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Inaccessible flash drives and other problems
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Inaccessible flash drives and other problems
10:47 AM EST 1/24/08
I have two questions regarding our GATES computers.

1. Two of our computers have started giving us the following message

"You may be a victim of software counterfeiting. This copy of Windows is not genuine".

2. One of our GATES computers will not reocgnize Flash drives. When a flash drive is inserted into the correct slot, we receive a message that says "Found new hardware". But nothing shows up in My Computer. And we are unable to access the flash drive.

I do not kmow where to start to look to find out how to solve these two problems.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.
Re: Inaccessible flash drives and other problems
1:31 PM EST 1/24/08 as a reply to Jo Ann Gustavson.
Well, that's pretty interesting! (not so much the reaction you were hoping for I bet).

I take it from your other message that you had not recently done Windows Updates before this happened? And they have been locked the whole time? Also I am assuming that you have restarted the computers to see if what is happening goes away.

I don't have any actual fixes at this point but here are some things to try to help narrow down what is going on.

- On either of the two, keep the drive locked and log on to exec and place a new icon on the desktop. Then restart and log back in to see if it is still there. This will verify whether the Centurion Guard is working.
- On the one with the flash drive issues, try shutting it down, and then switch to Hard Drive and DVD drive Locked. Now try it again and see if the flash drive appears with the drive letter the DVD normally has. If not, also try inserting the flash drive while in exec. These are all to check if it is an error with the profile policy.
- Assuming the CG is working, you might actually try running Windows updates on one of these.

Whatever happens, come back and let us know how it goes.

Also - what do these messages look like? Is there any other wording? Any graphics at all?

Dale
Re: Inaccessible flash drives and other problems
2:08 PM EST 1/24/08 as a reply to Jo Ann Gustavson.
Dale:

Here are some answers to your questions that you posed.

I have not had a chance to try any of your suggestions, as our computers are usually all busy during the day. But I will try them first thing tomorrow morning.

I had not recently done Windows update.
The computers have been locked the entire time preior to this happening.
Yes, Ihave restarted the computers, and it does not make a difference.

The messages are contained in a little box or baloon. I do not believe there is any other wording, but I will check again tomorrow morning when I start the ocmputers. As far as I can tell there are not graphics.

The computer that is giving me the problem with the flash drive is the same one that I had problems with and had to remove and then reinstall the profiles last year. I believe you also helped me with that.

Also, I am thinking that there might be more going on with this computer than meets the eye.

Because, come to think of it, it is giving me problems in the area of shutting down. At closing time, we will go and shut down the computers. The computer acts like it is shutting down (and does so as far as I can tell).

But then the following morning, when I go to turn it on, it sounds like it is already on. Nothing is on the screen, but I can hear it running. So I have to hold the power button in, to get it to turn off.

Then when I turn it on again, it makes a couple of clicking noises (this does not sound like it is trying to find a floppy. More like the sound that is made when your tongue goes up against the roof of your mouth and you make a sound).

Then the ocmputer starts and works, except for the flash drive not working.

Does any of this help narrow down the problem, or is our computer just going to heck?
Re: Inaccessible flash drives and other problems
7:53 PM EST 1/24/08 as a reply to Jo Ann Gustavson.
Well, here is the answer to at least one of your problems - the issue with flash drives. The profile restrictions restrict what drive letters you can see from the public profiles. The settings out of the box didn't provide for using the DVD and a flash drive at the same time.
So, follow these instructions to change the settings to allow for the extra drive letter - this must have been done at one time, but when you reinstalled the profiles, you also wiped out that change.
http://pacomputing.webjunction.org/do/DisplayContent?id=7296

But that other issue doesn't sound good - I think its hard drive might be going bad. Even though you were able to work around the earlier problem, it still sounds to me like a drive slowly going bad.

You can check the drive by going here:
http://support.gateway.com/support/drivers/getFile.asp?id=21280&dscr=GWSCAN%205.12&uid=184967755
Follow the instructions to download the application and install it on a bootable floppy. You then boot to that floppy and run a scan. It can tell you if the drive is dying. If there are just small problems it will also try to fix them.

Dale
Re: Inaccessible flash drives and other problems
12:11 PM EST 1/25/08 as a reply to Jo Ann Gustavson.
Thanks again Dale. I have resolved the problem with the flash drive via the instructions you sent me.

I have also resolved the problem regarding the Counterfeit Windows issue. It seems that somehow the date and time got goofed up on the computers. They were all at least one day behind, and several hours behind. So I checked the date/time on all computers, and it seems to have taken care of it.

I have not had an opportunity to check the hard drive yet. I will get to that later today or tomorrow.
Re: Inaccessible flash drives and other problems
12:55 PM EST 1/25/08 as a reply to Jo Ann Gustavson.
Ah, I had forgotten about that possibility. If all your Gates computers are way off, the most likely cause is that someone has turned on the automatic daylight savings time change. Because of the Centurion Guard, that setting needs to be left off. Otherwise Windows sets the clock back or ahead an hour, but then every time you restart it does it again because it loses the record of always having done it. After a month or two, they are far enough off to cause these kind of odd problems.

Dale
Re: Inaccessible flash drives and other problems
1:55 PM EST 1/26/08 as a reply to Jo Ann Gustavson.
Dale:

I had a chance to run the GWSCAN today on the hard drive. It passed. It came back with a message that stated no errors found.

So I am not sure what the problem with that particular computer is.

But as for the other problems, they are totally taken care of.

Thanks for all your help.
Re: Inaccessible flash drives and other problems
2:13 PM EST 1/26/08 as a reply to Jo Ann Gustavson.
No problem.

Even if the drive is dying, there isn't much you can do. And you don't the concern you would on a normal computer of losing data when the drive dies. So with these it is probably best to just run the pc until the drive dies, and then go ahead and put in a new drive and run the upgrade disks on it (or ghost from another machine).

Dale