Windows...

[HangFireW8]

Nope, just let it do it's thing.... the geeks at Best Buy said the thing was fried, corrupted and unable to be fixed.... maybe a virus coming in piggyback?

Every single computer I've had come in from BB, Geeks, Office store, etc. that was "fried hard drive" just had a very confused Windows on it. I have yet to have someone bring in such a diagnosed computer with an actual bad HDD (yes I have seen HDD failures elsewhere). Some are so messed up they need a new patition table but once reconstructed I often find a usable Windows install still intact.

Having said all that, all my family and friends have moved primarily to tablets and phones, with one old laptop or desktop for homework, bills, or MS Office stuff ("real work"). So my free support burden has lessened dramatically in the past 5 years.

If there was ever a broken, overburdened, semi-functional Monopoly ripe for market disruption, Windows is that poster child. It will find a place in Government and Corporate America for many years, but Thank God the era of everyone having to struggle constantly with the Official Microsoft Virus Festival are over.

[glockfan]

the only thing i'm sure about is my next laptop will be an apple. i'm fed up with windows gremlins and updates....i've managed to install window 10 when 7 premium lost the window's support,so far it's ok,but the asus is for sure on its last miles.

[Tatume]

To clean your computer manually:

• In the Cortana search box type in : “appwiz.cpl” then press enter.

2. This will open your Control Panel to the list of all programs currently installed on your computer.
3. Scroll down the programs list until you see the software you want to remove.

Note: We want to uninstall any programs that have been installed recently (you can check this with the Install Date column) that you do not recall installing or that you do not need.

4. Click the software entry once to select it, then click Uninstall/Remove.
5. Confirm any messages to uninstall the program.

After removing any programs, there may be additional steps to take to remove any changes made by a PUA.

-- -- -- -- -- -- --

Part 2: Remove the software from your browser

These steps should be used for certain PUAs that affect the browsing experience. We recommend removing any add-ons or toolbars you don't currently use.

Choose the correct steps for your Internet browser.

For Internet Explorer: You don’t have Internet Explorer. I suggest you get it, and stop using Edge. Either that, or start using Firefox (and stop using Edge).

1. Open Internet Explorer.
2. Navigate to Tools > Manage Add-ons.
3. Select “Toolbars and Extensions” from the left column.
4. Select the extensions related to the unwanted software from the list on the right and click "Disable." You will not be able to remove these.
5. Click “Search Providers” from the left column.
6. Right-click the search engine you want and click Set as Default.
7. Now select the unwanted software and click the Remove button to uninstall it (lower right corner of the window). Once you have gone through this list, you can close the Manage Add-ons window.
8. In Internet Explorer, navigate to Tools > Internet Options > General.
9. Under Home page, click "Use Default" or enter your desired homepage, e.g. www.google.com
10. Click OK to save the changes.

For Mozilla Firefox:

1. Open Mozilla Firefox. Navigate to Tools > Add-ons.
2. Click Extensions.
3. Uninstall/remove the extension(s) relating to the software.
4. Navigate to Tools > Options > General.
5. Under Home page, click "Restore to Default" or enter your desired homepage, e.g. www.google.com
6. Click OK to save the changes.

Part 3: Reset Internet Explorer

In some cases, add-ons in Internet Explorer can cause issues with the way pages are shown. Resetting Internet Explorer to the default settings may resolve such problems. It can also speed up your Internet browsing.

Keep in mind that resetting Internet Explorer can reset your home pages, browsing history, form data, passwords, toolbars, etc. We will explain below how to prevent this.

To use the Reset Internet Explorer Settings feature from Control Panel, follow these steps:

1. Exit all programs, including Internet Explorer (if it is running).

In the Cortana search box type: inetcpl.cpl
Now press the ENTER key.

The Internet Options dialog box appears.

2. Click the Advanced tab.

3. Under Reset Internet Explorer settings, click Reset.

4. In the window that appears, ensure that the "Delete personal settings" box is NOT checked. This will prevent your home pages, etc. from being removed. Now click Reset again.

5. When Internet Explorer finishes resetting the settings, click “Close” in the Reset Internet Explorer Settings dialog. If you are using Windows 7 or above, you will need to restart the computer to apply the changes.

