Any Computer Geniuses on here?

[Peaches Lee]

My laptop has shut down. First it completely rebooted itself so I lost all of my documents and photos and favorites (on the web). Now, when I turn it on, it shuts down-restarts, shuts down-restarts.I'm really, really bummed about losing my photos most of all.

Is there any chance of getting this computer fixed so I can just retrieve my photos? Or is it all gone forever...

It's an 8 yr old Gateway if that makes any difference. Thanks for any help!

 

[PepsNick]

If you can get it fixed and there's not a memory problem then your stuff with probably still be there (unless there's some major problem), what kind of computer is it?

 

[debilorrah]

Is your battery charged?

 

[Peaches Lee]

Thanks for the replies...

It is a Gateway laptop.

I have it plugged directly into an outlet so I think that would mean the battery is charged?

 

[debilorrah]

Quote:
If it were in my house, that plug may not work right.

 

[Judy]

I had that happen to me once, took it to the computer shop, was told it was some sort of malware (virus etc.,) don't even remember whether it was repairable -- but at least maybe they could recover your data.

It should be running off regular power when it is plugged in. I once had one I used only when it was plugged in, with the battery removed. (Employer wouldn't replace the defective battery.)

NOT a computer genius, though.

 

[call ducks]

Well first off let me tell you this, you should never lose anything from your hard drive as a normal hard drive has something like seven layers of storage noting is ever deleted.

First if you can get on it long ennough to install this http://free.avg.com/ca-en/homepage and this http://www.malwarebytes.org/ do it. if not try restoreing it (if you make backups). If not i would go get it fixed by a "pro" and then go buy norton ghost to mack daily back ups

 

[welasharon]

Can you start it in safe mode?

 

[Runt Of The Litter]

Quote:
was it some years ago?,might have been the msblaster virus,mine-like a huge number of computers was hit by that,naffing microsoft didnt put the patch out intime,spread so easily because not all of us have automatic windows updating turned on. *cough* *cough*.

woud agree on this one,it shows the behavior of a virus and not a hardware failiure.
a struggling hard drive failiure for example more often than not happens gradually,and if are lucky enough to own a rig where the fan does not resemble a wind tunnel ,will start to hear the disc in the hard drive skipping-a slight clicking sound,it will take ages to boot,load stuff and shut down.
however,the description sounds very unlike a hardware failiure but is far more inline with viruses/malware that take advantage of buffer overflow exploiting-its classic behavior of this infact.

disconnect the net physicaly whilst scanning,incase remote restarting is being used.
safe mode AV scanning is the best way to attack viruses.

will also need to update the OS with all patches and service packs.

 

[Boyd]

Quote:
was it some years ago?,might have been the msblaster virus,mine-like a huge number of computers was hit by that,naffing microsoft didnt put the patch out intime,spread so easily because not all of us have automatic windows updating turned on. *cough* *cough*.

woud agree on this one,it shows the behavior of a virus and not a hardware failiure.
a struggling hard drive failiure for example more often than not happens gradually,and if are lucky enough to own a rig where the fan does not resemble a wind tunnel ,will start to hear the disc in the hard drive skipping-a slight clicking sound,it will take ages to boot,load stuff and shut down.
however,the description sounds very unlike a hardware failiure but is far more inline with viruses/malware that take advantage of buffer overflow exploiting-its classic behavior of this infact.

disconnect the net physicaly whilst scanning,incase remote restarting is being used.
safe mode AV scanning is the best way to attack viruses.

will also need to update the OS with all patches and service packs.

Actually this sounds like an automatic update gone bad. upon startup go to recovery mode, and then do a system restore to an earlier point before the problem started.