Threatening to throw it out the window . . . long thread sorry.

C

CloClo

New Member
Hi. I have an Acer laptop (possibly aspire 5920, but the box is in the garage), which has always been brilliant. Its only 8 months old, and uses windows vista. For all my Microsoft programs, I've been using office 2000. Everything was working fine until this weekend.

I was working on the home access section of my school website (actually, I had only just logged on), and everything froze. After a while, I restarted my laptop. Now I have nothing. The quick-launch on the start menu is gone, and all my ofice programs have completly disappeared. Most of my settings have disappeared. It took me three hours, but I managed to get my windows side-bar back.

I've been through all the setting, and can't get my quick-lauch back, even though the option is definitely selected. Then, about half-an-hour ago, a message flashed up requestion a performance rating. It did the performance rating, and my formerly 4.8 system is now base rated as 1! I can hardly access anything on this! Its the graphics one that is bringing it down, everything else appears to be fine. How can I improve this?

Also, has anyone got any ideas about how to get my microsoft office programs back? I have tried re-installing, and nothing's happened. Every time I open them, they bring up a blank screen, with no toolbar, and stop responding almost immediately. If nothing improves, I'm going to be forced to buy office 2007 by the weekend (I can get the full £430 version for just over £50, legally, because I'm still at school).

Please please please help me! I've got three computer-based coursework project deadlines in the next three weeks!

We think it's the home access on the school site thats done it (my old computer got a virus from school last year, transferred by memory stick). If my laptop is completly messed up, is the school responsible? As I've said, its only 8 months old, and one of Acer's best (retails at around £850).

Sorry about the long post, and hope its in the right place. Its the first time I've posted on here.

HELP!
 
Forgot to say that other tings seem to have changed - stuff like the shape of windows, and standard fonts. However, none of the settings have changed. It also won't let my turn my internet connection off - it's going to get very expensive as when the laptop on, its is automatically connected.

Always, on startup, a window pops up, making a bleeping noise, saying 'Permition denied.' What is this? It definitely does NOT say permission!

I can get it to an ICT technician who works in my mums company next week, but want to see if its something really obvious before I spend money. I had been told its a really good computer, but I'm beginning to wonder. I really hope we've not wasted the money on this.

Can we claim against the school if its their system thats caused this?
 
Sounds like you got a virus of some sort that's deleting your hard drive.

Unless someone comes up with a better solution I'd suggest doing a restore, this will restore your computer back to factory defaults, making it as if you just bought it. It will also delete everything on your computer, so back up anything important to a cd or thumb drive.

To do this:

"1. Power on the machine
2. At the white ACER BIOS screen, hold the “Alt” key and press the “F10” key simultaneously to start Acer eRecovery
3. Once eRecovery has loaded, click “Restore to Factory Default Settings”
4. Click “OK” to continue
5. From here, the eRecovery process will update all the data on the C: drive and restore a fully functional factory image (approximately 10 minutes).
6. Once eRecovery has run, press “OK” to reboot unit"
 
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I would head over to the security section first and post a HiJack This report. The details are in the sticky of that board. That would be a better first step before you decide to restore.
 
Before doing the recovery, (and hopefully it has an option to keep all your existing files in tact), please follow the instructions in this thread and post the requested logs.

Sorry Ukulele Ninja, you must have posted before mine did or I wouldn't have posted this.
 
Yeah I'm quick to pull the trigger on restore/reinstall. I have no patience for looking for viruses and such :P
 
Thanks for the replies, I'm following the steps now.

Last night I logged on, and almost immediately it started to open up internet explorer. I wasn't in the room when it started doing this, by the time I got back 157 windows of the program were open. It wouldn't stop doing it, and was doing it faster than I could close the programs, so I had to shut the comuter down. It hasn't done anything like that since.

If nothing works, I will do a system restore. Hopefully nothing gets deleted, I haven't got the time to write everything again before my deadline.

More help welcome though!
 
Ok, have in the last 10 minds lost desktop background, and any thumbnails of pictures (they are still there, and can be viewed when opened). Will the system restore help solve this, because I'm getting fed up of this?
 
CloClo said:
Ok, have in the last 10 minds lost desktop background, and any thumbnails of pictures (they are still there, and can be viewed when opened). Will the system restore help solve this, because I'm getting fed up of this?
Click to expand...

Like I said, the system restore will make it like you just turned your computer on for the first time. It's like a complete reset. It will delete everything on your computer though.
 
No improvement today, and now my internet exploerer is not compatible with the assisted connection feature Ive used for months. Will do a system restore on Saturday, once all my stuff is memory sticked. If I copy everything over, will any viruses get transported over?

And yes I followed the instructions in that other thread, and its posted. The malware found an infected toolbar on my internet explorer, which I got rid of yesterday. Nothing's changed though.
 
CloClo said:
If I copy everything over, will any viruses get transported over?
Click to expand...

It's possible, viruses can be pretty nasty. When you restore I'd recommend download antivirus software (like Avast) before you plug in the memory stick. Once installed and you've rebooted/updated and such, plug in the memory stick and scan it before opening anything on it. If it doesn't detect anything you should be ok.
 
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