Even the best‑regulated computer can suddenly turn nasty. Martin Walker guides you through the ways to recover when you're faced with a blank screen and a frozen mouse.
Windows 95 is far more robust than Windows 3.1, but crashes still happen, however careful you are. Following Janet Harniman‑Cook's recent guide to the causes of PC crashes (in December 1996's SOS), you should at least know how to avoid the kind of crash caused by trying to run too many applications at once, and even recover from some of them without losing any data using one of the many background protection utilities available, such as those provided with WinProbe 95, Norton Utilities, or First Aid 97 (see the 'First Aid 97 Review' box here, and also my roundup of PC utility programs in last month's issue).
Strictly speaking, there are two sorts of crash. A head crash is a rare occurrence: the hard disk read/write head takes a nose‑dive, and crashes into the surface of the disk, causing irreparable damage. A system crash is when the computer 'freezes', but no permanent damage occurs. But if you find your PC in this condition, how do you work out what happened? Sometimes you don't find out that something is amiss until you boot up one morning, even if the problem occurred the day before, since the boot process only occurs when you first switch on, or after a reset. If you can't even get as far as the main Windows 95 desktop, it's time for more radical steps — but before we discuss those, let's look at ways to prepare for this scenario, so that you emerge with the minimum of downtime, and the maximum of remaining hair.
Getting Backing For Your PC Venture
Once you have suffered a crash that leaves you with corrupted data, you'll almost certainly take backups in future, but the sad fact remains that most of us don't bother until the inevitable happens. However, you already have a backup program that comes free with Windows 95, Microsoft Backup, and this is pretty self‑explanatory to use. Once you've chosen which files to back up, by clicking on any combination of files and complete folders, this 'set' is saved as a single compressed file to your chosen destination (preferably on a different disk, such as a removable drive). Whenever you want to restore data, anything from a single file to the full set can be extracted and restored to its original position.
A full backup of your entire hard disk is not normally needed — as long as you have your original application disks, these can always be re‑installed — but all data files and any INI files that incorporate your preferences should be backed up. If you re‑install an application, the program may create a new INI file without checking for an existing one, but when you've evolved your default preferred settings in a complex program such as Cubase over months of use, it can be very annoying to have to do it all over again. Just in case you have a badly behaved install routine that does this (see the 'Badly Behaved Install Routines' box for more details), copy the appropriate INI file to a temporary folder — then at least you still have a spare to refer to.
How often you back up depends on how much work you're doing. If you've just spent 10 hours working on a music track, then an extra two minutes to save an extra copy of the file to a floppy or removable drive before you switch off should give you peace of mind, but 'once a week' backups are sufficient for many people — just ask yourself how much work you would be prepared to redo, and back up as often as that. Sometimes even an hour of intensive sequencing is irreplaceable — so back up every hour! Many applications (including Cubase) allow you to Auto Backup, saving a file automatically every few minutes, and this is often the best solution, since you can then concentrate on the work in hand. If you do have a crash, always run Microsoft Scandisk or an equivalent disk‑checking utility after you've rebooted — any open files at the time of the crash may well have ended up corrupted. Scandisk will enable you to convert them to text files, so that you can inspect them for any useful data (they can be safely deleted if they contain nothing of interest).
Start As You Mean To Go On
If something untoward happens to your hard disk (and I don't necessarily mean a hardware fault — it may be a corrupted or missing driver file), you may find that it's impossible to get a single file to load. In this case, it's time to get your floppy Startup disk out of its hiding place. You did make one, didn't you? If not, do it now. Go into the 'Add/Remove Program' applet of Control Panel (see Figure 2, left), and click on the Tab shown. Have a blank floppy ready, and away you go. Once this disk is written, you can boot up your PC from it (put it into the floppy drive before you switch on) and it will start the machine in MS‑DOS mode, giving you all of the standard DOS commands, as well as copies of Scandisk, Regedit, and Format, plus Fdisk in case all else fails and you have to reformat your hard disk and start again (this is very rarely necessary, so don't panic). Utilities such as Norton Rescue (part of the Utilities package) do much the same with their Rescue Disk, but also write extra proprietary utility programs onto the floppy, as well as copies of your registry data and startup data in the CMOS chip. Do try the floppy to verify that it works before you really need it. A particularly good time for backing up files and updating the startup disk is after you've installed new devices and applications, when you have a good working configuration.
