[othersteve]

a_to_z,

Yeah, that's perfectly fine. I may or may not be around, but if I'm not, we can always put it off for a few days. Chances are things will be fine, it's just that it isn't viable in the long run for you to be using a system that is, for all intents and purposes, relatively crippled in some fundamental way.

Take your time and let us know when you want to continue. You're right; it is possible that with the SP2 update we could run into the same old problems. But we also may not. It's a bit of a stretch, but there is a remote possibility it could actually solve nearly all of these problems all on its own, as it replaces a great deal of system files and re-registers them.

Also, to everyone else here at G2G, I am hardly a perfect tech. As such, I'm open to ANY advice or input you've got on this issue. If anyone disagrees or thinks there may be a better way to approach this, please do speak up.

~os

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othersteve...you have been doing fine...I would recommend you backup your data and a upgrade repair at this point...
a PITA for sure but if you can't get any updates your going to get infected for sure...and some of the new baddies can be a major chore removing or if by chance you get virut...the only fix is a clean install

[happyrock]

othersteve...you have been doing fine...I would recommend you backup your data and a upgrade repair at this point...
a PITA for sure but if you can't get any updates your going to get infected for sure...and some of the new baddies can be a major chore removing or if by chance you get virut...the only fix is a clean install

[a_to_z]

os,

I installed the 30-day trial version of Acronis last night. The amount of data on my C: drive to backup is about 103GB---where do I back up to? My EHD is only 100gB and already about half full with other stuff. Will I be backing up my D: drive too?

Again, sorry for my ignorance--new territory here again!

[happyrock]

back up your data to dvd's using nero or roxio or sonic...
Acronis would be good if your trying to clone the drive...your not...you just want the data backed up to your external drive AND dvd's...remember just the data...not programs ...those will have to be reinstalled

[othersteve]

Actually, happyrock has a very good point here. Since your OS is already corrupted, an image is probably unnecessary. Yes, you'd have to reformat in the event of some major issue, but you would still have all data at that point.

If you had the space, an image is never a bad idea. But since you don't, you might need to simply collect your data and go with that.

Sorry for the confusion on this point.

~os

[a_to_z]

Hi os,

Hope you had a nice holiday weekend. Mine was far busier than I expected or I would have gotten back to you sooner. In any case, I have my stuff backed up. I ended up purchasing an EHD with more capacity so I have both an Acronis *.tib file backup and just regular files backed up. So I guess I'm ready to go.

I don't think I mentioned this before and I apologize if it makes a difference, but my HP computer has a D: drive which is a recovery partition. (and that's all I know about partitons, lol) Does that help us out as all?

AZ

Edited by a_to_z, 30 November 2009 - 05:46 AM.

[happyrock]

think of a hard drive as a room...bigger hard drives are just larger rooms...partitions are walls you put in the room to divide the room into smaller areas...
the recovery partition on your computer will restore the computer back to like the day it left the factory...
you may have already given this info but what is the make and model of your computer...

[a_to_z]

Hi Happyrock,

My computer is an HP Pavilion Slimline s7700n PC.
AMD Athlon ™ 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 3800+ 2.00 GHz
1.00 GB of RAM
32-bit Windows Vista Home Premium sp1 (which came installed on the PC)
2 Hard Disk Drives:
HP (C:) 117 GB free of 226 GB
Recovery (D:) 903 MB free of 6.25 GB


I mention the Recovery(D:) partition because othersteve raised the possiblity of having to completely reinstall Vista if the SP2 upgrade doesn't work. Considering the fact that I don't have an installation CD, would the (D:) partition serve the same function as an install CD?

[happyrock]

yep...the instructions are here

start where it says... Starting a recovery from the hard drive and the computer is off
I advise you to burn the recovery disks as soon as you can after you get everything working right

[a_to_z]

Hi happyrock and/or othersteve,

Well, I reinstalled Vista last night and am currently moving through round after round of updates. I had a couple of failed updates overnight but they seemed to install ok the second try this morning. Assuming I get caught up with updating with no glitches, is there a scan we could or should run to make sure I'm OK before I start re-installing programs?

Also--since I'm not planning on reinstalling Norton, this is what I planned for PC security after reviewing the Malware Guide:
Windows Firewall
Windows Defender
MalwareBytes
avast!

Do you see any conflicts there? The distinctions between antivirus, anitspyware, and firewalls are somewhat murky to me.

Thanks!

[happyrock]

drop Windows Defender and get spywareblaster

[a_to_z]

drop Windows Defender and get spywareblaster

Will do!
One last question and then I think we can get on with our lives (I hope!)

Windows Update now says there are no new updates available which is fine with me--it took me through IE8 and SP1. Othersteve had mentioned SP2--do I want to find that myself and manually install it?

[happyrock]

nope...wait until windows update wants to do it...and then create a restore point just prior to doing it...

[a_to_z]

I AM FIXED!

Of course it meant completely reinstalling Vista and all my programs and files and slogging through 6 pages of posts here in this thread, but I can't believe you guys stuck with it as much as you did, (when I would have given up long ago), and I learned so much in the process.

You guys are rock stars.

Thanks!

[happyrock]

your welcome...and thanks for letting us know...