But you did move in the last six months; is it possible something might have been joggled to not connecting properly in that move?









Ooh, that is a really good point.

Lol, the heat has barely been on it’s been so hot outside around here, lol

Buddy of mine told me about some programs I can download that should tell me what’s going on.

Ooh, that is a good point too; especially since he just moved in the last 6 months!

I’m running Win7 and it’s been a couple weeks since it did an update. I also checked the drivers and nothing changed there.


Like the cable from the gpu to the mobo? Yeah I checked it it’s fine.


This is very true but why would it start causing trouble 2 months later? Besides, I checked the cables and they all were secured so *shrugs*

This could also be a bad monitor, not your video card. If you can borrow/use another one, that would narrow things down.

Good call. The thought that my monitor was messing up did cross my mind when trying to connect into the integrated graphics of the mobo didn’t work.

You might also try replacing your monitor cable first. That is the cheapest thing to start with.

Lol, that was actually the first thing I tried because I thought something went wrong with cable!

Welp, the day is upon us. Windows7 is at the end of the road as far as official support goes. Currently running the program to update to Windows10.

For what it's worth, I've been running W10 for several years with no problems. I hope you enjoy the same results.

Lol, I’m sure it’ll be fine. I’m just kind of like ol’ ‘Rocu and a bit resistant to change. Just not quite as extreme!

Well, if it's extreme wanting to keep what works then yeah; colour me extreme

I still have a 40-year-old 8 bit computer with a monochrome (amber) monitor. You're not extreme at all.

I just wish I'd had space for the 60-year old mainframe computer I was once offered. I could probably afford the electricity to run it now.

... and the tool shed to store it in.

... and the time to watch it figure out what 1+1 is

Those things were enormous. The water cooling units wouldn't fit in the tool shed, let alone the computer itself. A tape drive was the size of a fridge/freezer, and a disk drive the size of a washing machine. The CPU unit was about the size of my shed. Most other peripherals were desk-sized, and you'd have a card punch, card reader, printer, all wired together with cables four inches thick.

The one I was offered had 16,000 bytes of memory, and 7MByte disks. I forget what the capacity of a twelve-inch reel of tape was. Not a lot, at only 200 bits/inch.

That sounds amazing to have though.

A company I worked for had one the size of a room = a Honeywell.

This is something I read in the comment section of a youtube video. I'll repost it here because I think it sounds like good advice.


--------------------------

As a computer technician at a large corporation, I constantly have people bringing me their computers to be fixed, they never use Adblock they either use Chrome or Edge, most of them just stick with Windows Defender- don't have any spyware removal software, defragers, or any real cleanup tools on their computers. And almost all of them have the exact same issue, they clicked on some ad in something or a bad email, and then when their computer started acting slow they just kept restarting it.

First rule of business, if you think your computer is being hacked or your computer has a virus- do not restart your computer. Leave it up and running and sever the internet connection If somebody's hacking into your computer this will completely break their connection, and if it's a virus it will slow the spread. The next thing to do is to immediately clear cache on your browsers- all of it. Most viruses start in a cache folder, either audio cash or internet cash is their favorite point of entry.

Once you have severed your internet connection clear your cache if you still have control of your computer set Windows Defender to do a deep scan, if it wants to restart don't let it. When you restart you leave your computer wide open to attack during the boot up process. If it's a virus, if you can download even just the free version of avast or any of the other good ones like Malwarebytes, download it and run a deep scan. After you've completed these steps if the antivirus client fails to find anything, or your computer locks up and does not allow you to do anything, take your computer to the professionals to be cleaned up. And folks, always backup your computer.

I'll chime in on defragging, since it's mentioned within your quote. SSDs and M.2s don't benefit from it. If anything, defragging can shorten their lives. I assume it's still beneficial for 'conventional' disk drives? That said, there 'might' be some benefit to defragging even SSDs to totally remove threats of infection, but I've never come across mention of it.

I use both Avast antivirus freeware and paid-for Malewarebytes. I like Avast a lot, except it's forever pushing its non-free software. Up until recently it also tried to sneak in Chrome browser every timer it upgraded itself. I don't allow that on my computers. As mentioned in the past, I feel Brave Browser is a better yet similar alternative. I still prefer Firefox, but Brave is a solid backup browser. In fact, I use it as a primary browser on my secondary computer, leaving Firefox for my brother's use during visits.

There was something odd about the Honeywells. The word size was incompatible between IBM 365 & 370 and the Honeywell. In the 1970's the company I worked for had two computer rooms; one IBM, one Honeywell. They were mine from midnight to around 7:00AM when the managers started to come in.

Yep. Windows Defender was fine, until one day it wasn't. Grr.....


Between you and ghastley, we could have our own 1970s computer classes.

Wow, this is some great advice! Thank you so much, Mirocu!!!! *Inserts bowing down emoticon*




I've also heard that about not defragging my SSD drive; just to do it on my standard drive.

I used to use the Avast Freeware, and also used Malwarebytes = but I just used the free version of it. Since we moved in 2016 and changed carriers to Comcast I've just been using the Norton software that Comcast pipes to all their customers (they call it "free," but I'm sure it is included in your internet charges). Norton has such a good reputation; but I don't know how or why. I've always had crappy coverage with it.

Was that in Miami, Florida? That place I worked had two buildings with two different huge massive computers that were totally separate. I worked in the building with the Honeywell; and like Ghastley said = they used those Keypunch cards. The other building was the "elite" administrative = the top brass. They had the IBM. The two computers did not talk to each other; as far as I knew.

Norton is so popular it's one of the first antivirus software to be worked around by a virus.

Aha, that explains the issues then. ... urgh.

