Computer Experts - Help Needed

[BrettM]

I run a Lenovo laptop which is great, and the wife runs a Dell Inspiron 1525 which we have had no end of problems with over the past 12 months. The Dell service guys up this way know us well given the amount of 'blue screens' that the Dell has had over the past 12 months. It has had new motherboards, hard drives, anything. It is a real lemon since we have owned other Dell's in the past which have been great - hence we went with another for her.

Since its last repair it has been running well (finally). But last night the gremlins returned. It keeps rebooting itself but Windows now will not start. We have tried the recovery disk but still the same problem. It tries to start, before a very quick blue screen (which we can't read what it says) before going to a screen which asks whether we want to start Windows in safe, normal, etc. Whatever mode we try, we get the same result, back to the Windows mode menu.

Given the problems in the past we have everything backed up on an external hard drive. Does anyone have any tips to get Windows going? It is Vista which I think is crap, but the Vista I run on my Lenovo never misses a beat. How can we wipe the drive and start again if Windows won't load?

[BrettM]

I should add, we have run a full day of diagnostic stuff as it was always the first thing Dell asked us to do. Keeps saying nothing is wrong.

[Minor_Threat]

Have you had the RAM replaced? Blue screens are commonly associated with RAM issues. I should also add that my work laptop is a Dell and within the first 2 days of getting it the RAM was replaced due to Blue Screens.

[BrettM]

Yes, the RAM has been replaced twice.

[Webster]

Your flux capaciter may require more banana skins.

[BrettM]

Peddle faster perhaps?

[dan]

Throw it in the trash and buy a mac. Life's too short to piss fart around with inferior equipment.

[mike]

I find it amazing it took 6 replies before someone started wanking on about macs.

[kingslayer33]

Because they obviously have never had a problem with new gear.

[markTHEblake]

Throw it in the trash and buy a mac. Life's too short to piss fart around with inferior equipment.

Reliability and service from Apple is no better.

[IanO]

If you have XP OS around you could reboot from the XP CD and use it to blow away the Vista OS and install XP. IMO XP is a lot more stable than Vista. This "might" work. If it is a hardware problem then it won't help.

[idgolfguy]

My lenovo used bsd regularly on XP. I put Win7 and no issues. Worth a try if Dell won't spring for a new machine.

[dan]

Reliability and service from Apple is no better.
4 macs in 13 yrs. Only had 1 with problems and that was after 4 yrs of constant use (was time to upgrade anyway). And on the software side, only 1 virus. If that's not reliable then I don't know what is.

[markTHEblake]

Dan, I did not say Mac was not reliable at all

[mike]

I've got no sound. I plugged the head phones in a while ago and there was a pop up that said something like "audio device has been disconnected"
The sound icon down the bottom right says "no audio output device is installed".

What have I done and how do I fix it?

[markTHEblake]

reinstall the audio adaptor drivers

[mike]

Pfft. This is mike you're talking to.

I'll ring my computer guy tomorrow.

[markTHEblake]

Thats what I said. Lucky you have a PC, if it was a Mac you would have to buy a new one.

[Courty]

If that doesn't work, replace teh sound card.