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#1
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8
64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. The machine has been scanned for viruses with Avast, AVG and MSE and is clean. He is a sucker for buying magazines that tell him to run various cleaners and speeder-uppers to keep Windows working well. The writers of these articles should be taken out and shot. If he tries to go into several programs, nothing happens. For example hitting Control Panel gives him a blank window that cannot be closed. I can access his machine using TeamViewer and have checked that the actual Control Panel programs are still there and can be used. Event Viewer shows errors. If he runs sfc /scannow, it does nothing, just sits there with a cursor showing (ie doesn't go back to the prompt). I have loaded onto his machine three bookmarked tabs that combine into the procedure for downloading the iso and then doing a repair install, but I've only found 8.1, not 8.1 upgrade 1. He has looked at these and panicked. He is in his 80's, and is now talking of buying a new hard disk or SSD and having me visit him to reinstall 8.0 from scratch and then do the updates on the new disk. I'm now at the stage of thinking what a shambles all this is. It really ought to be easy to connect to Microsoft, enter your activation code and download or have sent a dvd that matches whatever incarnation of 8 that you have. I suppose I can try to cobble together the 8.1.1 iso here if I can find the image on the MS site. Then we could try a repair install which might or might not work. Can anyone point me at the 8.1.1 image? Does it matter that most of my machines are still 32-bit? Would the download auto-detect bits? -- Bill |
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#2
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
On 9/23/14 10:36 AM, Bill wrote:
A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8 64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. The machine has been scanned for viruses with Avast, AVG and MSE and is clean. He is a sucker for buying magazines that tell him to run various cleaners and speeder-uppers to keep Windows working well. The writers of these articles should be taken out and shot. If he tries to go into several programs, nothing happens. For example hitting Control Panel gives him a blank window that cannot be closed. I can access his machine using TeamViewer and have checked that the actual Control Panel programs are still there and can be used. Event Viewer shows errors. If he runs sfc /scannow, it does nothing, just sits there with a cursor showing (ie doesn't go back to the prompt). I have loaded onto his machine three bookmarked tabs that combine into the procedure for downloading the iso and then doing a repair install, but I've only found 8.1, not 8.1 upgrade 1. He has looked at these and panicked. He is in his 80's, and is now talking of buying a new hard disk or SSD and having me visit him to reinstall 8.0 from scratch and then do the updates on the new disk. I'm now at the stage of thinking what a shambles all this is. It really ought to be easy to connect to Microsoft, enter your activation code and download or have sent a dvd that matches whatever incarnation of 8 that you have. I suppose I can try to cobble together the 8.1.1 iso here if I can find the image on the MS site. Then we could try a repair install which might or might not work. Can anyone point me at the 8.1.1 image? Does it matter that most of my machines are still 32-bit? Would the download auto-detect bits? Hi, Bill, I don't have any solutions for the problem, but rather than go there, have him mail the computer to you if it comes to that. A lot cheaper than you going X miles across country. -- Ken Mac OS X 10.8.5 Firefox 25.0 Thunderbird 24.6.0 "My brain is like lightning, a quick flash and it's gone!" |
#3
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
On 9/23/2014 12:36 PM, Bill wrote:
A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8 64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. The machine has been scanned for viruses with Avast, AVG and MSE and is clean. He is a sucker for buying magazines that tell him to run various cleaners and speeder-uppers to keep Windows working well. The writers of these articles should be taken out and shot. If he tries to go into several programs, nothing happens. For example hitting Control Panel gives him a blank window that cannot be closed. I can access his machine using TeamViewer and have checked that the actual Control Panel programs are still there and can be used. Event Viewer shows errors. If he runs sfc /scannow, it does nothing, just sits there with a cursor showing (ie doesn't go back to the prompt). I have loaded onto his machine three bookmarked tabs that combine into the procedure for downloading the iso and then doing a repair install, but I've only found 8.1, not 8.1 upgrade 1. He has looked at these and panicked. He is in his 80's, and is now talking of buying a new hard disk or SSD and having me visit him to reinstall 8.0 from scratch and then do the updates on the new disk. I'm now at the stage of thinking what a shambles all this is. It really ought to be easy to connect to Microsoft, enter your activation code and download or have sent a dvd that