Welcome to AskAW! This section of our web site lets you submit questions about any problems/queries that you may have about Windows. Be it from a little icon that annoys you to hardware freezing your PC, we will try and help you out. You can submit your questions by e-mailing us at askaw@activewin.com.  You can browse through previous questions over at our Archive Page.  Who knows what you might find.

Here are the questions posted on: 10-18-2000

Question: Hi. I just discovered your site and am desperate. I had a great working setup on my old win98 computer, but recently my job forced me to upgrade to a faster computer (which came with win2k pre-installed). I decided to move the old win98 hard drive into the new computer (into one of the extra drive bays), so that I could dual boot. When I (just to test if it would work) set up the win98 HD as the primary master, it booted into win98 perfectly fine, and everything worked great. Then, when I rewired the win2k HD to be the primary master and the win98 HD to be the slave, win2k booted up fine and mounted the win98 HD as the D: drive, but I could not figure out how to boot into win98. IN desperation, I rewired the win98 drive to (again) be the primary master, and this time, when it booted into win98 (and after it showed that full-screen win98 booting image) the booting halted with an error message. I forgot what the error message is, but I can follow-up if necessary (I'll have to re-wire my computer again). My guess is that win2k did something to the boot sector of the win98 HD and now win98 isn't allowed to boot. So I know that you can set up the boot.ini file (in win2k) to allow dual booting, but everything I have tried has failed. What can I do? I really hope I don't have to reinstall either win2k or win98... I would really appreciate any help you can give me.

Solution 1: I am not quite sure on this, however, I think you will need to re-install which ever system you want on your second hard drive. This will create and modify the files used to initiate the dual boot process.  Marc Strickland

Submitted By: David

Question: I would like to organize my favorites list alphabetically as when it is when 'adding' to favorites. My ISP telephone support helpdesk couldn't come up with a solution. Do you know if this is possible ? Thanks

Solution 1: Go to your favorites list place the mouse over one of the favorites, right mouse click and select "sort by name" Marc Strickland

Submitted By: Carl Kenney

Question: Hello... Please can you tell me how to open windows explorer with the "c:\ "root , I'm using WinMe and its always open explorer in "C:\My Documents" . Thanks for your help...

Solution 1: Right click on your explorer icon, select properties, put this in the target box:
C:\WINDOWS\EXPLORER.EXE /n , /e , c:\      Marc Strickland

Solution 2: Alternatively, put this in your address bar: C:\WINDOWS\EXPLORER.EXE /n , /e , c:\  Geoffrey Lo

Solution 1: If you go to start menu/ programs/accessories the short cut to the msdos prompt is there.  Chad Cappellini

Solution 2: Click on start, press run and type "CMD". That's the DOS prompt. Some programs which require direct access to the HDD won't run though from the LOCK command to Norton Ghost  Geoffrey Lo

Submitted By: Paul Picard

Question: Hi. I have problems with my Disk Defragmenter. When I tried to start defragment hard disk, this program start working normally. But after 5-10 seconds it's restarted and tried defragment again. I didn't start others programs, while Disk Defragmenter is working. So this is not that reason of problem. I'm using Win98. Hard disk is 4,2GB. Thank you.

Solution 1: make sure your screen saver is not set to start after 5 or 10 mins. My defrag does that too some times, starts goes so far that starts over. but it always finishes. Chad Cappellini

Solution 2: Hey there, Make sure you disable the Antivirus before running and close any other application. Also, try unchecking "Scan my disk for errors" to save some time.  Geoffrey Lo

Submitted By: Renaldas

Question: Started by: Matt Sent: 10/12/2000 9:22 PM 1 Replies Hello, im having a problem in Windows 98 with adding additional hard drives. I have one twenty gig hard drive install partioned into 2 drives, I also have a cd-rw installed. I recently got a new hard drive and installed it as a slave. When I boot Windows 98, it shows my hard drives but then my cd-rw doesn't show up, but when I look in the device manager it's there. What do I need to do to get everything to work? because I am also planning on getting another cd rom drive so I can install things a little quicker then 32x. Thank you for your time