6. Start Internet Explorer again. You may receive a "Welcome to Internet Explorer" message. You may choose to follow the prompts, or you may click Cancel. The message will not appear again in either case.

Once you have completed these steps, you should no longer have any PUAs on your system and any unwanted effects should be reversed. If you still experience any unwanted or suspicious behavior, please send (Webroot, where I got this information) us a message with detailed descriptions of the behavior(s).

[RogerDat]

Apple, Linux, Windows, Android/Chrome book ALL have issues and shortcomings.
Apple is a walled garden with a high dollar price for last years hardware. Which it all works seamlessly as long as it is made by Apple, or you buy the right adapter for $$$.
*Nix is free as long as your time has no value and you are good with running more than one OS plus the VM application in order to get any required Windows applications to work.
Windows is an OS that can be run on lots of different hardware combinations BUT only if the drivers and specific mix of hardware all play nice. Great software but spendy software.
Chrome book or Android all want you to put all your data in their hands, they will take good care of it in their "cloud" which is nothing but hype for it being on someone else's computer.

If people read the terms of service for some of those cloud services they would have a heart attack same for most commercial OS and software. You lease not buy even though the transaction seems like a purchase.

Under the covers Apple is free BSD Unix so for the nix user it holds a special attraction. But if they know how to use the ports collection and create a desktop config why pay for the branded version?

For business or high end photo or digital editing Windows is probably the right choice. There is a posix/nix type system built into 10 for running unix/Linux applications BUT...

if all you want is surf the internet, do email, maybe have a place to view digital pictures and do minor editing, little bit of word processing or spread sheet to keep track of your reloading supplies or molds Then Linux (free) + Open Office (free) + Thunderbird email app (free) + Firefox and/or Chrome browser (free & free), then find a photo organizer-editing freeware program. You don't need much for hardware beyond top-o-the-line garage sale equipment.

If you are one of those people that simply can't figure out how to send pictures, make a printer work, or copy files from your smarty phone and computer and tablet then buy the Apple it's like paying for tech support up front in the purchase price.

Chrome book - not a fan. To limiting but if the limits fit your needs then fine. I don't find Google docs and office suite as useful as Open Office or MS Office. Like my tablet but bigger screen and keyboard.

Hardware can fail but OS, program or drivers are more likely culprit.
+1 on plug the drive into a caddy to copy your own files off BUT make darn sure you scan that puppy before getting your data off of it.

SSD drives boot so fast it is like a dream! Matters more on a laptop than a desktop that may well already be on and just need to be logged into. But fast don't half describe the speed of an SSD drive.

On the password migration to a new machine check out Password Safe https://pwsafe.org/ an application that stores and lists your passwords using a single password to open the encrypted password file. Small enough to run off of a thumb drive, secures the file with heavy encryption, your safe combination is the "key". Available for most systems. There is also a LastPass online tool. It works better for sharing with others but I'm not a fan of putting my passwords on a web site with a million other passwords, pretty big target, or if they fail all my data is gone. *cough* myspace, flicker, Picasa drive *cough*

[Traffer]

I am a certified PC Technician. As other folks said here. You absolutely cannot trust those big box stores to fix a computer. They are kids just out of school and they are under time restrictions. Chances are that they will give you bs about your computer and not fix it. I had a woman in my Church in Tampa Fl, who took a laptop in to one that had all of her daughters homeschooling stuff on it. They told her that the hard drive was dead. She called me in a panic. the state wanted her to show her daughters work in homeschooling or she was in BIG trouble. She asked me if I could get the info off of a dead Hard drive. Honestly, I told her it depended on how bad it was. I do not have the skill to take out a platter and get the data off but there are many other fixes that can be done that would be able to save her data. So she gave me the hard drive. I spun it up and found it had a nasty virus (which is a piece of cake to fix) I had it good as new in a few hours. When I told her that there was nothing wrong physically with the hard drive she was ballistic about the box store. I have seen the same type of scenario many times. Chances are when they tell you the hard drive is shot, It is just an excuse for them not to fix it. If you really need someone to get your data and cannot find anyone else you can PM me and I will take care of if for you for free (except for shipping)
Hans

[dragon813gt]

the only thing i'm sure about is my next laptop will be an apple. i'm fed up with windows gremlins and updates....i've managed to install window 10 when 7 premium lost the window's support,so far it's ok,but the asus is for sure on its last miles.