Putting The Boot In
If the worst happens, and Windows 95 refuses to boot up, what normally happens is that it gets so far, and then the system 'hangs' — all disk activity will stop, and the mouse cursor will be frozen on the spot. In many cases, you can cause a 'warm' boot by pressing Ctrl, Alt and Delete simultaneously (known as the three‑fingered salute). This will make the machine start again at its test routine. If this fails, the reset button found on the front of most PCs will always force a hardware reset, however locked up your system is. This is far better than the alternative, which is to switch the machine off, wait at least 30 seconds (to give all of the capacitors in the power supply time to fully discharge) and then switch on again. This causes extra wear and tear on your system — it's far more likely that electronic devices will fail during the switch‑on surge than at any other time.
Unless the problem is caused by a hardware failure — and these are, thankfully, not too common — you now need a way to get to Windows so that you can repair the cause of the crash... a catch‑22 situation. The solution is to press the F8 key as soon as you see the 'Starting Windows 95' prompt on your screen. This will bring up the Windows 95 Startup menu, which provides troubleshooting options (as shown in Figure 3, left). You may have an extra entry at number 4 if you're running a network, but for most people the options will be as shown. Option 1 ('Normal') is the default, and starts the full Windows operating system and GUI (Graphical User Interface). The second option, 'Logged', does the same, but in addition creates a file called BOOTLOG.TXT in your root directory, which writes in sequence every file and driver loaded and initialised during the boot process — not only will it show any missing files or failed initialisations (search through for the word 'fail' with a text editor) but its final entry may show the particular file that caused the crash, enabling you to narrow down the problem considerably.
A particularly good time for backing up files and updating the startup disk is after you install new devices and applications, when you have a good working configuration.
Although 'Logged' mode can be used as an analytical tool, the normal first procedure is to try the third option, 'Safe mode' (also available by just pressing F5 during a normal boot). This boots a minimal Windows 95 operating system which excludes the majority of drivers, as well as bypassing the AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS startup files, and the Registry (useful if you think it has been corrupted). Only essentials such as disk drivers and the Microsoft Standard VGA (640 x 480 x 16‑colour) video driver are used. Figure 4 (see page 84) shows you what to expect: you won't have access to CD‑ROM drives, printers and other devices. This removes problems caused by their drivers, as well as letting you recover from a case of the 'wobbles' — if you have video drivers that allow various refresh rates (how often the screen image is updated) then it is possible to select one that is too high for your monitor to support. The result is a screen display that rolls all over the place, just as when your TV suffers from a vertical hold problem. As you can't see properly to return the refresh to a more suitable value, boot into Safe mode with its plain vanilla VGA driver, and your screen will be perfectly readable. You can then enter the Display section of Control Panel (or wherever your video card utility is normally found), return the refresh rate to a lower value, and reboot normally. Because Safe mode removes so many potential sources of problems, you can often discover the cause of the crash, remove the offending driver or other file, and then reboot normally with no further problems.
'Step‑by‑step confirmation' is not a religious ceremony, but a way to isolate problems caused by applications (or you) putting extra lines in the AUTOEXEC.BAT or CONFIG.SYS files. These 'extras' normally run DOS hardware drivers (used by DOS programs only, and not normally required for most things running Windows 95), or they're extra statements to initialise things like SoundBlaster compatibility, or set paths so that other applications know where to look for initialisation files and the like. By using step‑by‑step 'Yes/No' responses, you can select which processes are carried out and which ignored, which can be very useful if you think that the problem occurs when a particular DOS driver is loaded. Use this mode if the startup process fails during loading of the startup files, or if you ever see an error message flash by during the normal boot process — you can then see exactly what problem is being reported, as well as being able to temporarily disable a specific driver if you think it is the cause of the problem.
An alternative approach is to use option five — 'Command prompt only'. This effectively leaves you in the DOS environment, which anyone who has used PCs for a few years will recognise. Only DOS commands work, and unless you've configured specific DOS drivers for your CD‑ROM drive (Windows 95 doesn't use them), you won't be able to load any files from CD‑ROM. The Command prompt allows you to load and run DOS programs and carry out file maintenance — a basic text editor kept on your hard disk will allow you to edit configuration files, for instance, and some people prefer the speed of putting a REM (remark) in front of suspect lines and then rebooting, rather than single stepping through as in the previous option. However, the biggest advantage of reaching the Command prompt is access to utilities — not only Scandisk to check your hard drive for problems; if you own Norton Utilities (see the April '97 issue for my review) then you can start a wealth of 'bail out' recovery programs which can pinpoint problem areas, or even repair your hard disk if they find problems. The final option on the Startup screen is 'Safe mode command prompt only' and you should use this if Windows 95 fails to start even in Safe mode. In addition to loading only the absolute minimum set of drivers, this causes the Command prompt to appear once more, so that you can rummage around your files and utilities to sort out the problem.