That was a bank in St. Louis MO. We did overnight data processing for 32 correspondent banks in the area. Yeah, in early 1970's there we loaded trays and trays of punch cards. Hard to imagine it's been so long ago.

Some government agencies still use the Keypunch system; and also still use those ancient CRT's with the orange text and giant blinking square cursor too, lol.

Oh, the old green screen. Those were the days.

Well, a month or so ago I noticed that Puter's external speakers began displaying some distortion at moderate (or more) volume. Since my headphone/mic that does not go through the speakers was fine I theorized that it was just my old speakers going bad. A call to the place that built and maintains Puter generated concurrence with my theory. So I ordered a replacement pair of the same inexpensive Logitec speakers for about $9US. They arrived today and perfectly fixed the problem. Simple, inexpensive and done. I'm pleased that I didn't have to send up emergency flare signals asking for rescue by SubRosa or ghastley.

Sweet, glad you got it fixed!

Long story short, I've been getting a lot of BSODs (and multiple kinds) in the past week or so, and now it is a critical issue. My computer now only goes to the hardware diagnostics black-and-white screen and it is running a test now. I think Windows 10 updates may have still had something to do with it, but now I think it is mostly my hard drive. I'm not super computer savvy, but I guess it could be responsible for most or all the different BSODs. I've had the computer for 3 years now, which is about the start of the range of the average lifespan of a hard drive. I have both an SSD and HDD, so I don't know if it would be one or both that are an issue.

Hopefully I can get this resolved fairly quickly.

How did the 'test' go? Can you still reach Windows? If so, I believe there is free utility software that can determine the condition of drives. I've not researched those ages so don't know what exits or how good they are. Still, it might be worth investigating. Of course the problem could be any number of things, from simple to hard-to-diagnose.

What? 3 year lifespan on hard drives? I used my old slow hdd for well over 10 years with no issues.

Though i suppose I'll need to upgrade at some point. I got her 3 years ago in January.

It is with Geek Squad at the nearest Best Buy to me now. They'll be running diagnostics and doing a couple other things with it, so we'll see what they have to say. Unfortunately, it isn't projected to be ready until Monday afternoon, although it could be ready earlier than that. Here's hoping that it gets done sooner and that they don't have to do more tinkering with it beyond what they are doing for it now.

My tests that I was able to do on the computer didn't really come up with anything. I've already heard from several people that it could actually be the motherboard that's the problem. So I don't know.




Damn, that was one stubborn HDD. But 3-5 years or something like that is supposed to be the average lifespan, so I'm sure there are a bunch that go beyond that. And there's definitely going to be some that go below that average.

I've never had a HDD that only lasted that short period a time. Heck, my current Windows 7 is on its 11th year now and my Windows 3.1 lasted almost 25 years! Both being used on a regular basis btw. 3-5 years to me would be a lemon.

Yeah, I typically don't replace hard drives unless I'm doing a whole new build or buying a whole replacement.

I prefer not to. I must just have had incredible luck.

I too have had good luck with HDDs. Well, discounting one Western Digital 64gb that arrived defective. Luckily, I bought two identical HDDs, so sending the defective drive back for replacement didn't slow down that system build. Can't recall having one go bad during use, but might be forgetting something. Seems to me I might once have owned an HHD that began showing signs of going flaky, so ordered a replacement drive in ample time to transfer data before I'd lost anything worth mentioning.

Well, good news: My computer is back in my hands. Geek Squad finished up with it pretty quickly. It was definitely NOT the hard drive. However, they weren't entirely sure about the root cause of the BSODs. But they did a whole bunch of stuff like fix registry errors, put a new antivirus on my computer, deleted a lot of temporary files, updated drivers (which, when I tried that before, said they were up-to-date...), and a bunch of other things, and when they left the computer on for extended periods of time it did not crash. So it sounds like I am in the clear. Hopefully.

I'm quite pleased that they finished up with it way earlier than they anticipated. Haven't really tested the computer out yet, but I am using it right now as I type this.

Encouraging news, Rader! I hope it continues to hold up without problems for you.

Those driver updates, especially if any were video card, are likely the cure. Drivers cause more BSOD's than anything else does.

And the BSODs are back.

They are not as frequent, but that isn't much solace. And for the first couple days, the computer was working great. Then, sometime when I was working on the computer yesterday or the day before, got several "CRITICAL_PROCESS_DIED" codes. Yesterday, I had one "UNEXPECTED_STORE_EXCEPTION," but other than that, it is always the critical process one. Almost every time it has been when I have been working in Chrome, but there was one time when I was in-game yesterday that it crapped out.

Back to Geek Squad tomorrow in the early afternoon for an appointment.

Sorry to hear that, Rader. That's gotta be frustrating as can be! Let's hope the Geeks have better luck with it tomorrow.

Anybody having issues with youtube randomly not dispalying thumbnails on vids?

Not me....so far.

Since they had checked hardware last time, they are looking at software this time. I'm suspecting, and the employee that checked it in is positive about it, that the issue is Windows 10. Thus, they are backing up all the data and doing a total wipe so that they can completely reinstall the OS.

My appointment is for Saturday late morning, but I got an email that they already finished service. So I'm going to see if I can get in there sometime tomorrow. I can actually pick it up at any time, but at my appointment time is when they can completely go over everything. I may just go early tomorrow in case they aren't busy or someone misses their appointment time.

This is what it looks like.

Some videos have thumbnails, others don't and I have no idea why it happened.


Edit: I have the latest Firefox update.

It will probably have something to do with the extension you have for classic YT. Regular YT is looking fine on my end.

Hmm. Maybe I should switch to another extension that gives the old look? Suggestions?


Edit: I have tried three different extensions one by one and all of them has this problem. Sigh. If only I knew why it all of a sudden happened.

Just added Privacy Badger to my Firefox. Anyone having an opinion on it?