I am still working in Word Perfect5.1 for DOS, and it is running through Windows 98 now because I needed a faster Internet connection and now have had Time Warner/Road Runner since April.
In addition now have WordPerfect 6.1 and 8 on my computer (was there before Windows 98), Internet Explorer (had it before), Outlook 2000, a scanner, Dragon Naturally Speaking, Winzip (had it before), Conversions Plus (had before), and a few dictionaries (had more, could not be installed via Windows 98), and Ozwin is still on my computer from the time I used only Compuserve for my e-mail messages.
Oh, and I am using an old keyboard with only 10 function keys on the left, none at the top because I am extremely fast with it and play it blind like a piano...needless to say that's not new.
And I have 4 different McAfee icons, spamkiller, private (something), personal, and security check. Takes about 4 - 5 minutes to boot each time and run through all these checks.
I hope I am not boring and shocking you too too much with this but I thought I needed to mention it in case any of these thingies are related to my problem:
I've had three (same) electronic mice since December: mi MICRO innovations
I took the first mouse back after a week when it got stuck, thought it was a mouse defect; same with the second one. In both cases, the new mice worked when plugged in. In between were hours of booting completely, restarting, frustrations. When #3 also got stuck, I unplugged it, plugged it back in, and it suddenly worked. I thought I had the problem licked. Before going completely on the blitz, it always begins to get sluggist and erratic, and suddenly it's stuck and will not budge.
I have a suspicion that the problem is somewhat related to Internet Explorer because several times it became sluggish while doing something there but it has also happened after Outlook.
Day before yesterday, it happened again after being really nice for about a month or more, and I'd thought the problem would not return. I unplugged, nothing happened. I spent about two hours rebooting, restarting, pressing the button because I could not click anything any more, and suddenly it worked. It was sluggish but I was able to work yesterday.
I should probably also mention that whenever I push Alt/Ctrl to stop the ongoing activity after it gets stuck, I always see Internet Explorer first and then various undefinable file names that sometimes each come up separately and must be ended, other times they don't come, there is no distinct pattern.
When I am on the desktop and the mouse is stuck, the thingie that's connected to the back of the tower flickers, and the curser on the screen sometimes makes involuntary movements but it does not get unstuck.
Yesterday the mouse got stuck again. After three hours of rebooting, it suddenly worked again, but sluggishly, i.e. it moved a few millimeters, and then I had to push buttons again and it moved another few millimeters. I had typed my message here but I saw nothing on the bottom of the page from where to post yesterday, although the arrow keys up and down worked. So I sent it to someone whose name I found as administrator or something, starting with "banana" I believe, and I'd like to apologize, I was desparate.
Shortly after doing that, the mouse froze completely again. I spent another 2 hours booting, unpluggin, safe mode, no safe mode, managed to go into Control and found no icons where yellow, changed mouse speed to faster while I was there (although my son does not want me to mess with any settings.) Nothing.
Finally because I've been forbidden to shake the tower and throw the mouse against the wall, highly frustrated by then, I accidentally mistaped my password when I was once again on that screen and guess what? Now (and prior to that ALL DAY), the mouse worked/is working perfectly.
So as long as it is working, I'd really like to figure out what I should do when it gets stuck again. The unplugging was obviously not the secret, and I am sure the wrong password is not.
I am not entirely computer-illiterate, in fact have had one since there were stand-alone machines in 1976. I can see a lot of things in WordPerfect that Windows users don't always see, among them a huge accumulation in Windows Temporary files, McAfee creates 321,000 bytes every time in a new directory. And Windows insists on creating temporary files of all attachments that I normally try to eliminate because I hate them and I collect my jobs in a very orderly and transparent Word Perfect filing system. But there are many temporary files, in fact 140 for 212 Megabytes, including lots of temporary directories. I wonder if they could have anything to do with my problems.
I don't keep any history (0 days) on my computer and I eliminate cookies and temporary Internet files daily.
Most of the messages with attachments that I receive originate from my own Kansas City office.
Oh, I am also getting messages about illegal procedures by the program from time to time and did yesterday, perhaps almost coinciding with the mouse crash.
If there is no other way but disinstalling WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS, I would rather get rid of the DSL line and go back to Windows 95, which did not give me any trouble, because if I add up the time the DSL line has saved me in searching and the hours I've spent trying to get the mouse unstuck, I probably come out considerably in the negative.
Please help...what do I do with that rodent???? Thanks in advance.
Doris Ganser
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