Repairing WinXP

[gwallen4]

I just did a clean installation of WinXP on a newly built PC. Everything was perfect until I installed Office 97.

Now some operations (like changing text to bold or saving a document) in Word or Excel frequently cause 10-20 second freezes. CPU temps are normal.

I have WinXP and Office97 running on two other PC's but have not noticed this problem.

I tried reinstalling Office97 but the problem persists.

I would like to try a repair on WinXP, but for the life of me, I can't remember how to do that. Can anyone help?

Thanks

[Mark Miller]

Hi,
I am not 100% sure but I think all you have to do is put the disk in and one of the options that first come up is to install or repair.
Hope this helps.
Of course you know that your boot order has to be for the cd drive to be able to be read first. [did I phrase that right?]
Mark:D

[gwallen4]

Update:

Thanks Mark.

I repaired WinXp by reinstalling (Upgrading). That preserved all the settings.

However, the problem still persists. I guess I'll try to reload drivers next.

Abit NF7-S
Athlon XP 2500+ Barton
OCZ 3200+ DDR 256 MB X 2, dual mode
Matrox Millenium G450eTV video card with latest driver

[Budfred]

Try this link:

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

[Paul Komski]

Since your problems seem related to Office apps and not more generally it would seem logical to uninstall/reinstall Office again after the WinXP repair. Or could there be any mischief at work?

If you uninstall - go into the office folder and delete all remnants before reinstalling just to ensure that no corrupt file could be reused.

Final thought is to defrag - if you havent done this lately.

[jabarnutcase]

I'm on the verge of being late for a meeting, so I can't find and post the link right now, but you might also check out the M$ OFFICE site for the many Office Updates available for your version (addressing XP problems?) that you can download too.

Being an older version of Office, you may find some important downloads for all of your machines...Seems to me I did for Office2000 which I am using with XP.

Good luck. ;)

[gwallen4]

Thanks to all:

Paul,

I completely obliterated Office 97 and reinstalled, but the problem still exists. Drats! (I'm afraid to use the words that come to mind, not wanting to offend anyone).

This is a brand new install of WinXP on a newly formatted drive, so I don't think defragging would help - good thought though.

Jabar,

I tried installing all the service patches that sounded like they might help - sigh.

[jabarnutcase]

Sorry to hear you're still having no luck-
I happened to have one more thought.
When you did the clean install, (or the subsequent "repair" for that matter...Which if I remember correctly, will also wipe out all of your Windows updates), did you reinstall all of the Critical XP updates available too?
There could be a lot of them depending on how old your XP Disk is.

I also have faint memories of there being a problem not so very long ago where a particular security update messed up some Office Apps. in XP.
(After which, new patches were available that fixed the problem).

For that matter, in light of the recent Hijacker problems and the numerous other Security risks to date, I hope you remembered to check and install critical updates!
Even if the Office problem remains a thorn in your side for now, the "Critical's" are certainly important as you know.

Don't mind me, just thinking out loud....You've probably already checked all that. ;)

[gwallen4]

Thanks Jabar.

My other computers with XP (and no updates) work fine with Office97.

Anyway, I decided to reformat C: and reinstall WinXP. In doing so, I lost the contents of D: (C: 16 GB, D: 64 GB). So I am starting from ground zero.

When I first upgraded the computer (two days ago) and installed WinXP, I also lost D: and had to repartition and reformat. I've never had that happen before. In retrospect I think my WD harddrive has seen better days (2 years old). I will do diagnostics, but I just don't trust it anymore since it lost my data twice.

It might be that the delays were caused by trying to access a corrupted HD. At any rate I will replace the drive and try again. I'll let you know the results.

[jabarnutcase]

My other computers with XP (and no updates) work fine with Office97
I understand what you mean as far as no Office updates, but I was referring to Critical Patches for XP itself....Have you run Windows update to be sure the OS itself is up to date?
You aren't running XP without SP1 and other important Patches are you? Especially the most recent which are very important.

In the other matter....Yes, running the WD Drive diagnostics sure wouldn't hurt.

Sorry, I tend to over complicate things sometimes, but what I was getting at is that after installing XP fresh (Or even a repair), you need to run "Windows Update" again and install all the Security Patches.

(If you got me the first time, please disregard this silly reply).
:p

[gwallen4]

Jabar,

Yeah, I have two PC's running XP without updates - work great, and no problems running Office97.

The one time I loaded the updates for XP, the PC crashed and burned. I've been reluctant since that time, and (knock on wood) haven't had any serious intrusions.

[jabarnutcase]

Yeah, I have two PC's running XP without updates - work great...
You have never installed ANY Critical Updates since you first installed XP on those Computers????
How long ago were the installations? And how old are the XP CD's?

I sure don't want to jinx you at this point....But I think you are surely flirting with disaster.
Some are absolutely Critical to the security of your system. (Hence the name) :p

Do you use Internet Explorer as well? Which version? With no updates whatsoever? Ever? :eek:

I'll keep my fingers crossed for you. ;)

(Edit) Past my bedtime...I'll say a little prayer for you tonight too. :)

[gwallen4]

My XP CD's came out before SP1. All my computers run IE6.

I guess my systems just aren't a challenge for any hacker so they leave me alone. Our family has three Win98 desktops, two WinXP desktops, and a XP laptop, all connected to the internet via a cable modem and router (no fancy firewall settings on the router). We never open an attachment unless we know who it's from and the contents of the attachment - no viruses for the past 2 - 3 years. The attachments occasionally do contain viruses but they aren't opened.

Back to the new computer:

I repartitioned and reformatted the drive, and tried again to install Win98 - no luck trying to get the Win98 LAN and sound drivers to work with this nForce chipset. Reformatted. Loaded an old copy of WinME that I saved after buying it, then hating it. It seems to work fine with Office97. Ran a Scan Disk thorough surface scan for 9 hours last night - no errors found, and a Western Digital full media extended scan also showed no drive errors.

Maybe I just had a bad installation of WinXP that caused all the problems with Office97. I'm going to put WinXP on D: (dual boot) and see if I'm still having problems.

[gwallen4]

Okay. A fresh installation of WinXP on a formatted drive solved the problem. My only problem now is how to get WinME off of this dual boot system - it's already crashed a half dozen times. Just kidding - I actually need it to run certain programs.

Thanks for your help guys!

[jabarnutcase]

Glad it worked out for you in the end! ;)

I would still urge you to install some Critical Security patches though....Especially if you've been following some of the recent threads about the "nasties" picked up recently....Even from just surfing the Web, and ESPECIALLY using Internet Explorer without the recent updates....(Or the half million other Security Patches before these).

I'm actually amazed you've never had any problems having NO Critical Updates installed on any of your Computers EVER!

Boy, sure do wish I had your luck! Have you considered buying Lottery Tickets? :D

Good Luck. ;)

[Paul Komski]

I have to say, that for my own reasons, I am very lax about being all that up-to-date myself. However I always patch against blaster and nachi before ever going on line with 2K or XP (they are in my must-haves image files) and to that I would now add the patch for the chm/mhtml exploit for all windows OSes.