baby/bathwater PC problem

[MetalPig]

My sense is that our guys don't really know what's wrong, and are just reformatting to fix it with brute force. Your opinions?

They probably don't have the time to find out exactly what's wrong.
Users often want quick fixes, and reformatting is just that.

 

[bug_girl]

I uninstalled defender, and the problem did get much better, although didn't vanish completely.

I'm betting it is something to do with the network drives--we've had problems with access to those for weeks. It is when I try to save/open that I'm most likely to have a problem. I think Arkan might have a winner!

Thanks guys--I appreciate all the help!!!!

 

[Wudang]

If you have problems with network drives try this

When using Windows XP's My Network Places to access shared resources on computers running older versions of the Windows operating system, you may have noticed that the process can be excruciatingly slow. What is the reason for this slowdown?
By default, Windows XP scans all remote computers for scheduled tasks--a neat, but seldom used, feature. However, you can override this configuration with a simple registry edit. Follow these steps:
Open the Registry Editor (Regedit.exe).
Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/Software/Microsoft/Windows/Current Version/Explorer/RemoteComputer/NameSpace.
Under the NameSpace branch, locate the subkey named {D6277990-4C6A-11CF-8D87-00AA0060F5BF}.
To make a backup copy of this key, right-click the key, and select Export.
In the Export Registry File dialog box, select a folder, and give the file a descriptive name.
Right-click the key, and select Delete.
Close the Registry Editor, and restart Windows XP for the change to take effect.

 

[NeilC]

This is why they want to reinstall.

You don't what is causing it. They don't either and may never know. I've tried so many times to sort out problems like this - hours posting to website, researching the MS website. I've found various fixes that seemed to work but then didn't. Reinstalling fixes most WIndows problems and leaves your PC all zippy and clean. I'd let them do it and spend your effort negotiating them to reimport all your data etc.

 

[ShowMe]

I'm betting it is something to do with the network drives

If you're running Symantec AntiVirus, open up the client and click Configure->File System Realtime Protection. Look at the bottom of the page at "drive types" and see if Network is checked.

We're running an older version of Symantec but the setup shold be approximately the same. Also see if the Microsoft Exchange is loaded & checked; if so, and if your IT department is depending on that program for email virus scanning beg them to go with a server-side solution. The local mail client on Symantec is awful.

ETA: I do agree with Splossy. If it's a large IT department then management has determined that the "slam and scram" method is more cost effective than spending hours upon hours troubleshooting a single problem. It happens to me more often than not; it's why every IT department has some sort of imaging software.

 

[Big Al]

IMHO, a full reformat and reinstall is pretty much the last resort when all else fails. I'd first do a full virus and malware scan, a registry scan with Norton Utilities or the like, then a Windows repair installation, then uninstall and reinstall Office... then a full format and clean Windows installation.

However, I've usually got a clean restore point to go to when I have problems.

 

[bruto]

I never was able to get Word to run properly when Symantec/Norton AV was set up to work on Word. If you have that running, I'd check the settings and try unchecking the Word option.

 

[bug_girl]

the problem for me is that the computer will be "in the shop" at least two days, then when I get it back, another 2 days will be spent reinstalling software, documents, and trying to reconnect all the different servers.

That's almost a week in which I'll still have work that needs to be done--and I'll be more behind than ever. I'm willing to spend some of my time trying to figure it out.

If I had more confidence, in general, in the guy, I'd hand it over right now.
But he really just doesn't seem to have a clue.

 

[baron]

I report this to our tech guys, and they say they want to reformat my entire laptop, wipe it, and reinstall everything.

This can mean one of two things ~

1) We don't know what's causing the problem
2) We can't be bothered to find out what's causing the problem

I've never encountered a scenario that required re-imaging. I've done it once or twice when the PC had nothing much on it, just because it was easier, but very very rarely is reimaging required.

That said, I'd need to see the problem to investigate it, so sorry I can't help you out. It could be any of 100 different things.

 

[Ocelot]

The reinstall is the easy fix in that it doesn't involve any diagnosis. As a tech support guy myself I'd say that this should only be done as a last resort. Since you have a lack of confidence in your support guy it may be diagnosis is not the route to take unless you can do it yourself. Intermittent problems are always a bugbear - you never know if you've fixed them. Sometimes I confess we techies suggest a drastic fix that will cause you a great deal of inconvenience just to demonstrate to you that your problems aren't that big of a deal after all. How frequent is the problem? Compare the inconvenience of having the problem fixed with living with it.