When Things Are Flaky
If you notice anything unusual while you're using your PC, such as an error message that hasn't come up before, don't ignore it because something else seems more important — when you finally return to it the chances are that so many other things will have since changed that the cause of the problem will be far more difficult to track down. The first thing to do is not to frantically re‑install everything you can, but to try to narrow down the possible causes. What have you changed or installed recently? If the error is confined to a particular application, either giving an error message about a missing file, or simply ignoring you, it's most likely due to an accidentally deleted or corrupted file, or even another new application (see the 'Badly Behaved Install Routines' box). You can normally resolve the problem either by manually copying the offending file from the original application disk, or by completely re‑installing the problem application, to ensure that all files are reinstated.
No manufacturer can check that their program will work with drivers that will be released in the future (science‑fiction addicts would probably call this a time paradox).
Re‑installing can extend as far as Windows 95 itself. It is quite easy to run the SETUP.EXE file on the Windows 95 CD‑ROM or floppy without disturbing the rest of your applications, and this is often the only way to recover from strange problems. If Setup detects an existing Windows 95 installation, it provides an option to verify installed components, and if any verify fails during Setup then individual files are re‑installed. I recently found that the System applet in Control Panel didn't run at all (I'm not sure when it stopped working, and I never did find out why it happened), so I just re‑installed Windows 95 over the top of itself, and this cured the problem. If you have installed any applications that have newer shared Windows 95 components, such as DLL files, Setup will detect them during the re‑install, and pop up a prompt asking whether you wish to keep the newer versions. In nearly all cases you should answer 'Yes', to save your having to update them later — the only exception is when you think that the file may itself be causing the problem.
If the fault relates to a specific piece of hardware, then it may be due to a driver problem, or conflicting hardware resources. This will exhibit itself either by an Error dialogue box popping up when you try to use the device (if you're lucky), or a crash when Windows 95 is booting up. If you get a crash, try rebooting into Safe mode. If this works (and it nearly always does), you can get into Control Panel and either change or remove the offending driver, and then try booting normally. In my experience, the most common cause of PC crashes are either Legacy/Plug and Play hardware clashes after you've plugged in a new expansion card, or wrongly installed drivers. For more information on these, see my 'Hardware Made Easy?' feature in the March '97 issue. And if you can't remember the name of your soundcard, then look on the packaging; don't expect to get very far by trying to install the soundcard driver that has the most familiar name — don't laugh, I know someone who did just that!
First Aid 97 Review
Such is the speed of software development that, less than two weeks after I finished my roundup of PC utility programs, one of them has already been upgraded! First Aid 97 supersedes First Aid 95, which largely concentrated on solving software problems. This new version now also checks hardware, and so is more relevant in a crash situation — hence its inclusion here. The first thing that strikes you is the much slicker interface (see Figure 1 on page 80) and the new automated hardware check‑up. This tests for hardware problems such as resource conflicts, missing drivers, hard‑disk errors and fragmentation levels, printer drivers and ports, and modem setup, and there's also a more comprehensive software checkup than before for file associations, shared DLLs, shortcuts, all file references in the registry, files referenced by each application, and much more. With this level of detail, First Aid 97 is more comprehensive than hardware‑oriented packages such as WinProbe 95, but it's kept its easy‑to‑use one‑keypress approach. If and when problems are found, you can either click on the Autofix button to sort things out (which generally works well, and the program explains what it's about to do), or use Manual to run the standard Windows 95 hardware troubleshooter in tandem and resolve the problems yourself.
The second new feature is the Advisor, and this shows a graphic of a complete multimedia PC, allowing you to click on any part, such as floppy drive, CD‑ROM, printer and so on, to lead you to a selection of possible problem areas. Answer multiple choice questions about your problem, and a possible solution is eventually given. The First Aid Advisor can be rather patronising, but it's more thorough than First Aid 95, and has 20Mb of total advice, which you can either copy to your hard disk during installation, or run directly from the CD‑ROM. Multimedia problems are better supported, although there's still room for improvement. You can also click on the 'software package' graphic to bring up the Tech Support Directory, which will connect you with manufacturers' web sites; a click on the Globe takes you to the Web Searcher, which looks for the latest tips and advice on the Internet. The third main area of the package is Emergency, and this lets you create an emergency startup disk, then takes you to Windows 95 Backup for more extensive work; meanwhile Back Track keeps copies of critical system files just in case a new application messes something up. Additional components include Windows Guardian, which adds a range of background monitors including Crash Protector (similar to that in other packages); and, to round things off nicely, Dr Solomon's well respected anti‑virus software is also on the CD‑ROM.