matches whatever incarnation of 8 that you have. I suppose I can try to cobble together the 8.1.1 iso here if I can find the image on the MS site. Then we could try a repair install which might or might not work. Can anyone point me at the 8.1.1 image? Does it matter that most of my machines are still 32-bit? Would the download auto-detect bits? First it is my understanding that 8.1.1 will not appear anywhere on an updated windows 8.1 computer. At least that is the case on my computer and I know it is current in its updates. In the list of installed updates, see below, there is no mention of 8.1.1, though I know they exist. Second how is he accessing the Control Panel? While it can be accessed from the Modern interface, the easiest way to access it and all computer functions is from the Desktop Interface. Right click ON the MS icon at the left end of the Desktop Taskbar, you can access the Control panel, and others. The most useful function from the MS icon is the System. This tells all about the computer, and the operating system. By clicking Windows Updates from the lower right corner of the System Screen, and then Clicking Installed Updates from the lower right corner of the Windows Updates screen you can see all of the updates installed on the computer. In this same screen (Windows Update) in the upper right corner there is "View Update History" This screen tells you all of the updates applied to the operating system whether they are important, optional, etc. and whether the update was installed successfully or not. While this is not meant to discourage, there are some things that can hid from the standard means of detecting them. I just had a piece of maleware, that was not picked up by McAfee or Malwarebytes. I spent two days, going through directories and the Window's registry to get it off of my computer. |
#4
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
Bill wrote:
A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8 64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. The machine has been scanned for viruses with Avast, AVG and MSE and is clean. He is a sucker for buying magazines that tell him to run various cleaners and speeder-uppers to keep Windows working well. The writers of these articles should be taken out and shot. If he tries to go into several programs, nothing happens. For example hitting Control Panel gives him a blank window that cannot be closed. I can access his machine using TeamViewer and have checked that the actual Control Panel programs are still there and can be used. Event Viewer shows errors. If he runs sfc /scannow, it does nothing, just sits there with a cursor showing (ie doesn't go back to the prompt). I have loaded onto his machine three bookmarked tabs that combine into the procedure for downloading the iso and then doing a repair install, but I've only found 8.1, not 8.1 upgrade 1. He has looked at these and panicked. He is in his 80's, and is now talking of buying a new hard disk or SSD and having me visit him to reinstall 8.0 from scratch and then do the updates on the new disk. I'm now at the stage of thinking what a shambles all this is. It really ought to be easy to connect to Microsoft, enter your activation code and download or have sent a dvd that matches whatever incarnation of 8 that you have. I suppose I can try to cobble together the 8.1.1 iso here if I can find the image on the MS site. Then we could try a repair install which might or might not work. Can anyone point me at the 8.1.1 image? Does it matter that most of my machines are still 32-bit? Would the download auto-detect bits? How about a Restore Point from System Restore ? That might work if System Restore wasn't disabled. System Restore includes a snapshot of the Registry file set, which is why it has some value. ******* System Restore operations can be reversed (as long as not done from Safe Mode). But I prefer that a "victim" do a backup first. You can install Macrium Reflect Free on your own machine, prepare the Macrium Reflect Free boot CD on your own machine, then send him the CD. That allows making backups of OSes which are broken (to an extent). And since you're using TeamViewer to get into the machine, there can't be that much wrong with it. The file system is intact enough to be backed up. The only reason I'm suggesting something that extreme, is installing Macrium directly into the OS, may not be working at the moment, due to the other problems. Maybe no executable works worth a damn, including freshly installed ones. The nice thing about the boot CD approach, is there isn't a dependency on the health of the OS itself. Since the OS used, is the one on the CD (WinPE based). Once he has backed up the system, you can use a Restore Point. Take it back a week, to a point where he knows it was working. This is the window for choosing a System Restore date to use. The dialog is copied from the tutorial link that follows it. You can certainly look in this now, to see if this is even possible. If there are no Restore Points, then this option isn't going to work. http://www.sevenforums.com/attachmen...em_restore.jpg Tutorial on restoring with System Restore point, which contains a copy of the Registry. Unlike WinXP, automatic restore points are taken less frequently on the more modern OS, which means you may have fewer choices for dates in