Before I start just want to mention that I figured out what was wrong with my computer.  There was a lot of dust that had collected in the back vent that the fan blows air out of.  And once we'd removed the back and side of the tower, there was a lot of dust inside as well.  Video card seems to be busted, too. A couple of the capacitors were bulged, and one had leaked some gunky residue.  Removed it, went to Micro Center, told technician about it and they gave me a better one.  Going to replace it and hopefully I should be set.  In the meantime, I'm on my laptop.


ETA: Replaced video card and am now up and running! Everything is fine - I can play videos again and everything else. *dances*

Anyway, before all this carp happened, I was rewatching bits of vid of JP in Gilmore Girls, and I thought I'd post my thoughts on it.  Cut because somewhat long...

( thoughts on JP's character Dean Forrester... )

... I can't play video.

I'm starting to think that there is something wrong with my video card itself.  After all seemed right once I installed that other video driver, I decided to see if there would be any problems playing video. I tried WMM, WMP, and PowerDVD.  Each time whenever I tried to play video, the screen started going out again, and finally it changed to an all solid color (usually blue).  And it stayed there. I couldn't even do ctrl+alt+delete to get rid of it. I had to manually shut the computer down, then restart it.  Tried it two more times, same thing happened. It seems like any video program will cause this.

I did as much research as I could and I can't find a way to solve this.  I noticed also that sometimes the fan in the computer runs very high - you can hear it like it's running very fast and it's quite loud sometimes. Like it's overheating. It's not hot in my home office, especially not lately, so I don't know what's going on with it.

Talked to my dad about it and we have a few options.  We're probably going to take the back and sides off and examine the video card. If it's really hot to touch, it's probably on its way out. It's totally shot if the capacitors are blown (i.e. look swollen and have stuff leaking from them).  In either case I'd invest in a new video card.  Another option is to see what condition it's in after we take the back and sides off. A tech guy we hired to fix our computers at work said that sometimes the computer can get dusty and that can cause problems over time.

So for now I can't watch video.  Which means that I won't be able to watch SPN eps on DVD with you guys during your chat tomorrow, meg_tdj  :(  Unless I watch them on my laptop, but it'd be kinda awkward going back and forth from the laptop to the desktop.  And I still don't have my laptop set up to go online. 

It also means I can't make screencaps for my picspams on this computer. Luckily I have WinDVD on my laptop, so I could still use that. I wasn't sure if it would work given my laptop is almost 7 years old now, but I tried it out last night and it seems fine.  So I should be able to cap the last two eps of season 3 this weekend ... which means that I should be able to have the picspams all wrapped up by next week.

So I guess all is not lost.  Just have to solve the case of the ornery video card. I'm glad my computer is working fine otherwise.

In other news, won't be around much tomorrow because I have to go for a training session at this lab where I'm doing some field work. Have to leave very early in the morning, ugh. Hopefully it won't be an all day thing.  Can't believe I'm ready for the weekend already.

Hope you're all doing well today. :)  *hugs*

I know I just posted, but...

OMG!!!

I think my computer is working again!!!!

I did some internet searching at work and found an article with a "quick fix" for my problem.  It also had a bunch of comments from other users, some of whom found the fix successful, and some who didn't but offered their own methods to resolve it.  Well, I tried the article's fix and it didn't quite work, so I tried one of the alternate solutions another user posted.

So far, so good!!


I can resume my usual computer activities (still going to continue to back things up of course)!!! *SQUEEEEEEEEEEE*

I am so, so, relieved!! :D

Arrrrrrrrrgggghh!!!

Can someone explain to me just WTF compels certain people to create computer viruses/trojans/whatever the hell they are and unleash them on random unsuspecting people?? Are they really that bored or screwed up in the head that they have to do this?!!!!!!

