their Ethernet port, I would be glad to know what to do to enable the ethernet cable connector to enter the port.  Thanks for any further suggestions.

Thanks, owburp, DBAN ver 1.0.7 worked like a charm.  I had been trying to use dban 2.3.0 which was 16 MB and wouldn’t install on the floppy.  I’m not sure what advantage the later version has, but the earlier one worked just fine.  Thanks again !

Update: I connected my problem PC to my TV with an HDMI cable, then turned on the TV and made sure that it’s signal source was the PC HDMI connector. Then I turned on the PC. Sure enough, the image on the TV was fine, but the image on the PC had the previously noticed multicolored lines at the bottom of the screen. So it appears that the LCD screen is the problem, not the display hardware. Also, the image problem on the PC disappears after a couple of minutes, so that it seems that the LCD screen needs to “warm up” and then it’s OK. I assume that this problem may get worse over time but I’m a little uncertain whether it’s worth the effort to fix it now. Any further comments appreciated.

Thanks to everyone for your helpful responses. The problem has only happened once so far and it does NOT occur when I move the screen back and forth. In fact, my wife’s PC has functioned normally all day today. The PC is not under warranty so there’s no help there. I will keep your responses for ideas of what to do if it happens again or becomes chronic. Thanks again for commenting on this problem.

Thanks, Rick – sigh, I guess I’ll have to try to figure out Photoshop. One more question:
the adobe download page has twelve different programs, including Photoshop CS2. Is that the only one I need?

2016 04 30:
Thanks to everybody who responded to my original request for help with lockups after boot, apparently involving Internet Explorer. My wife recently asked me again to fix it, since her PC is doing the same thing. I have been trying some of the options suggested previously but nothing has changed so far. Here is what I have tried:

1. Reset IE to defaults and reboot

2. Other websites suggest that “igfxupdate.exe” could be the problem but I could not find this program either in C:WindowsSystem32 or C:WindowsSysWOW64.

3. I applied a Microsoft Fix-it to Internet Explorer, as described at:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/mats/ie_performance_and_safety
The only problem fixed was to “Enable Data Execution Prevention.”
After running this Fixit, I rebooted, and the PC quickly lockup up again, just as before.

4. One previous suggestion was to see if a local program like Notepad locks up. But this is not possible to test because the keyboard and cursor don’t work during the lockup. In particular, even ctrl-alt-delete does NOT work during the lockup to bring up the Task Manager.

I still have some previous suggestions to try out, but wanted to thank those who responded for your suggestions and also let you know that I am still working on the problem.

Finally, I don’t really know how to interpret or understand the Task Manager/Resource Monitor. I note the following: with only MS Word open (NOT Internet Explorer), and the Task Manager, CPU Usage is low (0-1%) . Opening Resource Monitor initially shows CPU, Disk, Network, and Memory Hard Faults all blank (low usage). However, with Resource Monitor open (as I am typing this note), then CPU usage, Disk usage, and Network all spike higher (but NOT Memory Hard Faults). I don’t know what this means since the only thing running is MS Word, Task Manager, and Resource Monitor. Why would any of these programs use the Network or the Disk?

So I will continue trying to sort it out, but, as I said, nothing has affected the situation so far.
Thanks for any additional suggestions or comments.

Thank you, geochemster, for your response. It turns out I was too impatient. After about 11 hours, Windows 10 DID finally come up, preserving my desktop, WiFi connection, and networked printer. Microsoft messages said it would only take 90 minutes, so that’s why I thought something was wrong. In any event, here is a brief chronology of my experience:

After several days of attempting to download Windows 10, I took the PC home, attached it to my home Wifi, and let it run all night. Here’s a few benchmark times with MS messages in quotation marks:
3 am – “Downloading Windows 10; 2,887.7 MB total 17% complete”
7 am: “38% complete ”
10 am: “95 % complete ”
10:20 am: “Preparing for Installation” with green progress bar about 30 % complete
11:36 am: same as above – no apparent progress
1 pm: “Starting Upgrade”
1:10 pm: “Configuring Update for Windows 10 – 25% complete”
1:12 pm: “100% Complete – restarting”
1:15 pm: “Upgrading Windows – Copying files 2%”
1:25 pm: “Upgrading Windows – Copying files 48%”
1:54 pm: “Configuring Settings – 35%”
2:04 pm: “Welcome to Windows 10”
2:08 pm: “We updated your PC”
2:47 pm: Desktop appears, with icons in place; Windows 10 apparently functioning properly

Elapsed time: about 12 hours from when I started keeping track.

So thanks again !!!

Here is the response from the Teamviewer ticket:

“Thank you very much for sending us these Feature Requests.

We do not have a solution at the moment.
I will forward your suggestion to our product management. Such ideas are always welcome, although I can not promise when or if this Feature will be implemented, as the decision is based on public demand. Nevertheless, your feedback is very important to us as we want to continue to develop TeamViewer based on our user’s needs and demands. We will be happy to inform you about realization of this feature.”

So Teamviewer is of no help. Is there any workaround or anything else that can be done besides moving all my icons to the left portion of the PC screen?

Thanks for any other suggestions

Thanks BATcher, for your suggestion. I made a ZIP folder and sure enough, it’s only 8% smaller so that’s not much. In fact, I WOULD be prepared to remove some detail from this video. It’s only a talking head in front of a static background. I want to keep the facial expressions and the sound, of course, but nothing else matters very much. I tried running Handbrake at 30 FPS but that didn’t help. Any other suggestions? Thanks again .

Thanks CLint, I downloaded Handbrake, it’s free, and it does work, so that’s great. The instructions in the above link are also very clear and helpful. Unfortunately, the MP4 file did not shrink in size after following the instructions. Since the file is already MP4, maybe it’s as compressed as it can get. In any event, I was hoping to be able to reduce its size further. Do you have any other suggestions? If not, thanks anyway.

How well do any of these backup-synching services protect against cryptolocker type viruses that actually encrypt files on your hard disk?

Great ! Thanks – works like a charm.