It may be a scheduled task such as a virus scan, downloading updates or indexing. It may be malware If it's malware most can be detected by adaware or spybot but me being me I prefer to just dive straight into the registry and see what being loaded up in HKLM and HKCU \software\microsoft\windows\current version\run also win.ini and system.ini can be used to load adware as can the startup program group. I also like to identify any browser helper objects. Your mileage may vary.

The other malware option is that it might not be installed on your machine. It might be elsewhere on the network and trying to access your machine. Are you ever off the network? If so does the problem occur when you're disconnected?

Task manager should be the first port of call. Next time it happens bring up the task manager switch to the processes tab and sort the processes by CPU usage. If it's word or Excel that's timing out on you then you'd expect to see EXCEL.EXE or WINWORD.EXE hogging all the CPU. If some other process is hogging the CPU then you've got a guilty party right there.

If it's Word or Excel then you're not much closer. Is there any pattern to the timeouts. Does it usually happen whilst you're trying to save (or autosaving look at the status bar) If so then there may be some problem with your network or local storage. Is there a sequence of events that can bring about this behaviour. If so then post it here for discussion. It would be good if there were as it removes the problems of intermittent symptoms.

If not again, then there are less drastic measures to a full reinstall. The problem seems from your description to be centred about Office Applications. Is that just because your usage is centred about Office applications? Many time a user will tell me very specific symptoms to a general problem - e.g. They say - I can't get my e-mail when it transpires that they can't do anything at all it's just that e-mail is the only thing they've tried to do.

If you are satisfied that the problem is related to Office Applications alone then a reinstall of Office should be tried before a full reinstall. This can be done in progressively more destructive stages. First try simply reinstalling the latest office Service Pack. This may fix the problem without changing any user customisations. If that doesn't work then try uninstalling office and reinstalling it. This will tend to lose a few configuration settings. If that doesn't work then try uninstalling office, deleting anything left in the Office install folder, and running a registry clean before reinstalling office. All configuration in office will be reset to the defaults.

 

[bug_girl]

Those are all really great suggestions ocelot!
I will try some of them.

I did suggest just uninstalling and reinstalling the office suite, rather than a full wipe, but they said they couldn't do that. I suspect it's because the disk image they have is all or nothing.

It's worth it to me to spend some time poking around during breaks/lunch to try to troubleshoot. At the very least, I can keep it limping along until spring break, when I'll actually have more time to implement the final solution, if need be.
I just really don't want to go there--so much software to reinstall, and then the days of trying to reconnect to the servers. Sigh.

 

[voidx]

I uninstalled defender, and the problem did get much better, although didn't vanish completely.

I'm betting it is something to do with the network drives--we've had problems with access to those for weeks. It is when I try to save/open that I'm most likely to have a problem. I think Arkan might have a winner!

Thanks guys--I appreciate all the help!!!!

If you are in fact having problems with network drives, check Windows Explorer. Any old drive mappings to non-existent network shares, or to shares that are inaccessible due to network problems can often cause issues with application slowdowns.

The main reason is that when you open the Save As dialog in Word or Excel, etc. and hit the drop down to choose a drive to save to. It goes looking to refresh the status of those drive mappings. It can at times cause performance issues because Explorer is basically sitting there waiting for a response from a shared network resource that is not responding. Eventually Explorer gives up, and Windows carries on its merry way.

If you have any mapped drives that look old, or that you simply cannot connect to, right click them and choose Disconnect. Worst case scenario, you can logout and logon again to get them back via the logon script.

Another thing that can cause issues with mapped network drives is DNS. Check to see if your mapped drives are mapped via:

- IP (10.0.0.x)
- Netbios name (server1)
- or Fully Qualified Domain Name (server1.domain.com)

If DNS is not setup properly, or is having issues, resolving the Netbios or FQDN name can cause delays in access mapped drives. Mapping directly to an IP in this case might make an improvement. Ideally drive mappings should use FQDN though.

Another few suggestions.

Again, I'd re-iterate that not doing the time to diagnose these problems, means that potentially more serious issues are being over looked. Such as the network issues you mention.

 

[voidx]

Those are all really great suggestions ocelot!
I will try some of them.

I did suggest just uninstalling and reinstalling the office suite, rather than a full wipe, but they said they couldn't do that. I suspect it's because the disk image they have is all or nothing.

I don't buy this. They installed Office either off of a physical CD, or they did an Administrative share install on a server. Either would have to be available to them, and hence to you. How else do they push out Office updates then?

All Office requires is access to the location from which it was installed. You'll notice when you go to Add / Remove Programs you can Modify office rather than remove it and you can Repair or Reinstall the instance of Office on that machine. There's no real good reason why they shouldn't be able to do this.

How large a company is this by the way? How large an IT department?