Solution 1: I'm going to assume that your cd-rw is on ide2 as master and is not scsi. check and make sure the cd-rw is set to master. open your bios and see if it sees your hdds and cd-rw.  Chad Cappellini

Solution 2: After checking how your BIOS recognizes the drives, open up the case, look at how they are attached to the primary/secondary controller, and you might need to adjust the jumper settings accordingly (check manual, esp. for the CD). My recommendation: old HD: primary master, new HD: primary slave, CD: secondary master. Good luck!  Adam Sowalsky

Submitted By:  Jason Christy

Question: While in IE 5 we are bombarded by tons of annoying pop ups and they are not from sites that we have visited. We like using the IE browser a lot more than Netscape but the pop ups cause freeze ups and or slows loading of pages we are trying to open. Anyone else have this problem? How do we avoid those stupid pop ups? Thanks

Solution 1: Gidday! Go here, and install the Junk Busters proxy server -  http://www.junkbusters.com/ht/en/ijb.html  . That should solve your problem. Ekapshi

Solution 2: You can also use PopUp Killer http://software.xfx.net/utilities/popupkiller/download.htm , I have personally used this or I hear that a program called Webwasher http://www.webwasher.com/en/products/wwash/downloa1.htm?submit=I+agree  works well.  Chris Murray

Submitted By:  Don

Question: Hi, I recently upgraded from Win98SE to Windows 2000 Professional. In 98SE under accessories>system tools>system information I was able to view the system's uptime very easily. I'm wondering where this is in win2k? The system information box does not have the uptime information. Thanks in advance for your help!

Solution 1: Unfortunately you can't, but you can tell how long you've been logged in for (by pressing "Control+Alt+Delete")   Ekapshi

Solution 2: Actually, there are two ways to view system uptime in Windows 2000. One way is not very exact, one is. The not-too-exact way is to start up Task Manager (right click taskbar, select Task Manager). The time listed under "System Idle Process" on the Processes tab is a very close estimate to how much uptime you have. The other way is to buy and install the Windows 2000 Resource Kit. There is a command line utility called uptime.exe that shows you exactly how much time your computer has been up.   Philip Tan

Submitted By:  Brandon Prashad

Question: Dear Sir, How to get an image thumbnail view for image files in Explorer Page when set in Web page mode. I get thumbnail image view only for bitmap not nor for other image formats...

Solution 1: I am not totally sure on this one, however, I know that after I installed a program called Acdsee I could view all the different formats. Here is the web site, they have a trial ware version for download: http://www.acdsystems.com/english/products/index.htm     Marc Strickland

Submitted By:  ???

Question: Hi, I have a question regarding Windows 2000 compatibility I hope you can help me with. So far, almost all new games have successfully run on win2000. However, there are still a few games such as Thief that refuse to run on win2000. I really think that these games can run on win2000 and that they are probably paranoid of the "Windows NT" signature win2000 still carries instead of the "Chicago" signature. Is there a way for me to trick these programs into thinking Win2000 is based on win9x instead? Thanks.

Solution 1: Hi! Are you referring to Thief - The Dark Project 1.0? If so, you are in luck. It is included in the Microsoft Windows 2000 Compatibility Updates. You can download the update here: http://microsoft.com/windows2000/downloads/deployment/appcompat/default.asp  Regards,   Bob Stein

Submitted By:  Ben

Question: I want to install Linux on my machine as a dual boot option. I have two hard drives one for all the Windows ME stuff and the second is for back up. Athalon system 1ghtz processor. Any instructions or should I get a copy of the software that allows you two run both? How can make it so number one Thank you

Solution 1: If you want to make Windows your primary installation you will have to work at it a little bit. If you install Linux after Windows, Linux will offer you Lilo, booting software that you can configure. If you have installed Linux first, then go about installing Windows, windows will overwrite Lilo and will boot Windows every time. You will need to either create a boot disk which would not be in your best interests since you have a separate Hard Drive. A boot disk is usually only necessary when you have exceeded the maximum amount of clusters in which Linux will allow you to boot from. So in your case you will need to reinstall Lilo and configure it. Good Luck.  Travis Rendell

Question: Hi, Could you please tell me how to get kingpin: life of crime to play on windows me. I have a new time computer with windows me installed, the game loads ok but when play is started an error message saying "hardware device not found" appears and then we are taken back to the desktop. Please can you help.