If you think you’re getting away from problems by moving to Apple better think twice. Apple is a walled garden. If you don’t like their rules then oh well. They force untested updates to the public just like everyone else. To be fair I don’t know how often they do this w/ their computers and laptops. W/ the phones and tablets this is constant. Apps break constantly because of this. I had to install a profile on my phone to make it think it’s a TV. It’s the only way to stop forced updates on iOS 11.

Apple also tells you what you need. This has never been more apparent then w/ the omission of a headphone jack on their phones. It’s no different w/ the computers. Customization isn’t an option.

[Grmps]

anymore, I store all my logins and passwords in a notebook locked in a gun safe.

[HangFireW8]

MacBooks are NOT walled gardens.

Perhaps you were thinking of the Apple phones and tablets, which are. You can install anything you like from Internet, CD or thumb drive on a MacBook, or even boot another O/S. You can go root and program it yourself without subverting the O/S. You can hold off or end updates as you please. That's not a walled garden.

I use MacBooks daily for work, but most of my home systems run some flavor of Linux. Heck even at work the MacBooks are primarily just terminals for Cloud servers- running Linux.

[Mr_Sheesh]

I have a password clues file on most every computer, they're clues to ME but no one whose mind isn't mine would get any clues from the file. That way I have multiple redundancy and won't lose the file in a one-hard-drive crash. The clues use my sense oh humor and life experiences to form the clues; A clue like P*P*{#} is quite clear to me, but not so clear to anyone else

I do use multiple, lower powered computers (because I still have them); I can take a slower old notebook and use it for an inventory or whatever or for a web search and the main machine won't be slowed down. If you only have one computer and it goes down, it's HORRID; If you have 4 other, slower computers, as well, it's annoying but not AS bad, till you get the faster machine back healthy. And you can back up data from one to the others, pretty easily, over your network. (Just encrypt it if it's private.) Us engineering folks do NOT like single point of failure scenarios, if they're too old you get into multiple constant failures o'course, so upgrade them as needed

[Tatume]

Most of the time that someone nefarious gains access to a computer, it's not because he guesses a weak password. It's because the owner of the password gave it to him. We are the weak links. Someone calls, sends an email, or a text message, and asks for the password, or asks that we click on a hyperlink. It doesn't matter how strong the password is, if it is freely given to the culprit.

I know, I know, "I" (meaning you, of course) would never do that. But I've seen highly intelligent, well educated people who not only should know better, but DID know better, fall into the traps.

So lock them into a safe if you wish, encrypt them, do whatever you wish if it makes you feel better. But don't give the password to the criminal.

[Geezer in NH]

Geeks at Best buy did their work you bought a new computer.

Find a real computer guy and he will fix your old one most likely.

[10x]

Yep, they call that virus "Windows 10"...

The difference between windows and a virus is that the virus has better support.....

[HangFireW8]

I'm no fan of Chromebooks either. Locked bootloader, data not under my control, walled garden Apps, very limited usefulness without Internet, basically just a tablet with a keyboard. The resale value tells the real story here.

At home I use an old ThinkPad running Linux, and store data on my ownCloud server. I sync my phone pics and share them to my PC's there too. I can spend a whole evening syncing range notes, target photos, making PDF's, reducing data and building up my shooting database, never plug anything into USB for download, all ownCloud backed up and shared, and not one packet of data leaves my home LAN... and not run one byte of Microsoft code.

[glockfan]

The difference between windows and a virus is that the virus has better support.....

[Tom W.]

Geeks at Best buy did their work you bought a new computer.

Find a real computer guy and he will fix your old one most likely.

Not really. I've had troubles last spring with the laptop, and had a man re-do the thing. It was old and as stated I needed (and wanted) a new one...I also had troubles with the keyboard. The letter "A" wouldn't work half of the time.
Generalizations aren't always accurate....

[Mr_Sheesh]

While it used to be the case that Thinkpads were GOOD machines, once Lenovo bought them out / spun off, I've seen that they turned into crud. Friend has about 30 Lenovos at home (Software Dev, he works at home MANY days) and we watch the spyware on them run (Installed in the BIOS at the factory etc., it's in ROM, not on the hard drive / SSD) turn the laptops on / off, have them take pictures, make them scan his network, etc. etc. - He has some 500 secure embedded devices (microcontroller devices) on his home LAN, so he thinks it's rather funny as there's no chance for them to determine much about his network at ALL other than how large it is. But I won't buy a Lenovo after having seen that. Older pure IBM machines, sure, not the later ones though.