 

[Zep]

It sounds like a whole preconfigured "corporate standard" image install, voidx. They make up a standard unit, copy that off as an ISO or similar, the use it to blast any new/reconditioned PCs. It's fast and easy, and many units can be done in parallel too. So it is exceedingly cost-efficient.

It's also VERY impersonal and highly inconvenient in cases like Bug_girl's.

 

[voidx]

It sounds like a whole preconfigured "corporate standard" image install, voidx. They make up a standard unit, copy that off as an ISO or similar, the use it to blast any new/reconditioned PCs. It's fast and easy, and many units can be done in parallel too. So it is exceedingly cost-efficient.

It's also VERY impersonal and highly inconvenient in cases like Bug_girl's.

I figured as much. However, they would have to have created the standard unit at some point in order to create the ISO. Meaning at the very beginning, they still installed Office off of either a CD, or a network Administrative share. This setting would be carried over to all the subsequent images made with that ISO. So if they wanted, they could still manage a way to facilitate the install or repair of the Office installation. Its likely just part of their policy not too.

I can certainly sympathize with the cost-efficiency that is forced upon IT departments, and the sacrifices we are often required to make as a result from them. Everyone wants a flawless and stable system, but they don't want to pay for it. There often seems to be an expectation that IT will always be able to wave a magic wand and do more with less.

While I agree that IT needs to be cost-effective and efficient, it can easily go to far.

 

[bug_girl]

How large a company is this by the way? How large an IT department?

It's one guy and a couple students, maintaining all the servers and computers for a division of a major university. There's about 500 employees in our division.

technology is not a funding priority

It isn't his fault at all that he doesn't want to deal with this.
But--I also think he's seriously over his head, and doesn't have much experience with LAN issues. The fact that we use outlook, and I get over 500+ spam emails a day, with no server side protection, should tell you something.

 

[voidx]

It's one guy and a couple students, maintaining all the servers and computers for a division of a major university. There's about 500 employees in our division.

technology is not a funding priority

It isn't his fault at all that he doesn't want to deal with this.
But--I also think he's seriously over his head, and doesn't have much experience with LAN issues. The fact that we use outlook, and I get over 500+ spam emails a day, with no server side protection, should tell you something.

Well I'll certainly backtrack in this instance. That's a tough gig. The desktop management alone for 1 or 2 people is quite ridiculous. Let alone the servers and applications and the time to create a coherent and robust helpdesk process.

There's a lot to know and learn about the entire breadth of a functioning network. I'm certain he barely gets by just keeping the desktops and servers functional. Let alone running optimally.

 

[bug_girl]

Yeah. I don't envy him.

I did an uninstall and reinstall of Office, and things are cranking along just fine now, with only minimal stalls. I can live with that!

Right now I'm trying to backup 5 years of server logs, because we have run out of space. I wish I had a DVD drive

 

[Pro7]

Hi all. I want to get confirmation of a hunch.
I am forced to use a PC laptop at work, and it's begun having some hiccups. When I'm running one of the MS Office programs (excel, word, outlook), they will occasionally give me the "not responding" message.
After some experimenting, I discovered that if I just wait one minute, the program recovers and continues just fine. Wierd. Annoying.

I report this to our tech guys, and they say they want to reformat my entire laptop, wipe it, and reinstall everything.

That seems awfully extreme. I haven't even had this computer for a year. Additionally, I will have to find and reinstall at least 10 other programs, from SPSS to our web logging software. Big pain in the *** for me.

My sense is that our guys don't really know what's wrong, and are just reformatting to fix it with brute force. Your opinions?

As a suggestion, only hard format the computer when there is a problem with reading from the memory core. *such as virus damaging the core system files (overload) or kernal memory problems*

I have noticed that people do not understand the 2 format methods on window machines.

1. Soft Format

It is a method where you just put in your window os installation disk and do the soft format as in replacing the current operating system with the newer one while retaining all the files.

2. Hard Format

Its a method where you just wipe out everything on the harddrive and reinstall the operating system with a fresh start.

Otherwise, yes the tech guy is lazy to fix a simple problems on the computer.

 

[gnome]

Another sources of stalls that may not have been mentioned:

Check your list of printers. MS Office (for some reason) insists on communicating with the default printer before displaying the document. If the printer is inaccessible or slow (say for example if it's a network printer), it may try for a few moments before it gives up. The solution would be to set your default printer to a local printer until your usual default printer is more reliably accessible, or to set it to offline mode so that it gives up right away.

The problem with just reformatting it is that if the problem is caused by a software conflict or a configuration setting that you use, you might walk back into the same problem.