WEIRD computer problems!!!

***HELP PLEASE***

OK my friends dad has asked me to help fix his PC as it is running
a little sluggish and sometimes freezes

He had NO graphics driver installed and refresh rate was 60hz OUCH!!!

The graphics card is integrated into the mortherboard which is an ASUS A7 series and I managed to intsall the correct graphic driver so it runs a lot smoother

I thought that must have been the reason why it was freezing, as it is usually graphic related am I right?

But after further use the PC froze on me, I couldn't CTRL-ALT-DEL the reset or power button would NOT work and I could only get it to restart by disconnecting at the mains first.

He says it frequently freezes when he uses some CD labelling software but also at other points.

It froze on me when I was looking at Amazon.com???

The other strange problem with the PC is I think it is possessed or stoned because it thinks it has a UMAX ASTRA 1220P (Scanner) connected it keeps saying unknown device found need to install hardware but wont automatically.

He does NOT have any umax devices connected and the scanner connected is a HP!!!!

The 3rd and final problem is the CD writer, he has a lite-on DvD writer that works PERFECTLY but also has a HP series 9100 cd writer which opens and closes is acknowledged in bios, shows in windows explorer, but it wont read ANY disc inserted and if a disc is inserted it crashes the PC to the point where again it can only be restarted by powering off at the mains first!!!!!

3 problems!!! Are they all connected?

Help

Thanks

 

The first thing I'd do is disconnect the HP CDWriter. Remove the data and power cables; be sure the main power cord to the PC is unplugged before opening the case. After that CD drive is removed, try booting up the PC. I wouldn't be surprised if disconnecting that drive fixes most of the problems. Last week I was working on a PC with a faulty CDRW. It locked up, ran slow, and even the good DVD drive wouldn't work properly. As soon as the bad drive was disconnected, the PC ran perfectly. For the scanner problem: disconnect the scanner from the PC by unplugging the data cable with both the PC and scanner turned off. Reboot the PC w/o the scanner attached and go to Add/Remove Programs in the Control Panel and uninstall all the scanner software for the HP, and if anything is listed for the UMax, remove that too. Go into the Device Manager (Control Panel > System > Hardware > Device Manager) and look for any scanners or unknown device or yellow question marks or exclamation points and remove any that you see. Reboot the PC and re-install the HP scanner software according to HP's directions. That should do it! Good Luck!

hopperdave2000

 

Hi

Thanks for the reply, it seems logical! so I will it give it a go

Now that you mention it the CD Writer did seem to sometimes
affect the performance of the DvD writer.

Will keep you posted (not going back for another week)

Thanks again