Yep still happening (thats why it takes so long to type lol). What ever it is it must boot early. I get Windows popup, then go while it runs AVG(to check for viruses), then back to carry on loading Windows. By the time its got that far it has already tried to spin that Drive 3 or 4 time and havent got to Desktop yet.

*EDIT* shall i boot in SAFE MODE and see what happens ?

Case has been off since yesterday, i did try all connecetions earlier, but will give it one more go. Don't think anything could be stuck in there as i havent used it in days, Anyway, back in a few.......lol

that wouldn't cause it. I belive it's either a script running or a physical problem with the drive. shut all the way down, unplug your PC, hold the power button for 5 seconds, take the side of the case off, un-plug and replug the IDE cable for your cd-rom drive at the drive and the motherboard, put everything back togetherm adn restart. Then let me know if it's still happening. Also, is it possible that something is stuck in the drive?

Done all that lol, i may sound thick, but i know most things about 98 SE. I have msconfig set on selective startup anyway. I will have another look though.
Just seems odd that it just started out the blue & the only difference from yesterday is the 2nd hard drive i put in, but thats was blank and only used for storing music and has been no trouble at all.

hummm, I'll have to get back to you, it's been years since I've used win98. try going to run and run this program "msconfig". Then click on the services tab (far right) and see if there's anything in there that you don't know.

there is no 2nd tab, thats where i looked, it will show me the close program list, BUT wont let me copy/paste it out :(

ctrl-alt-delete, 2nd tab should say processes

Well you tell me where to find that on 98 SE and i will LOL

hummm copy and paste what all's running in your task manager under processes

Have reset PC again lol - also run every Norton thing i have & AVG as well.
The minute i re-booted it kept trying to access the CD drive, even before windows had colpleted loading.
I added a new 20 GB Hard Drive (extra - for storage) last night, but everything has been fine up until about 90 mins ago.

it's possible that the data wire to the cd-rom has came loose. All certain spywear programs and v/b scripts will try to access your cd-rom. (i.e. have you ran adawear latley?). Let me know what happens after you restart.

first of all reset your PC.

Why does me cursor/pc/Keyboard keep freezing for about 1 second every few minutes and tries to read something of by CD drive even thougn there is nothing in there (and the little light does NOT even come on to say its trying to read). You can hear it spin, just after the PC unfreezes.
I have tried leaving the door open, then when it gets to that moment it shuts it & also tried playing a disk, which it will start get a few seconds into a sone, stop and tell me there is no CD in there ?

Come on Backoff LOL - whats the crack ?

for normal page loads it dosn't make much of a change, but when download very large file (like a linux ISO) it can save alot of time!

and all that speed to watch BK boards come through square by agonizing square... (sorry Fencer, but I couldn't resist)

:) Backoff, do you really need that kind of speed? When i lived in NYC my provider upgraded me for free to 5Mb/sec, so pages loaded in 0.3 seconds instead of 0.5 seconds :)

Ok just kinda to brag!!

I upgraded to the bellsouth DSL xtreme service yesterday. I was on the ultra plan. for only $5 more a month, they doubled my line speeds and gave me a static IP. I now have 3.0Mb/sec down and 356Kb/sec up. For anyone who lives in the southeast US and has BS DSL, upgrade to this, it's worth every penny!!!

<there are also some hiden MS files and folders, which are used at ths system's discretion. one is the recycler, the other is "System Volume Information". you can see them by unchecking tools->folder options->view->mask exploitation system files (this is not recommended)

Yeah, things like when receiving music or pictures, things like that i used to divert to my D:*.* (wherever i wanted them) drive to save space on C:

I would of thought Norton would of picked up anything like that by now as its been a year since i have had a second disk or as you say a program would of shown up somewhere with an error or put stuff elsewhere. Thanks :-)

I am not quite sure what you are asking...I think you are asking how to track down white programs might still be looking at your second drive. If that is it, the only way is to go into the programs, one by one, and check them out.

Any program that you have used while you did NOT have a second drive, most likely won't save files there by default.

Thanks Summertop, that was the hidden file :o)

Another one as we are on form. As i said i used to have a second disk in before for putting stuff (storing) on to. How can i track down to find out if any of these Links (for want of a better word) that i used before are still active on my system ?

I have just looked in Norton "Recycle Bin" settings and it does show the new drive (says its the same size as my C: for some reason, but still LOL). Let me go and look and change the folder options.

I think...
when windows access a drive (that does not have Windows on it)it creates a "Recycle Bin" automatically. You can change your folder options to show hidden files.

But how did it get there then ?

Summertop maybe right. Even empty recycle bin takes some place.

Cant be Summertop, there is nothing on the disk. It was reformated and showed as blank. Only after a while back on line, something is there, BUT i dont know what or how it got there LOL :o(

Is the hidden file the "Recycle Bin"? The hidden file is probably whats taking space.

