[pchelpers] Re: Computer dose not turn on

Hi Trudy,

Tuesday, October 30, 2007, 5:03:30 PM, you wrote:

TA> a friend called me this morning and said his computer is not
TA> turning on when he pressed the power button. However, he said
TA> there is something working, because something is shining through
TA> in the back, it looks like a yellow light of some kind is on.  
TA> Does anybody know  what the source of that light  is?  Does that
TA> mean  his  powersupply is working? 

Have your friend physically unplug the power cable from the computer,
then hold in the power button for about 15 seconds. Then, plug the
computer back in and see if it works. On modern computers, I've
noticed that often a power surge can cause the computer to appear to
be dead, but all it needs is to be turned off fully and drained so
that the system will reset properly. Modern systems are never off
unless physically unplugged or a switch flipped on a power strip. If
anyone on this list has ever taken their dead system to a shop and it
worked perfectly fine there, this is the cause, and the instructions
above are the fast way to get it working again.

Many motherboards typically have an LED on them which is on when the
motherboard is receiving power.  That does not necessarily mean that
either the power supply or motherboard are working properly.


TA> He also said he has problems with spyware lately, and he was
TA> wondering if a hacker could have something to do with that
TA> problem.  

Unlikely.

If he has Windows XP, he should get Windows Defender, available from
http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software. That should
take care of most or all of it, and he can then spend a bit more time
to find something better... if he wants to.
http://www.spywarewarrior.com is a reputable site with information on
which ones are good; anything not mentioned here as good should be
avoided. Windows Defender, being free and provided by Microsoft, is
the baseline, and some of the pay anti-spyware programs are not as
good as Windows Defender, or are outright malicious.

Have him also go to http://secunia.com/software_inspector to check to
see if everything is up-to-date, and update anything which is not;
there should be NO red X's when he's done.

-- 
Scott.



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