Solution 1: I am guessing you are using the default Windows ME video drivers. You will need to go to your video card manufacturer's web site and get the latest drivers. It should work then. Windows ME has this problem with not having good gaming drivers for video cards. Good luck.  Travis Rendell

Submitted By: Thomas Hill

Question: hello...I have a unique problem...how do I re-enable "WinWord". I have win 95

Solution 1: You need to be more specific. We have no clue what you mean. Re-enable it in the "Open With" dialogue, Whether it is no longer your default Text editor, or what, see where I am going here? Travis Rendell

Submitted By: oj ivey ii

Solution 1: I personally do not know a cure for what ails ya. But if the problem is just that the frame is annoying and you want to get rid of it, just push the search button up top again, and the frame will disappear. Good Luck. Travis Rendell

Submitted By: Tom

Question: Dear ActiveWin, I've just upgraded from Windows 98SE to Windows ME. Could you please help me solve these two annoyances?
1. How do I uninstall the Windows Media Player 7? The WinMe installation did not provide an option to skip this program, and there is no listing in the Add/Remove Program afterward. WMP7 has caused other apps I had to stop functioning properly, and has replaced my beloved WMP6.2. I've already searched the MS Knowledge Base, and as a solution, it suggested that I install the WMP7 (http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q272/4/41.ASP?LN=EN-US&SD=gn&FR=0). How is installing something help uninstall it? As I remembered back in my Win98SE days, installing WMP7 also didn't provide a removal method.
2. Up until WinMe, Windows Folder Options had a checkbox that allowed me to see ALL-CAP file-names in Explorer as lowercase names. It seems to me that this option is gone. Is there any method to obtain that effect?
Thank you for your time and effort, Regards

Solution 1: I am afraid that those problems are just "gripes" as you put it. Windows Media Player 7 cannot be uninstalled. If you want the older 6.x look choose the "classic" skin in the skin browser. And the same thing with the capital letter file names. You can't change it, that I am aware of. Sorry. Good Luck.  Travis Rendell

Solution 2: Dear MetaBabble, True you cannot remove Windows Media Player, but you can learn to live with it. What I recommend, is going to your C:\Program Files\Windows Media Player Folder. Inside it you will find Mplayer2.exe which is our old beloved player. Simply open it, go to View, then Options, then Formats. You can then make This version be the default player for your media files. The new one will never "pop out" at ya again. On each ME install, I just create a new link in the Quick Link Bar and Start menu labeled "Windows Media Player Classic" and the you have access to both. This way if you like, you can have the new one play CD's while the old plays >Mid files, .Wavs etc Kind of best of both worlds without resorting to 3rd party applications for a "fix". Try it  Good Luck  Craig Catapano

Solution 3: I believe there are some third-party applications out there that when installed give you the option to remove Windows Me Applications that Microsoft does not allow it itself. So it is out there!  Bob Stein

Solution 3: I do not think WMP7 should stop other apps from working. It is that certain apps like Norton Systemworks2000 and a few more do not work under ME and need to be upgraded to the 2001 (sic!) version.  Mean Drake

Submitted By:  MetaBabble

Question: Hi! I just ordered my first computer. It comes with Windows me installed. My main reason for getting the computer was to play games. Will games that say Windows 95/98 work with Windows me? I sure hope so. Thanks for your help.

Solution 1: I have had no problems with win 98/95 running on WinMe. I did have a problem getting sound to work properly with Duke Nukem, however, that is a dos based game that doe not recognize newer sound hardware. Plain and simple, I do not believe you will have any problems running games certified for Win 98/95.  Marc Strickland

Solution 2: One problem you might have initially is the drivers that came on your computer for your video card when you bought it may need to be updated. Find out what kind of video card you have, go to the manufacturer's web site and get the latest drivers. Good Luck.  Travis Rendell

Submitted By:  ???