This new version of the First Aid package provides a significantly more complete service, adding a wide range of hardware checks to the software‑based analysis of its predecessor. It is also one of the new breed of 'dynamic' products, which can receive updates via the Internet to cure even more problems. Unless you want to spend hours with your head under the bonnet, this one‑button software and hardware approach is now comprehensive enough to be the only piece of software you need to give you peace of mind. At £34.95 for the basic version, it's also excellent value for money. A worthy successor indeed!
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Badly Behaved Install Routines
One of the most annoying causes of seemingly unconnected problems is installing a new application that neglects to check for newer versions of shared system files, before copying an older version across. Sometimes, a vital new revision of a file in the Windows\System folder ends up being replaced by one dated 1992! The application just installed works perfectly happily, but later on another application may throw up its hands in horror, sending you little error messages or refusing to run at all. This is another job for an Uninstall program such as CleanSweep (from Quarterdeck), which will alert you when something like this happens, although you can manually check the version number of system files through the 'Properties' option in Explorer (see Figure 7 on page 88). If all else fails, then re‑installing the program that's now throwing a wobbly will probably cure the problem, as it will reinstate the offending file, without (you hope) altering yet more shared system files!
However, there is another side to this problem of different versions of identically named files — it's never safe to assume that getting an updated driver or system file (via the net, for example) will automatically improve the performance of your machine. Occasionally, changing to a newer version may cause odd bugs in one particular program, due to incompatibilities — no manufacturer can check that their program will work with drivers that will be released in the future (science‑fiction addicts would probably call this a time paradox). This problem is quite rare, but if you ever get it, the solution is often to re‑install the older driver or file — if the problem goes away, you've cracked it! One other word of caution when you're trawling for updated hardware drivers via the net (or supplied on magazine covermounted CD‑ROMs) — read any text file supplied with the files and find out why the new version was released. Quite often, revisions are desinged to cure bugs that only occur when the program's used with specific hardware — not only may the new driver prove no faster than your existing version, but extra code will have been added (most newer drivers tend to be larger) and so its performance may be marginally worse. If the manufacturer announces an improved version, go ahead and install it, but if it solely adds a bug fix for something you don't possess, then there's absolutely no point!
Hot Stuff
There's been a lot of discussion about whether leaving your computer on 24 hours a day will give it a longer or shorter lifespan. Since leaving it on avoids switch‑on surges, this would seem to indicate less stress on the system. In fact, it's temperature that causes more problems than anything else — or rather changes in temperature. When you switch on your machine, it starts at room temperature, but within the next 30 minutes or so some components may end up at 80° Centigrade (even more if your cheap CPU cooling fan breaks down and gives you a quick‑fried Pentium!). Every component will thermally expand by a slightly different amount, and then, when you switch off, everything cools down again at different rates. Over long periods of time this continual expansion and contraction can cause stress cracks in components and circuit boards, and chips have been even known to slowly walk out of their sockets. Intermittent hardware problems can sometimes be cured by gently applying downward pressure to suspect chips to re‑seat them in their sockets.
Because of these thermal problems, some people prefer to leave their machines on continuously, but of course this increases running costs by a small amount, and if a fault does develop during the hours of darkness then you could be in trouble, with no‑one there to notice the smell of burning. In the long term, the best operational solution is to switch on at the beginning of the working day, and only switch off when you finish at night. Don't bother to power down during coffee or lunch breaks, and you should give your cossetted machine the best chance of a long and happy life!
Hardware Detection Problems
When you're installing new hardware in a mixed Legacy (pre‑Plug and Play) and Plug and Play system, selecting 'Yes' when Windows 95 asks 'Do you want Windows to search for your new hardware?' can, in my experience, sometimes result in a crashed machine. If it does, when you switch off and then reboot as suggested, the machine may end up with an incomplete picture of what hardware is actually connected. On one occasion I did this while I still had a review model TEAC CD‑R50S plugged in, and after rebooting the Device Manager claimed that there were three of the things connected! Until anomalies like this are resolved, the PC may also continue to crash before reaching the Windows 95 desktop. You can normally just 'Remove' the duplicates via Device Manager in Safe mode and reboot to solve the problem, but if this happens to you during the installation of Windows 95 itself, the correct procedure to follow is to run Windows 95 Setup again. The previous crash should be detected on rebooting, and the Safe Recovery dialogue box will appear (see Figure 3 on page 84). Select the Use Safe Recovery option, and then Windows 95 Setup can use built‑in methods to avoid the problem that previously occurred, and thereby finish the installation without causing the same crash.