When I started my computer this morning, the desktop didn't load completely. Then the screen kept going out.  No interruption of power to the monitor, it was like the computer itself was causing the desktop to disappear and everything to go black.  I tried to figure out what was causing it but nothing worked and the computer was being abnormally slow. I restarted and the desktop loaded completely, but the screen kept going out (again there was nothing wrong with the monitor).  For a split second, this Symantec window came up (I have both Norton Antivirus and Internet Security) that said something like "your computer may be at risk." I couldn't read the rest of it because the window disappeared as quickly as it had appeared. 

I decided to do a virus scan. It's been about 2 hours and it's still running. Every so often everything will appear to stop and the screen will go out, then come back on.  And it's sooooooo slow... if I can be sure it's still running, anyway.

Only thing I can think of is that it's a virus. I hate not knowing exactly what it is. I can't call Dell tech support because my warranty expired.  I have no idea who can help me with this.  If the virus scan doesn't pick anything up I may reboot in safe mode and see if I can do "last known good configuration" or something like that.  The thing I really need to do is back up my files, especially email folders. I've been meaning to for a long time, but my stupid CD-RW drive doesn't work right. I can only back up to things like pen drives or external hard drives.  If this stupid thing will let me do it now...

Sorry I'm so slow with replying to comments. I just hopped onto my mom's laptop in order to give you all an update of what's going on. I'm not sure if I'll be able to resume the picspams tomorrow like I promised. If I can't get this stupid computer working again, it's going to set me back a little.  I'll get back on here later and let you know what the status is.  I just hope I can figure out what the hell this is and how to fix it.

And it was working fine last night.

People who create computer viruses are the scum of the earth.

*headdesk*

*headdesk*
 

It seems like I'm using this journal just to complain about everything and I know how tired people get of hearing me complain. So ... sorry.

But anyway, that's what today is ... just one of those days where anything and everything wants to go wrong. I got into work and switched the computer on. It wanted to download updates for Windows (tech guy once said we must download all the security ones). Okay fine. But I can't do anything til they finish because they always make you restart the computer... unless I save my work. At any rate it's annoying. So it finishes downloading and I go to restart the computer. As it restarts and the first screen comes up, it goes dead. Totally dead. I click the mouse, press different keys, nothing. It just beeps whenever I press a key. Wonderful way to start the day.

I manually shut it down. I reboot and wait for everything to finish loading, and it looks fine. I open my web browser to check email before starting work and it takes forever for the window to even come up. I opened one of the programs I use a lot here at work and that wouldn't come up. Everything gets really slow, programs start to hang. I try ctrl+alt+delete, doesn't work. Desktop is frozen. At this moment I am about two minutes away from putting my fist through the thing (yeah okay so I really can't because I'd get in huge trouble).

So I go and shut it down manually again. I wait a few minutes and then reboot. I wait extra long for everything to load up just in case. Then I start as I usually do. So that's the point I'm at now. Everything seems fine, but I don't know if it'll last. I really hope it will. The fact that I woke up with a bad headache doesn't help matters either. :p

It feels like one of those days that starts out bad and is just destined to get worse as it goes on, until it's 12:00 AM Saturday, then I know the day is over and the promise of a whole new, most likely better, day is in store.

Oh well, hopefully Atlantis tonight will make me feel better. Not really mentioning SG-1 because I'm not so sure if I like how it's going to go. There was another AOL Vignette thingie for tonight's ep (with a preview of next week's) up on YouTube. You can watch it here. I did a double take because it actually looked like Daniel (despite the fact that Vala is with him ...AGAIN...) actually talked to Sam. *insert "OMG" here* But I don't know if I like the way he talked to her, especially when they first made their way up to Sam.

In the cut is a little sort of "summary" of the events.

( In the Company of Thieves )

Anyway opinions would be helpful. I know we'll be seeing the ep for ourselves in less than 12 hours but just wanted some thoughts on his behavior towards someone who is supposed to be his friend. It's funny, I showed my mom that vignette last night and she said she doesn't like the way Daniel is now, almost like he's snotty and much too sarcastic. Sadly I have to agree (but that's just me).

Well I guess I'll shut up about that now. I'm hoping that things will get better here as the day goes on.

*pops an Advil*