Question: I am trying to backup my Hard Drive to aCD-RW. I am running Windows ME. It works fine until I try to backup the Windows folder its self. When it gets to the file "win386.swp" it gives me an error that says this file may be in use and stops my backup. How can I get around this.

Solution 1: No need to backup swap file, windows creates a new one, Good Luck  Craig Catapano

Submitted By:  Richard

Question: I changed the networks settings so that I would log in as Admin & when I rebooted the machine it wouldn't accept my password... when I go the safe mode, it still asks me to log on to the network. I've tried hitting Ctrl Alt Del @ startup, but it wont pop up the window allowing me to change the password.... any ideas thanks

Solution 1: Hi, If you are locked out of your Admin account then you would probably be best reinstalling from scratch. Did you have Caps Lock on when you entered your passwords? Try every combination you think you might have used. There is a tool known as NT Locksmith from http://www.winternals.com , but it is expensive. Brian Lyttle

Submitted By:  ???

Question: We are network with 6 computers in our office. My Gateway 2000 freezes up with the error message stack dump. I have one other user working within my computer off of the network. I must have him exit my system and turn off the computer there is no response from ctrl alt del. What does stack dump mean and is their somewhere I can find this to read. best

Solution 1: Hi, You seem to have a problem with a badly written bit of software. The Stack is an area of memory in you computer which holds the address of the last instruction executed, when the processor heads of into a 'function'. Using a process called Recursion a function can call itself, therefore repeatedly placing data on the Stack. Unfortunately, the Stack is a limited size, and when the space runs out errors occur.
This is only a very brief explanation, but the Stack Dump is a dump showing the contents of the stack. This allows the programmer to debug the system. You haven't specified what software you are running, but try and narrow that down. Once you find the piece of offending software, try and contact your Vendor for a fix. Stack errors should be quite easy to replicate.  Brian Lyttle

Submitted By:  tena houser

Question: Great web site... Would you be aware of any hidden/undocumented shell related registry hacks that allow access to Windows 2000's alpha transparency and object shadowing functions? I'm aware of Stardoc's "WindowFX" applet that accesses this, but I'm guessing the "hooks" for these additional "Windows metrics" are buried deep in the registry somewhere, available for anyone to tweak with.... (I'm not sure what the mechanics would be....possibly different windows classes could be assigned permanent transparency and "shadow-toggle" values....i.e. application windows, explorer-shell-folder windows, app/system dialog windows, pop-up menu windows...etc.etc....) ***OR!...any FREEWARE tweaking tool for W2K that gives access to these specific features...? Any info appreciated Thanks

Solution 1: Take a look at http://www.nikkie-luuc.demon.nl/index.html  Many of the Shell Enhancers use functionality which is very poorly documented, this means very few people create program like Stardock's.   Chad Cappellini  &  Brian Lyttle

Submitted By:  ???

Question: Hi, When you click "My Computer," "C," and "Windows" you get the warning about modifying the files and then have to click "Show Files" in order to access the Windows directory. I once found a registry modification to remove this warning but upon reinstalling windows it has reverted to the default. I've looked everywhere for the fix but haven't been successful. Any ideas? Thanks for a great forum.

Solution 1: Dear Mr. Gallagher, When you are in the C:\Windows folder, simply right click on the folder and you will be greeted with the "option" to "Customize This Folder", click that and choose to remove customization then click your way through. After refreshing, the Windows folder will be accessible as you recall. Best Wishes  Craig Catapano

Question: I have an old Dan Pentium PC that I bought in Jan. 96 with Windows 95 & although I have upgraded some hardware features (i.e.. AMD K2-333Mhz CPU, ATI All-In-Wonder graphics card etc. ). I still use the original version of Windows 95 with Service Pack 1 applied (ie.950a). I would like get the OSR2 features & facilites so that I can install a 4 port USB PCI card that I have bought recently hopefully allowing me to connect a USB scanner. I read the answer to an OSR2 FAQ on your Active Windows site that said these components can be downloaded direct from Microsoft but I have not been able to locate them. Could you tell me exactly what components I need to apply to bring my Windows 95 OS up to OSR2 or 2.1 & where I can obtain them from. Thanks...