there. In WinXP, this panel looked more like a calendar. http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...m-restore.html This covers the converse case, of manually making a Restore Point, before "doing something dangerous". It covers some of the associated settings. I'm only showing this, for reference purposes, not to act on any thing in here. http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...nt-create.html *Do not* change any settings on System Restore, until the machine is normal again. For example, if you adjust the size of the space used for System Restore, it can cause Restore Points (some of them) to get deleted. If you turn System Restore off and on again, it deletes the contents, and then you've lost them. There are many ways of shooting yourself in the foot, which is why I'm recommending an OS partition backup for "safety first". There's no particular reason for a System Restore to go wrong, but then again, you're not sitting in front of the machine, either. "It's a long walk, if you make a mistake." Paul |
#5
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
In message , Keith Nuttle
writes On 9/23/2014 12:36 PM, Bill wrote: A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8 64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. The machine has been scanned for viruses with Avast, AVG and MSE and is clean. He is a sucker for buying magazines that tell him to run various cleaners and speeder-uppers to keep Windows working well. The writers of these articles should be taken out and shot. If he tries to go into several programs, nothing happens. For example hitting Control Panel gives him a blank window that cannot be closed. I can access his machine using TeamViewer and have checked that the actual Control Panel programs are still there and can be used. Event Viewer shows errors. If he runs sfc /scannow, it does nothing, just sits there with a cursor showing (ie doesn't go back to the prompt). I have loaded onto his machine three bookmarked tabs that combine into the procedure for downloading the iso and then doing a repair install, but I've only found 8.1, not 8.1 upgrade 1. He has looked at these and panicked. He is in his 80's, and is now talking of buying a new hard disk or SSD and having me visit him to reinstall 8.0 from scratch and then do the updates on the new disk. I'm now at the stage of thinking what a shambles all this is. It really ought to be easy to connect to Microsoft, enter your activation code and download or have sent a dvd that matches whatever incarnation of 8 that you have. I suppose I can try to cobble together the 8.1.1 iso here if I can find the image on the MS site. Then we could try a repair install which might or might not work. Can anyone point me at the 8.1.1 image? Does it matter that most of my machines are still 32-bit? Would the download auto-detect bits? First it is my understanding that 8.1.1 will not appear anywhere on an updated windows 8.1 computer. At least that is the case on my computer and I know it is current in its updates. In the list of installed updates, see below, there is no mention of 8.1.1, though I know they exist. Second how is he accessing the Control Panel? While it can be accessed from the Modern interface, the easiest way to access it and all computer functions is from the Desktop Interface. Right click ON the MS icon at the left end of the Desktop Taskbar, you can access the Control panel, and others. The most useful function from the MS icon is the System. This tells all about the computer, and the operating system. By clicking Windows Updates from the lower right corner of the System Screen, and then Clicking Installed Updates from the lower right corner of the Windows Updates screen you can see all of the updates installed on the computer. In this same screen (Windows Update) in the upper right corner there is "View Update History" This screen tells you all of the updates applied to the operating system whether they are important, optional, etc. and whether the update was installed successfully or not. While this is not meant to discourage, there are some things that can hid from the standard means of detecting them. I just had a piece of maleware, that was not picked up by McAfee or Malwarebytes. I spent two days, going through directories and the Window's registry to get it off of my computer. Well, the first problem is that he has installed one of the start menu programs, so he doesn't have the MS icon. He has Control Panel in the list that comes up from his start menu button. This, and the other ways of accessing Control Panel all just bring up the totally blank initial CP window. Then, in http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials...indows-8-a.htm l item 4 refers to W8, 8.1 and 8.1 update. I assume this last is 8.1.1. Is this correct? If it is, that is what I can't find. He has a history of reading magazines then downloading and running programs with disastrous results even back to XP days. This is a machine he has only had for a few months. It really is more likely that he has removed some vital file or registry entry than that he has picked up malware, but I can't be sure, of course. The major problem is that he is still able to use the machine to submit work to various places, so he is reluctant to send it to me. It's also why he was thinking of starting again with a second HD, so that he could swap back if we didn't get it finished. -- Bill |
