Any computer wizards around here?
I don’t know much about computers, but luckily I know a little bit.
In college used to know the keyboard codes to put accents over vowels and the tilde over an n. My fingers would do it automatically, and still, ten years later, 0233 just feels like an e, 0237 has something indefinably i-ish about it, and 0244 goes o! But on my trusty little netbook none of these worked, and when I looked in the character map, to my chagrin I found no sign of tilde’d n’s.
Last night I made a small cheritable donation through a secured website, then accepted that couchsurfing friend request that’s been lingering in my inbox for awhile, also through a secured website. Then I got an email from a friend with those codes for tildes and accents, and out of curiosity I tried them in an email. Unfortunately no effect on my netbook, but just to be sure I tried them in a word processing document too.
As I hit alt + 2 my screen changed to blue, saying “preparing for standby.” First time it’s done that, a tad unnerving. I woke it up from standby and it wasn’t running right so restarted it.
I entered my password as usual, then saw this:
Anybody know wtf this means? Help?
That’s as far as she goes. Rats.I don’t know much about computers, but luckily I know a little, so highly doubt pressing alt + 2 can kill one. Anybody know what to press to revive it? Anybody wizard enough to fix a computer in a different hemisphere?
If you do a hard shut down, does it ask for your password or go right to this error?
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I meant to say, if you do a hard shut down and hard reboot, does it ask for your password or go right to this error
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I will confer with my husband to see if we can assist.
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It asks for my password first, then this comes up. Thank you a boatload for your help, whether it works or not! (I was just getting some good work done on the dang thing too…thank god for google docs.)
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Ok, so Q1: am i correct in assuming you are running MS Windows 7? or if not, what OS is it?
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It’s pretty old…I think it was XP. It’s one of the first netbooks, and I doubt there’s enough memory in there for an updated operating system. I figured that would eventually be a problem once sites stopped working with XP. Maybe that day is here? Sounds more like a virus though.
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Tim,
I believe this message indicates that it is not seeing the hard drive when/where it expects to.
The first thing to try is when the computer is starting up (during the windows logo screen usually) there will be a message to press F2 or F11 or some F key to go to setup. Press that key.
In setup you want to look at the boot order and what drives it sees as options for the boot order.
It is usually best to have the CD drive as first boot item (in case you need to use it to reinstall the operating system), then the hard drive, then any other options. You definitely do not want to have the LAN as a option before the hard drive.
I don’t know how these would have gotten re-arranged, but that is the first thing to check.
And if your computer does not see any hard drive available, then that is your problem. It may be worth trying (if possible) unplugging and replugging in the hard drive while the computer is off. This will depend on what kind of access you have to it (I have never opened a laptop to try this).
You can also try setting the boot order settings to their default values – if there is a choice to do this. Look around at the other setting and see if you see anything that looks like it might have an effect, but don’t change anything until you know what it does and have good reason to.
Report your results. Hope it goes well.
Also, I read:
“Standby problems which arise for no apparent reason are almost always caused by installing a device driver or an application which is not fully compatible with Windows power management features. As such, the cause can only be tracked down by trial and error, removing a driver (and it’s associated device) one at a time and trying standby after each removal.”
So, try and go over what you did previously – if you installed anything recently. Opened anything which potentially had a virus, etc.
If the hard drive has failed, it may just be that the hard drive is the device problem and it has nothing to do with the drivers.
Good luck,
David
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Excellent, thank you for the tips, David! I will check the boot order as soon as we get back to the room. Hopefully that’s it, because it doesn’t have any disk drives, I hadn’t installed anything in months, and I don’t think I can open the wee fella up. It is however several years old, since I bought it secondhand for $65 in 2009…
Thanks again,
Tim
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1. I take it, you have no USB / CD / SD card attached when you boot?
2. If the thing boots (cold) is there something appearing on the screen like “press Esc” or “press F2” or similar to enter Setup/ Bios/…
Do that and see if you can enter the Bios Setup to see where it tries to boot from.
The message simply means it does not find an operating system on the places where it is looking. Looking at the screenshot it first tries to find one by your network card (net boot) then it will go to the next place (harddisk or cdrom or usb or …) That list should be in the Bios Setup.
Could be the harddisk connection is a bit unstable and the cable is not connected properly anymore. Could also be the MBR is corrupt. You would need a DVD or CD with your operating system to repair that.
Do you hear any strange sounds when the disk runs? If so that could mean hardware failure.
You can always send me sms when I’m not online.
Fanne
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Goede dag Fanne! 1: Nee, ik had er geen anything attached, 2: I can get into a setup screen (with oldschool blocky letters that look like they escaped from 1990). It doesn’t make any noises, and there’s no disc drive, so I’ll check for the boot order thing there.
Dank je wel voor je hulp!
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Looks like either your hard drive failed or your BIOS is trying to do a LAN boot. When you first start it’ll have a message to push a key to edit BIOS….push it and find boot order in there and make sure its not listed LAN first.
Also you can try disabling the network adapter in there. If none of that works its the HD.
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Cool, I’m glad to have something to try before just chucking the thing. I’ll take a gander and see if it’s in a form of English I speak. Thanks for the help mate!
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