Solution 1: Hi, I went to microsoft.com/downloads and took a look at what I could find on Service Pack 2/2.1 for Windows 95. Unfortunately, it appears that Service Pack 2 for Win 95 is a OEM Version Only, which means it is unavailable for download unlike Service Pack 1 for Windows 95 . If you still would like to use Service Pack 2 on your computer I would suggest going to ebay.com and searching for a Win 95 CD that is one of the later versions with OSR 2 on it which I am sure you can find for under $20. Sorry I couldn't help more! BTW, here is a place that is selling the update for $34.00 (down from the original price over $145, wonder why? hehe)... http://www.downsoftwaretech.com/sdf.html Regards-   Bob Stein

Submitted By: Dave Newson

Question: I was hoping you could shed some light on this problem for me, there seems to be nothing on this in Microsoft's trouble shooting areas. After installing the win me upgrade (from win98), my Search Files or Folders no longer works, the window comes up and allows me to input search criteria, but clicking the search now button doesn't do anything at all.

Solution 1: Just out of curiosity, do you have the "look in" box set to a drive letter? I found if you accidentally had it set to something like My Documents or Desktop, it appears as if nothing is happening when doing a search, but it is, it just appears as if it didn't! This may be a long shot, but sometimes the easiest thing can be overlooked.  Chris Murray

Submitted By: Michael Rose

Solution 1: I believe that IE 5.0 is the default version for Win2k. So if you had upgraded to IE 5.5, you can go to Add/Remove Programs and uninstall Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.5. There is an option to restore to the previous Windows configuration. This will get you back to the default version. As far as I know, you can't down grade the version of IE that is embedded into the original OS code, being that you are looking to install an older version of IE 5 that is already built in!?! You should be fine otherwise.  Chris Murray

Submitted By: Fazle Khan

Question: I'm running Win2kPro, and recently installed SP-1. I have two hard drives, one 10GB and one 20GB. The 10GB is my system drive, the 20GB is for data. Both are formatted NTFS (Win2K version, not NT4). After I install SP-1 the 20GB drive's partition shows up as only 7GB, and when I try to open it in Windows Explorer I get an error message telling me the drive needs to be reformatted! But when I uninstall SP-1 the 20GB partition magically reappears. Is there something I can do to fix it? Thanks

Solution 1: Ok, that is an odd one! The only things I could suggest are running scandisk and/or to try a program that looks at partition data for errors. One of the programs is Norton's Utilities 2001 and the other I can't talk about for two weeks =\  Michael Hicks

Submitted By: John Woltman

Question: ok, I used mcafee's quickclean program to "clean" some files from my system, choose every file myself, but I think I might have accidentally deleted a system file that system restore needs (which I don't understand since that would defeat the whole purpose of system restore), but when I tried to run system restore, the date WITHIN the program says Saturday December 30, 1899. I re-installed windows and it still has the same problem, but only with system restore, everything else recognizes the proper date.

Solution 1: Looks more like a bug than a missing file as WinMe (I guess you have that as system restore is available) prevents you from deleting critical system files.   Mean Drake

Submitted By:   Steve

Question: I have been having some real problems with IE5. Sometimes my computer just freezes while using IE5.x for no apparent reason. There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to it and it happens on 2 different systems. From searching the net it seems that this problem exists for many other people but there doesn't seem to be any real resolution for it. There are some differences between the 2 systems but they are pretty much the same as far as hardware and software are concerned:
Win98 SE
IE5.5
Microsoft Intellimouse (USB)
Microsoft Internet KB Pro (USB&P/S-2)
Both use Abit MB w/Intel BX Chipset 1 P-III-450 / 1 Celeron 366
Both systems have problems in IE5.x but never had problems with Win98 and IE4.x Can you help me with this. I've been pulling my hair out over this and I'm running out of hair... Thanks

Solution 1: Seen this on many systems but have not unfortunately been able to pinpoint a single cause. One of the systems had a faulty RAM chip. But ....   Mean Drake