#6
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
In message , Paul writes
Bill wrote: A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8 64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. The machine has been scanned for viruses with Avast, AVG and MSE and is clean. He is a sucker for buying magazines that tell him to run various cleaners and speeder-uppers to keep Windows working well. The writers of these articles should be taken out and shot. If he tries to go into several programs, nothing happens. For example hitting Control Panel gives him a blank window that cannot be closed. I can access his machine using TeamViewer and have checked that the actual Control Panel programs are still there and can be used. Event Viewer shows errors. If he runs sfc /scannow, it does nothing, just sits there with a cursor showing (ie doesn't go back to the prompt). I have loaded onto his machine three bookmarked tabs that combine into the procedure for downloading the iso and then doing a repair install, but I've only found 8.1, not 8.1 upgrade 1. He has looked at these and panicked. He is in his 80's, and is now talking of buying a new hard disk or SSD and having me visit him to reinstall 8.0 from scratch and then do the updates on the new disk. I'm now at the stage of thinking what a shambles all this is. It really ought to be easy to connect to Microsoft, enter your activation code and download or have sent a dvd that matches whatever incarnation of 8 that you have. I suppose I can try to cobble together the 8.1.1 iso here if I can find the image on the MS site. Then we could try a repair install which might or might not work. Can anyone point me at the 8.1.1 image? Does it matter that most of my machines are still 32-bit? Would the download auto-detect bits? How about a Restore Point from System Restore ? That might work if System Restore wasn't disabled. System Restore includes a snapshot of the Registry file set, which is why it has some value. ******* System Restore operations can be reversed (as long as not done from Safe Mode). But I prefer that a "victim" do a backup first. You can install Macrium Reflect Free on your own machine, prepare the Macrium Reflect Free boot CD on your own machine, then send him the CD. That allows making backups of OSes which are broken (to an extent). And since you're using TeamViewer to get into the machine, there can't be that much wrong with it. The file system is intact enough to be backed up. The only reason I'm suggesting something that extreme, is installing Macrium directly into the OS, may not be working at the moment, due to the other problems. Maybe no executable works worth a damn, including freshly installed ones. The nice thing about the boot CD approach, is there isn't a dependency on the health of the OS itself. Since the OS used, is the one on the CD (WinPE based). Once he has backed up the system, you can use a Restore Point. Take it back a week, to a point where he knows it was working. This is the window for choosing a System Restore date to use. The dialog is copied from the tutorial link that follows it. You can certainly look in this now, to see if this is even possible. If there are no Restore Points, then this option isn't going to work. http://www.sevenforums.com/attachmen...684574-system- restore-system_restore.jpg Tutorial on restoring with System Restore point, which contains a copy of the Registry. Unlike WinXP, automatic restore points are taken less frequently on the more modern OS, which means you may have fewer choices for dates in there. In WinXP, this panel looked more like a calendar. http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...m-restore.html This covers the converse case, of manually making a Restore Point, before "doing something dangerous". It covers some of the associated settings. I'm only showing this, for reference purposes, not to act on any thing in here. http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...nt-create.html *Do not* change any settings on System Restore, until the machine is normal again. For example, if you adjust the size of the space used for System Restore, it can cause Restore Points (some of them) to get deleted. If you turn System Restore off and on again, it deletes the contents, and then you've lost them. There are many ways of shooting yourself in the foot, which is why I'm recommending an OS partition backup for "safety first". There's no particular reason for a System Restore to go wrong, but then again, you're not sitting in front of the machine, either. "It's a long walk, if you make a mistake." Paul Thanks, Paul. For some reason, I hadn't thought of Macrium Reflect even though I use it frequently here. I'll try all this when we next both feel up to having a Teamviewer session and after I have posted him the CD. He has multiple backups of all his data files, so it's all more of a pain than critical. -- Bill |
#8
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
On Tue, 23 Sep 2014 17:36:35 +0100, Bill wrote:
A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8 64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. There's no such thing. |
#9
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
In message , R. C.
