Salinger

It would appear it was a software problem. Had to engage services of a professional in order to save a small amount of un-backed up data. Other than that I believe it was fixed by completing a re-installation of the O/S. RandyL - I will be investing in a memory upgrade in near future. Many thanks for all your help and advice.

I will try to connect HD to another PC and then get back to you. Many thanks for your help

I got to torrent from Neosmart after goggling how to fix the crc.sys problem. I downloaded the Vista recovery file but as previously stated this did no more than I had already done using the F8 control. Can you please explain the "unable to help because of useage of torrented software". My Vista was pre-installed on the PC when I bought it from PC World so I assume it is legal. Cheers

Vista home premium Operating System My computer will not boot up. It was working fine and suddenly the Windows Sidebar stopped workng - maybe connected ?. The computer continued working OK. I turned computer off as per usual. On turning the computer on later it would not boot up. Using "safe mode" "Loading Windows Files" was displayed but this stopped at "windows\system32\drivers\crcdisk.sys". I have tried using F8 + F10 using Start Up Repair, System Restore etc but to no avail. Sometimes Start Up Repair did find somehing but this made no difference. System Restore did on one occasion find a restore point, the time earlier in the day I had used it and showed a windows update had been made, which I tried. It now does not show any available restore point. I created a boot disk on my laptop from Neosmart / torrent and started computer with this but only got as far as the Repair Your Computer screen which I had already been able to access. I have tried chkdsk from the dos command but this appears to do nothing. The current situation is the screen shows "Windows Vista Home Premium" flashing on and off at the bottom of the screen, the cursor and blue circle are also showing with the screen flashing a white band at the top as if it is trying to start. I have made no changes, added or removed anything between the PC working and it failing to start. It is an Acer Aspire T180 AMD Athon 64 Dual Core Processor Ram 1024 mb Hard Disk 160 GB Optical Drive - Multi-Format Dual Layer Graphics - nVidia GeForce6100 Sound Card Realtek ALC 880 I have Microsoft Security Essentials installed and have automatic updates activated. I have been searching the internet for answers for two days but am at a loss as to what to try next. I would like to avoid a complete re-install if possible. Any advice would be most appreciated.

Jelly Bean - thanks for your response. I have re-installed the system from Acer e-recovery and then updated it from Microsoft Update until all updates were installed. This appears to have solved the problem. After re-installing an Operating System make sure the first thing you do is install all updates seems the way to go. Takes an age but system is OK now. Many thanks for everyones input.

Thanks RandyL, can't remember exactly what I did on reinstall. I will re-install the system and then try to install updates prior to doing anything else. I have Microsoft Security Essentials running as my antivirus software. Many thanks

My Acer Aspire T180. Running windows Vista Home Premium Spec: AMD Athlon 64 x 2 Dual Core Processor 4200+, 2200MHZ, 2 Cores, 2 Logical Processors. Installed Physical Memory 1 GB Total Physical Memory 767 MB Available Physical Memory 229 MB Total Virtual Memory 1.76 GB Available Virtual Memory 677 mb I recently restored factory settings as my system was running slower and slower. It appears now that Windows Update is having problems installing the updates, specifically SP1 and SP2. I have followed the recommended fixes from Windows Help. Mr Fix It and Windows download tool, but I am still getting problems with failed downloads. Unable to download SP1 and SP2. Have tried SP1 manual download but this did not work. Have noticed Microsoft stop supporting Vista system without SP1 & 2. Each time I turn the computer off their are updates waiting to be installed, which I do, and when turning the computer back on these continue to update / install. Error codes for the failed installations are: 80073712, 8000FFFF, 80242006 & 80246001. I have followed the instructions to resolve these errors but appear to be gong round in circles. Any help would be most appreciated.

Thanks for your reply. Have amended start up programs but does not make any difference. System appears to lock up / go really slow when opening browser and e-mail at same time, sometimes with Microsoft Security Essentials updating at the same time. Thought the Dual Core processor would stop that happening. Last question, what improvement would an extra 1 gb of RAM make ? Many thanks

In the start up tab it shows Adobe Acrobat, Adobe reader & Acrobat Manager, Microsoft Security Essentials, Microsoft Windows Operating System and Google Update all with a tick in the box. I have deleted the tick for Adobe Acrobat and Adobe reader...... Under the General Tab of the three options Selective Start Up is ticked. The box for Load System Services is ticked and the box below Load Start Up Items contains a smaller blue box. Use Original Boot Configuration is ticked but not active. Under the services tab there are a lot "running" but I am afraid I do not know what most mean. eg There is one called Telephony that is ticked and running. Cheers

My Acer Aspire T180 appears to run slower and slower as time goes by. Running windows Vista Home Premium Spec: AMD Athlon 64 x 2 Dual Core Processor 4200+, 2200MHZ, 2 Cores, 2 Logical Processors. Installed Physical Memory 1 GB Total Physical Memory 767 MB Available Physical Memory 229 MB Total Virtual Memory 1.76 GB Available Virtual Memory 677 mb I do not use PC for gaming, mainly internet access. I have IE 8 installed as well as Google Chrome, which i tend to use, and have just started using Microsoft Security Essentials. It seems to take a relatively long time to boot up and freezes a lot if I open more than one or two web pages. Is it a simple fact that I just need more memory. Any help would be appreciated.

This has worked although I would have preferred to go back to using the Windows Mail format. Many thanks for your help. Don't suppose you know how to permanently get rid of the advertising pane pain that appears to the right of the screen ? Cheers

Only options I get are to change my Homepage. I am trying to use Windows Mail basically instead of Windows Live, which previous to my re-installing the O/S I could do. When purchasing the new PC a couple of years ago I remeber having to do somehing in order to use the Windows Mail format instead of Live Mail but can't remember what I did. Cheers anyway.

Just re-installed Windows Vista to try and solve slow system problems - doesn't appear to have worked. I previously viewed my e-mail, a Hotmail account, in the format of Windows Mail. Now I can only see it through Windows Live. I now Windows have changed Hotmail to Windows Live but previously I could view my mail through the Windows Mail format. Hope I have explained properly. Anyone know how to do this ?

Have managed to re-install from e-recovery system on hard drive. System still really slow, maybe need more RAM. Currently only 1gb of which 256 is for graphics. Cheers for help

Computer: Acer Aspire T180 Desktop - Purchased February 2007 from PC World O/S : Windows Vista Home Premium My system is running really slow, particularly booting up and shutting down. I am trying to put it back to the original factory settings. I have a Recovery Disc that I would have made when I purchased the PC. When I put this in the drive and re-start the PC I use F12 to enter the set-up and select "Boot from CD". The system starts to work but then after about 1 min a message appears. " Windows could not start due to an error while booting from a ramdisk. Windows failed to open the ramdisk image. File STCDBoot.ISO could not be loaded. The error code is 32768 " I can not recall exactly what I did to create the recovery disc but I would have followed the instructions and I have also written a password on the cover. I also have a Windows Anytime Upgrade disc that came with the PC. My intention is to put the PC back to factory settings in order to get rid of any previous used programs or files that are slowing it down. I defrag etc on a regular basis and have Windows Live Onecare to keep everything update. Any assistance would be most appreciated. Cheers Salinger