Help?

[BobFretwell]

I have a computer, brought with me when I moved from England to Spain three and a half years ago...
It runs Windows 98 and has had extra memory (RAM) to 312 since I have been here. I also have McAfee virus protection (which seems to work well enough). However I have had a recurring fault which several 'experts' have tried to fix for me. These experts have all charged me their 'reasonable' fees for their knowledge (that, too, should be in inverted commas!)
The first spent four hours before telling me that he didn't know my 'software' (this was a problem with e-mail) (?) Charged me 150 Euros plus wanting 75 Euros for travelling the fifty kilometres to my home.
He spent at least one of the hours looking at his own web site 'to see how it looks on other peoples' computers'.
The others have charged me their 'reasonable' rates between 35 euros an hour and 65 euros an hour or 'part of'...the last came to the house, gave me a bill after two minutes for an 'hours' travelling (11 Km) plus an 'hour' for looking-remember the two minutes? and telling me he couldn't fix it- and another 'hour' for having to go home...all this at 65 euros an hour? I'm afraid I wasn't very polite with this last one!
The problem...when I turn on and click on yahoo to read my e-mails everything wotks fine until I click on one of the buttons to 'delete', 'move', 'compose' etc. I then get a flashed on screen error message which tells me I have performed an illegal operation and the system will be switched off...not very impressive, huh?
Sometimes the problem persists after restarting, other times it will work fine until the next time.
I'm afraid I am old (ish) and just want my computer to do what it is supposed to do without having to pay 'experts' enough to buy a new villa after merely telling me they don't know how to fix whatever is wrong.
Am I being unreasonable?
Bob Fretwell,
La Roda de Andalucia, Spain

[Kay]

Oh dear, this sounds awful, Bob. Never fear, we have some smart cookies on BE. I'm sure someone will be able to help you.

Kay

[ruggie]

Urk. I'll wait for Alan to pass detailed comment, but my first question is: how many applications do you use, and do you have the installation CDs for them? If it's just MS Office and one or two simple things, the quickest fix is probably to archive your data, erase everything, then re-install the operating system. But it may still be cheaper to look for a good deal on a new computer at your local hypermarket or PC shop. If you can keep your keyboard and screen, 500 euros will get you something that will be good for many years, and come with better software.

[Savannah_Alan]

mmm, that's a strange one. The first thing that comes to mind is that there may be an issue with your browser and javascript scripting. I've just had a look at the Yahoo webmail page and there sure is a lot of javscript there surrounding the compose functionality etc...

The first thing I would suggest would be to try a different browser. You don't mention what browser you are using. I'm assuming you're using Internet explorer. You could try downloading Mozilla Firefox. It's quite a small(ish) download and it would be interesting to see if that cures your problem. I suspect it will.
Other than that, I would make sure I have the latest version of IE (if you wish to use that).

Other than that, Ruggies idea seems a good one! Maybe it's time to think about changing the operating system and/or computer. I bet a fresh re-install would do the trick though.

I'd be interested to know the outcome.

Alan.

[BobFretwell]

Thanks to Alan and Ruggie for your answers...
To Ruggie...I have a number of applications installed some of which I do not have the discs for. I'm sorry to say I'm one of the (many) people who really don't know what I'm doing when it comes to backing up programs and even less about getting them back when I have, so I no longer back up anything. This, as I'm sure you know, can land one in a big mess when the system goes down. And has! 18 months or so ago I lost everything and had to re-start. Not nice as there were a huge number of files lost on my MIcrosoft Publsher 98 program (the one I use most) We lost every label, instruction sheet (painfully translated in Spanish and English) plus all the product recipes, history, formulae etc. etc. when I bought the computer I didn't get a MS 98 disc with it, as it was preloaded, so I had to wait several weeks while a replacement came from England.
I bought a new MS Publisher program disc (as it is by far the easiest to use) and started everything up again, promising myself I would back up every day yada yada yada...however, when I lost everything again I found I couldn't get any information from my religiously saved back up discs (obviously down to me being a cretin!)
Most of the work on the computer is on this program and I would not like to lose that by changing anything. (Fear comes to the fore here)
For this reason I'm afraid to try Alan's suggestion of a different internet system in case I lose things I can't easily replace. I do have the latest (and regularly updated) version of Internet explorer.
Unfortunately, following the collapse of my pension fund with Equitable Life last year I no longer have the money to think about buying a new computer, though, from your comments that is probably what I need, We barely have enough money to get through each month now, so major purchases have to take a back seat (sorry about the cliché)
Perhaps I'll have to try to learn properly how to back up and recover my data and then I'll try wiping everything again.
Thanks to both of you for the suggestions, I am grateful. I'll let you know how everything turns out,
Cheers,
Poor Bob, happy in Spain despite the lack of money.

[Dave]

Bob, you can rest easy - adding Mozilla Firefox to your computer won't lose anything that's already on there. You can run both Firefox and IE on the same machine at the same time - I do. It's just a matter of clicking on either the IE icon or the Firefox one.

The only thing you'll find is that when you visit sites with Firefox that you've previously registered with while using IE, you'll need to log in afresh - Firefox won't have any record of you having visited them before. The same thing applies if you visit with Firefox first, then go there afterwards with IE.

Sorry to hear about your pension fund - what a terrible blow.

[Savannah_Alan]

Dave is right Bob. Installing Firefox will have no effect on your your Internet Explorer.


To be honest, I bet Dave would agree with me when I say I wouldn't really recommend using Internet explorer anyway - particularly on a Win '98 machine. This is for reasons of security.

Now, as far as your computer goes, there is probably no pressing reason why you need to upgrade your computer or operating system if you don't want to.
The only unfortunate thing that I always found with older versions of Windows was that it was a virtual necessity to do a periodic full rebuild. The newer versions of Windows (2000 and XP) seem to be more stable, but with the older versions, I used to count on the fact that I would have to rebuild my system at least every three months (I knew one person that would do a fresh rebuild every single month as a matter of course). I find Windows XP to be far better in this respect even though I spend most of my time in Linux these days.

Take my word for it, visit http://www.mozilla.org/, download Firefox and give it a try. I bet your problem with Yahoo mail will be gone. Then just work on those backups, because your tea leaves are predicting a rebuild in your future ! We'll be here to answer any questions.

Alan.

[ruggie]

obviously down to me being a cretin!)

No. Down to the fact that, 20+ years after the PC came into being, and more than ten since it became a household item, usability is still crap. I wouldn't mind betting that BE forum users as a population rate in the top 15 percentile, or better, as educated and worldly-wise people - yet look at the problems we have!