Submitted By:  J Bruno

Question: Hi, I've got a question about setting up a PC to boot to different operating systems using a start menu. I've seen it done before but for the life of me can not figure out how to do it? Has anyone done this not using a helper program like System Commander. I like the old school of doing in it DOS. Thanks

Solution 1: If you want to run two os's, say Win98 and Win2000 Pro, set up Win98 first. When you install Win2000 Pro, you have the option to set up on a separate partition. If you want more than that, and for safer results, use something like Partition Magic.  Charles Putman

Submitted By:  Troy

Question: Is there any way of turning off power management completely for windows 2000 on laptops? Thanks

Solution 1: Under Control Panel, and Power Options, create a custom profile that has everything turned off. Also, check the laptop's BIOS to make sure that Power Management is turned off there also.  Charles Putman

Submitted By:  Sudeep Menon

Question: Hello I have problem about using Remote Administration from local computer(win2k prof.) to Server . I already install adminpak but it can't work .It's show message "Cannot find network path" If you can solve this problem ,please reply me . Thank you very much. Regard

Solution 1: You might want to check out all the documentations plus this info from the KB Search Engine: http://search.support.microsoft.com/
Usually you will be able to troubleshoot all the problems after you read the readmes and the above info. Remote administrations usually goes from server to client, in which vice versa in your case, so I don't have any experience on that. I hope this will help.  Bill Wiriawan

Submitted By:  Akkapol

Question: Hello... I have a computer running Windows 2000 and ICS. It has a DSL connection, with 2 network cards in it. One NIC is for the LAN, the other, for the DSL modem. I have successfully setup ICS and I can browse WebPages on other computers on the LAN without a problem. However, one thing I can not get working is AOL Instant Messenger. I tried changing the ports, even adding them in on the host computer but to no avail. I would appreciate any information you could give me, or any place I could go to get the information. Thank you for your time.

Solution 1: I believe that it is AIM which is designed not to be run simultaneously, ICQ will run, but as soon as it finds that the current UIN is online, it will detect and disconnect immediately. I think it's the same case with AIM. If you are running another ID on AIM, and it didn't work, so it's simply the program that is not designed to be run from ICS connection. Check out the help and documentation for more info.  Bill Wiriawan

Solution 2: I found by configuring 2 pc's at one time, yes this is the exact case. If you are on one Pc, then boot the next, and Aim starts, it logs you OFF the first one (gives you a message that "another instance of Aim exists". Hope this helps Good Luck   Craig Catapano

Submitted By:  Anthony

Question: Hi I tried installing the "intelcampaton.reg" file some time ago, but im still having the occasionally BSOD. So maybe the .reg file doesn't do the trick after all.

Solution 1: What BSOD are you having? the next time you have it, write down the file name (usualy *,vxd, *.sys, *.dll) and email back if you want me to look at the specific issue. There are TOO MANY reasons that Windows 98 will freeze, crash, boom, or, bang, to locate the main problem check out the following resources:
A Troubleshooting Guide to Windows 98: http://members.aol.com/Knows98/index.htm
New Life Windows 98: http://newlife-win98.server101.com/
Troubleshooting and Configuring Windows 98 Index: http://members.home.com/mr-scary/
World O'Windows: http://www.conitech.com/windows/index.asp
Contact your vendor for any related issues after you find out which one of your hardware is causing the error.  Bill Wiriawan

Submitted By:  Enforcer

Question: I'm using Explorer - Ver- 5.0 .2314. When I try to change anything in the 'select settings' area it gives me an error msg. & won't let me change the settings. The result is that I can't download anything. Area & Msg. Under IE Properties, - on the 'General' tab the second section is Temp. Internet Files. When I click on 'Select Settings' .... and try to change 'any' setting on that page I always get the same error msg. "Select a Value between 1 & 0 for how much disk space temp. Internet files may use." The setting is stuck on 0 and can't be changed. All I can do after this error msg. is click cancel. It won't allow any changes to the other settings on this page either. This is preventing any large downloading, so I'm unable to download IE again. I may be able to download a small fix file. I have tried the IE5 Repair tool, it seems to run, but does not fix this. What do you recommend? 