White writes Pressing Win+Break should cause the System Properties screen to pop up on the monitor. And it should work from any program that might be running. We are going to try Paul's suggestion here. I have posted him a Macrium Reflect CD, and will try your suggestion via Teamviewer after he has made his image. item 4 refers to W8, 8.1 and 8.1 update. I assume this last is 8.1.1. Is this correct? If it is, that is what I can't find. Yes. Microsoft's remarkable naming crew is at work again. :( MS never called it 8.1.1, but that is the nickname others have applied to the 8.1 Update. My full-updated Windows edition is identified as "Windows 8.1 Pro with Media Center". Thanks. The problem now is that there Microsoft don't say whether the 8.1 image on their sites have the major update or not, but the repair instructions that I pointed to earlier indicate the versions have to be matched. Has he visited Windows Update recently? Does that show any pending or available updates? I keep mine up to date at least weekly; a check just now says "3 important updates are available". They are KB2990967, KB2998527, and the daily-or-so Definition Update for Windows Defender, KB2267602 (Definition 1.185.941.0). (I'll install those as soon as I send this post.) That's actually very interesting. I have a W8.1.1 machine here which says 3 updates needed, 2 of which match the numbers you give above. When I then go to the actual update, it says "Not needed:3 updates 3important updates selected", and doesn't have the actual install option. I think, but may be wrong, that Windows update is one of the programs that the friend can't get to run. It really is more likely that he has removed some vital file or registry entry than that he has picked up malware, but I can't be sure, of course. Has he tried the System File Checker (SFC /scannow) yet? Yes, it doesn't work. It appears in the list of services running, but the command window just sits there. This is in some ways similar to his Control Panel window. Just a window - no text or pretty pictures. Good luck to you and your friend. (I'm much younger than he is; I just turned 79 in July.) Thanks for this. I'm not far behind in age. -- Bill |
#10
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
On 9/24/2014 6:20 AM, mechanic wrote:
On Tue, 23 Sep 2014 17:36:35 +0100, Bill wrote: A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8 64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. There's no such thing. There was an update that rumor called 8.1.1, that when installed did not change the basic version number. With this rumored 8.1.1 installed the computer will still show being at 8.1 |
#11
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
On 9/23/2014 11:36 AM, Bill wrote:
A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8 64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. The machine has been scanned for viruses with Avast, AVG and MSE and is clean. He is a sucker for buying magazines that tell him to run various cleaners and speeder-uppers to keep Windows working well. The writers of these articles should be taken out and shot. If he tries to go into several programs, nothing happens. For example hitting Control Panel gives him a blank window that cannot be closed. I can access his machine using TeamViewer and have checked that the actual Control Panel programs are still there and can be used. Event Viewer shows errors. If he runs sfc /scannow, it does nothing, just sits there with a cursor showing (ie doesn't go back to the prompt). I have loaded onto his machine three bookmarked tabs that combine into the procedure for downloading the iso and then doing a repair install, but I've only found 8.1, not 8.1 upgrade 1. He has looked at these and panicked. He is in his 80's, and is now talking of buying a new hard disk or SSD and having me visit him to reinstall 8.0 from scratch and then do the updates on the new disk. I'm now at the stage of thinking what a shambles all this is. It really ought to be easy to connect to Microsoft, enter your activation code and download or have sent a dvd that matches whatever incarnation of 8 that you have. I suppose I can try to cobble together the 8.1.1 iso here if I can find the image on the MS site. Then we could try a repair install which might or might not work. Can anyone point me at the 8.1.1 image? Does it matter that most of my machines are still 32-bit? Would the download auto-detect bits? safe-mode , system restore |
#12
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What would anyone here do? Control Panel
mathedman wrote:
On 9/23/2014 11:36 AM, Bill wrote: A friend across the country has a fairly new machine that came with W8 64-bit and has been upgraded to the latest 8.1.1 in 2 stages. The machine has been scanned for viruses with Avast, AVG and MSE and is clean. He is a sucker for buying magazines that tell him to run various cleaners and speeder-uppers to keep Windows working well. The writers of these articles should be taken out and shot. If he tries to go into several programs, nothing happens. For example hitting Control Panel gives him a blank window that cannot be closed. I can access his machine using TeamViewer and have checked that the actual Control Panel programs are still there and can be used. Event Viewer shows errors. If he runs sfc /scannow, it does nothing, just sits there with a cursor showing (ie doesn't go back to the prompt). I have loaded onto his machine three bookmarked tabs that combine into the procedure for downloading the iso and then doing a repair install, but I've only found 8.1, not 8.1 upgrade 1. He has looked at these and panicked. He is in his 80's, and is now talking of buying a new hard disk or SSD and having me visit him to reinstall 8.0 from scratch and then do the updates on the new disk. I'm now at the stage of thinking what a shambles all this is. It really ought to be easy to connect to Microsoft, enter your activation code and download or have sent a dvd that matches whatever incarnation of 8 that you have. I suppose I can try to cobble together the 8.1.1 iso here if I can find the image on the MS site. Then we could try a repair install which might or might not work. Can anyone point me at the 8.1.1 image? Does it matter that most of my machines are still 32-bit? Would the download auto-detect bits? safe-mode , system restore With the caveat that you can't undo an attempt to use System Restore that way. If you use System Restore from regular running mode, you can revert the System Restore attempt. That's supposed to be one difference in behavior. Paul |
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