[Tazman1602]

.....with what I've heard here about having your computer fixed at the big box stores, it's simply ridiculous. When I started in the computer business after a successful career as an Automotive Technician and teacher of Auto Tech, I've seen the same thing happen to computers that happened to cars.

"Back in the day" if an alternator wasn't charging, we fixed the alternator, not just threw parts at it. Same with TV's, small appliances, small engines, and everything else in the world. When it breaks now, you're not supposed to fix it nor could you buy the parts to fix it if you wanted to.

At the age of 35 or so I went back to school for Network Engineering and brother back then Engineering was just that. You had to KNOW some things and when something broke, you fixed it. Shoot you couldn't even buy a Network Server configured for what you needed. You had to design it, figure out user loads, what software was needed and then you had to BUILD IT FROM SCRATCH. Not anymore.

Windows was the downfall of the computer business, the problem is that when a company (yes I'm talking about Microsoft..) owns 95% of the desktop market you're stuck with them, no choice but to integrate. Can't tell you the amount of sleepless nights I've had because of Microsoft updates making your server a giant blue screen of death.

The glory of the old Unix systems was that if one of my servers had a problem, it was fairly easy to identify the process causing the problem and either fix or kill the process and restart it without having to boot the server and having 500 users offline while it *hopefully* started successfully. Same thing pretty much applies to home users -- your life may b on that PC and when it takes a walk south you are SOL (surely out of luck) so you've got some options.

1) Learn Linux or Unix and run a Unix box, way beyond the scope of a home user nor do most casual users WANT to spend hours learning a new OS, personally I'd rather be shooting or casting or reloading or building guns or....anyway you get it..

2) This is what I've done at home, buy the cheapest, crappiest laptop you can get and add a terabyte drive to it, LEARN how to backup your important documents etc. PROTECT them with virus protection updated at LEAST WEEKLY and encrypt it or password protect it. When Windows crashes then buy the cheapest piece of junk you can buy and restore the programs/documents that are vital to you.

These aren't the only ways, there are dozens you just have to pick which one suits you. Personally I keep Windows boxes for my wife, and for my important stuff I still run an outdated copy of Unix, suits me fine.

Oh yeah, I also use an iPad to do most of my websurfing/email stuff, but everything important is on another server for which I pay to host everything, never had an iPad crash and if they weren't so blamed expensive I would buy a MacBook or whatever is current with Apple.

Love it, hate it, whatever you still are going to have to live with Windows sometime even though they were the downfall of a great business to be in....

Art
Novell MCNE (Master Cerified Novell Engineer)
SCO Unix A.C.E. (Advanced Certified Engineer)
Sun Solaris Engineer
Citrix Certified Administrator

.....and if you're over 50 with those kinds of certs, don't even bother applying for the job because you already know what's coming --- BOHICA

Thank God for saving and early retirement....

Art

[Tazman1602]

The difference between windows and a virus is that the virus has better support.....

......and the virus has more better written code.......

<GRIN>

Art

[Mohavedog]

Tom W, your experience is what happened to me a few days ago. Windows update notified me of updates and I chose to update. It took an extraordinary long time to update, but I never touched the comp during the update. When it restarted there was nothing I could do. Nothing was on the hard drive. I think the download was a virus or malware designed to look like legitimate Windows update. I'm not computer literate enough to fix this myself and my $300 laptop isn't worth spending a lot of money with a pro. For my uses I'm probably going to a Acer Chromebook. After 20 yrs of headaches with Windows I'm done. I only do email and surf for the most part. At some point I may have someone work on the crashed laptop but right now I'm fed up with Windows and just want to get away. I can't afford a Macbook. Right now I'm on a borrowed Windows laptop.

[HangFireW8]

The BIOS hack in Lenovos was real. It's now removable and only affected... Windows users.

The other malware was par for the course for HP, Dell, Acer etc bundling crapware (some of which is not properly vetted and turns out to be malicious).

Here's the list of affected machines. You can often pick them up cheap.

http://news.lenovo.com/article_displ...rticle_id=2013