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I am looking at a system which is running slow but has plenty of disk space (disk is only about half full). When I try to defrag it, it refuses to do so and says ChkDsk has to be run first at start up. As I understand it, Chkdsk is looking for bad sectors on the disk? if so, why does it stop...

I have a customer with old files (file extension .LET) created in Print Shop 10 (they were on a Windows 98 system). He no longer has the software and I suspect it wouldn't run on his current XP system even if he had. We have tried every possible other program to open these files without...

No install CD was supplied. Not even a recovery CD. There is a factory restore partition on the hard drive, but it's not possible even to boot into this at startup. I've advised her to contact Dell and request a replacement hard drive. I assume in warranty cases like this they will just send out...

Thanks for the advice but I don't have this software. As it's US$89 I think I'll have to swallow my pride and advise her to ship it back to Dell. The only consolation being that at 6 weeks old she won't have lost too much data on it... I still can't work out how installing a Microsoft webcam...

I've been asked to look at a Dell Inspiron 1525 that won't boot into Vista. Only a couple of months old. Using F8 it will load as far as the Advanced Boot Options screen, but whatever I then choose (Safe Mode, Repair Your Computer, Command Line Window), it just brings up the scrolling green...

Turned out to be the diverter valve. The rubber diaphragm was badly decayed. Once replaced, the problem has gone. Engineer advised that the driver PCB or the thermistor may also need replacing, as the burner is not modulating properly. But now at least when it cuts out on the overheat, it will...

Thanks. The 'burn time' is consistently 45 seconds or so, not 5 or 6. However since my original post the burner is failing to fire first time when hot water called for (bath/shower/sink, everything). Turning the tap off and on again usually gets it going and then it cycles off/on as originally...

Thanks for the advice, I've done a few more tests. The cycle is fairly consistently 40 seconds burner on and then 15 seconds off. It never fails to relight. The weird thing is that this only happens when using the shower. I've tried running the sink hot tap full bore and it burns as long as the...

FozzieBear, are you getting any outbreaks of 'Antivirus Pro 2009' recently? I've had two calls in the last day to fix this spyware (strangely enough both in the same street-must be crawling through the walls I reckon). Anything you would recommend to remove this? The standard AV programs don't...

I have one of the above combi boilers, installed in 1999. CH side works fine, but when using the shower the water goes cold after 2/3 minutes as the burner cuts out. It always reignites after about 30 seconds, is OK for a couple of minutes more and then goes cold again. The water pressure is not...

FozzieBear-managed to repair it using a program called MalwareBytes. Needed a 3 hour scan though. Once I'd run that it revealed about 20 more rogue programs. Once I'd removed those and rebooted it went to Chkdsk of it's own accord and repaired some damage. It nows runs Defrag OK, System...

C drive is NTFS, D drive (recovery partition) is FAT32. Error message on chkdsk is 'Windows is unable to complete the disk check'. Comes up immediately. Tried to run from command line, the black command box flashes up and then vanishes immediately. Have I got the spacing right? (Sp+space)...

Thanks for your suggestions: 1) there are no restore points set-although system restore is turned on! How can that be? 2) plenty of HD space-disk is only about 40% full. 3) have cleared all temp files with Disk Cleanup and CCleaner. 4) will try AOL uninstall, but I think this is not genuine...

I'm trying to clean up an XP laptop which has some viruses and spyware on it. It's slow and freezes, and has a pop up (aol.software.exe) that won't go away and asks me to run Chkdisk. Norton AV was installed but not updated. So far I have: Run Liveupdate and scanned with NAV. Reports all clean...

Thanks for the advice. After cleaning it inside and reseating the RAM, the graphics started working again all of it's own accord. No obvious loose connections, just one of those mysterious Windows glitches!

Brilliant, thanks, any particular type/spec of card I should use, not many PCI graphics cards around now I suspect?

I have been asked to try and fix an old Celeron PC running Windows 98. It boots up OK, can hear one beep for the POST, but nothing on the monitor except 'no signal'. Have tested the monitor and VGA cable on another PC and they are working OK. Have also reseated the RAM and cleaned out a decade...

Er, no. While I accept that they're not responsible for the customer's PC settings, the fact that they 1) failed to set up his wireless security properly, 2) changed the router password and failed to write it down for him, 3) didn't set up his bt email account as promised, 4) were in and out the...

Thank you, I finally managed to get Windows Update to run and applying SP3 resolved the problem immediately, though I am not sure exactly what it was. But it was not related to the Firewall settings.

I'm trying to set up a BT Home Hub 1.5 for a friend. BT charged him £50 to 'install' it (i.e. to take it out of the box and plug it in). They got it connected to the net on the 'engineer's' laptop using the wireless link,, but couldn't get an internet connection via the network cable to the...