I have just installed another hard drive on my PC. It was an old 20.0 GB one i had. I did fdisk and formated etc... all fine.
Started pc up in Windows as normal, went into My Computer, right click, properties on the new disk and a lovely empty, totaly free one there (all pink lol).
After a while i have just been and looked again at it, and now have a small blue line and its saying 32.0 KM used.
Thats the problem, how do i find out what is putting things on there. If i look on the disk it is empty apart from 1 Hidden file ??.
I used to have a 2nd disk in there last year for storing Music etc... on, so there could be something set to direct data to it on my system already.

Problem: Where is this Data and why can't i see it ?
AND also how can i track down what is putting it on there ?

Yea, I tried some of the common names for myself that would have been cool (michael, mikel, bigbadwolf, etc...) Plus I just got done setting up an account for my wife with her nickname, so she will be happy.

my co-worker has a gmail invitation, looks like all english, indian and russian first names already taken :)

I guess i'll stick to yahoo. I got in early enough to use my first name variation :)

YEA - I got a Beta Account!

Details on how to get your own beta account: Basicly the only way to get in right now is to get an invite from a current user - which "random" users are given the option to invite up to 5 people or something like that.

Well check out this website:

Gmail Swap - It is set up where you, normal person can ask/beg/SWAP something in return for an invite. (I posted links to some hot air balloon pictures and said if someone enjoyed them, send me an invite - and it worked.) (NOTE: Invites are also for sale on eBay - tons of them, between $1-$10)

Anyway, if you REALLY want an account early to try to pick a some-what unique name - check out that site. If not, I'm guessing it will be public within a month... but that is just my guess. (I don't think it's worth paying anything of value)

The first thing I found in my SBC/Yshoo account was spam, before I had given the addy to anyone, and it is only increasing.

My SBC/Yahoo mail account is now 2GB - but I never use it.

I heard that once testing is done Google may remove all test accounts. BTW, only for $20/year yahoo will give 2Gb, POP access and some other extras.

Google Mail - cool that the subject came back up - i'm in the process of trying to get a test account.... if I can get it, I'll post how I did it so others can possible get in early (and get the name you want!)

I have heard nothing else from google mail since i signed up for it.

Probably as a anti-google reaction, yahoo mail is offering 100Mb of storage (was 3 to 6 Mb)

Still not 1000Mb, but nice to have :-))

There really is tons of stuff out there !!
http://appleblossomart.ezthemes.com/pcenhance/ic/main.phtml?blank+Computers
http://www.iconnews.freeserve.co.uk/icon_page.htm

ahh, there come with different desktop themes you can download from hundreds of sites. On those same sites, you can find others that you can DL just to use alone. just google desktop themes

JUST TO HAVE SOME DIFFERENT ICONS TO ASSIGN TO MY SHORTCUTS (oops caps lock sorry) that I save on the desktop and taskbar, and also to assign different icons for particular files in shared working directories makes things a lot easier for everyone

what sort of icons are you looking for ? You say for work, but not knowing what you do... ?

Does anyone know a good place I can download heaps of useful Icons.
I tried googling and some of the crap I got might be good for childrens icons, but in this case I wish to use these icons at work so smiley faces etc are not very appropriate.
If anyone has any good info on this and where to get some useful icons I would be most appreciative.
Thanks

ya learn somthing new EVERY day LOL.

http://sepwww.stanford.edu/sep/jon/family/jos/webtv/developer3/authoring/no404/404probs.htm

WebTv Users can not see HTTP 400 or 500 series headers!! This may explain the confusion at times when pages are unavailable etc. It gives descriptions such as NOT PERMITTED etc

Nice to see that. I make a bet that webTV problem is solving itself, because same CACHE (proxy or DNS) expire and servers of WebTV want to take new information from the "WORLD". :-D

Good, we can remove an alternative URL webtv.brainking.com prepared as the last possible solution :-D

I think that problem is solving itself with Webtv as well. There are members back here playing again as normal.

Yep she's on a XP box. If it's a DNS problem, then it will fix itself (like it did in her case) after a period of time. WebTV on the other hand uses proxy servers and all kinds of other trash in between the box and the internet so there's no freak'n telling where the problem is.

But then Eriisa is PC isnt she, so was a diferent problem I guess

Cheers Aragon :o)

I belive it to be a DNS problem. I worked on Eriisa's computer for over a half hour last night using remote access and I tried every trick I know and still could access the site with it. I could ping just fine and trace route fine. Still nothing. This morning when she got up, she could access it. To me that smells like a DNS problem with her ISP. As far as I know, her ISP isn't using a proxy server so I don't belive that to be her problem.

http://developer.msntv.com/Tools/WebTVVwr.asp

thats where i got mine mate, and yeah it makes sense :))