Solution 1: I think it's your temporarily internet files (cache) settings that has a problem, it could be that you change the settings before, or you have some errors with IE setting info/registry settings. I recommend that you revert back your settings to default for each tab settings that has on it, open the Internet Settings, and [ Reset to default ]. If the option is available open the add/Remove programs applet, and repair internet explorer settings from there. If there is no such an option (You use Windows 98se, Me, or 2000) You might have to reinstall your operating system for easier troubleshooting, just install as an upgrade so you will not loose your settings In order for your system to run smooth, you need at least 20% of each partition size empty for temporary files and caching, empty your unused folders and files, and check your disk for files, make sure that you have "Temporary Internet Files" Hope this will help.  Bill Wiriawan

Submitted By:  Sam

Question: Hello, I did a fresh install with WinMe and now my IBM Deskstar 13.3g HD won't accept DMA. Under Win98 the box was checked. Now I check it and reboot and it is unchecked again. I have tried installing other controller drivers, but nothing. Also my Bios recognizes the drive with DMA 4 etc. My CD rom works fine with the DMA checked. What happened. What did Microsoft change?

Solution 1: Obtain the latest patch for the chipset, and the DMA from Intel or your motherboard, and make sure that your motherboard supports UDMA (66/100) then go to the device manager, and choose DMA if available from your disk drives properties.  Bill Wiriawan

Submitted By:   Chris

Question: I am trying to work with DOS application using windows2000 and for some reason my screen is pushed up to the top. I am using the correct drivers and I've check almost all the option in display properties. I've used windows standard and/or just about everything. I downloaded all the service packs and critical updates. Any suggestion would be helpful. Thanks

Solution 1: What do you mean about "screen pushed to top?" please send more details and/or screenshot for us to determine the problem. What kind of dos program has this error, please name a specific program or file. When you open the command prompt, does it have the same problem? Looking forward for your details soon, as we currently have no idea what kind of error you are having here.  Bill Wiriawan

Submitted By:  Nasir Khan

Question: How can I get IE (5.5) to open fully maximized from all of the following: IE Icon Windows Explorer Link in Outlook Express and .. an htm file on the desktop and to set it to do this every time? Thanks

Solution 1: You can use a batch file or a command script within windows, here's an example of my "Go Online" script:
Look for a *.bat, or *.cmd file (for win2k), and edit the content like the following lines, and save it as a different file in your prefered location.
---------------------------------------
@echo off
start C:\PROGRA~1\INTERN~1\IEXPLORE.EXE
start D:\MICROS~1\Office\OUTLOOK.EXE
start E:\Outlook\ICQ\Icq.exe
---------------------------------------
For windows98 dos batch file, just remove the "start" before each line.
To set the HTML file to open, make it your default home page from the internet options (Open the file, and open the internet options, and press the [ use current ] button. Press F11 to maximize to full screen or push the max button to normal maximize. Close IE, and create a shortcut to your command file, open the properties, go to shortcut tab, you can change the icon or name, and choose run minimize from the drop down menu, and check, exit when finish (for dos batch only). and close it. try your new script, and you should have all your programs opened, and the script should closed it self after translating the command. Good luck.  Bill Wiriawan

Submitted By: Jim

Question: I used the Windows Media Player 7 to copy a CD to WMA files onto the HDD. I can only use analog mode because it says my CD player does not have digital capability. It seems to copy the song fine (at 64kbps) to the HDD and I can hear the song playing as it is copying. But after it is done and I try to listen to the WMA file and it is there and about the right size in MB, but it has no sound in it. I tried different CDs with same result. All the other functions of WMP 7 seem to work fine. I have the following system: Windows ME PII-450 128MB RAM Pioneer DVD-103S 13GB HDD Everything else works perfect in ME. Any guesses?? Thanks Chip

Solution 1: What windows are you using at the moment? Make sure that you connect the digital audio cable to your sound card, and your sound card is capable of processing digital audio. Then try enabling it by going to the DVD properties. If you still have problems, use the troubleshooter or the help files related on your topic, and follow the instructions. You need also have to check whether the copy has any digital protection and the related settings in WMP.  Bill Wiriawan

Submitted By: Chip

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