tacrewsfl
asked on
Misbehaving Notebook
I have an ACER Aspire 3000 notebook with problems. It has a 1.80 GHz AMD Mobile Sempron CPU with 1 GB of RAM. It has a built-in touch pad mouse. Here are the steps I have taken:
1. I have “F-diskedâÂ
2. I created a new partition and allotted the entire 40 GB to this new active directory
3. I installed XP Service Pack 2 (Build 2600) – during which I formatted the new partition as NTFS
I have repeated these 3 steps (4 times) because the notebook acts squirrelly after I install the XP. I have used 2 different XP install disks with the same results. The symptoms are:
1. The built-in touch pad mouse only works in “safe modeâ€ÂÂ, for regular Windows bootup the touch pad is inoperative. A USB connected mouse does work after regular bootup.
2. The built-in keyboard only works in “safe modeâ€ÂÂ, for regular Windows bootup the touch pad is inoperative. A USB connected keyboard does work after regular bootup.
3. The Microsoft online hotfixes can’t install properly (the notebook just freezes after downloading about 40 of the required 82 hotfixes). At this point, I have to pull power from the notebook to reboot (task manager shows a “sysfaderâÂ
At this point, I have a dysfunctional notebook that the keyboard and touch-pad mouse only work in “safe mode†and when I attach USB connected keyboard/mouse and bootup in regular Windows mode; I can’t install the Microsoft hotfixes (or any other program like 2003 Office Suite).
Other than performing an exorcism on the notebook or using it as a paperweight, does anyone have any suggestions for remedy?
1. I have “F-diskedâÂ
2. I created a new partition and allotted the entire 40 GB to this new active directory
3. I installed XP Service Pack 2 (Build 2600) – during which I formatted the new partition as NTFS
I have repeated these 3 steps (4 times) because the notebook acts squirrelly after I install the XP. I have used 2 different XP install disks with the same results. The symptoms are:
1. The built-in touch pad mouse only works in “safe modeâ€ÂÂ, for regular Windows bootup the touch pad is inoperative. A USB connected mouse does work after regular bootup.
2. The built-in keyboard only works in “safe modeâ€ÂÂ, for regular Windows bootup the touch pad is inoperative. A USB connected keyboard does work after regular bootup.
3. The Microsoft online hotfixes can’t install properly (the notebook just freezes after downloading about 40 of the required 82 hotfixes). At this point, I have to pull power from the notebook to reboot (task manager shows a “sysfaderâÂ
At this point, I have a dysfunctional notebook that the keyboard and touch-pad mouse only work in “safe mode†and when I attach USB connected keyboard/mouse and bootup in regular Windows mode; I can’t install the Microsoft hotfixes (or any other program like 2003 Office Suite).
Other than performing an exorcism on the notebook or using it as a paperweight, does anyone have any suggestions for remedy?
ASKER
No question marks or exclamation points in Device Manager. Sorry.
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
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If Touchpad and KB work only in safe mode, the problem is very likely a driver that is bad or conflicting with another driver or software. Run msconfig and disable all unnecessary stratup items and see if there's a difference (diagnostic startup). Sometimes a touchpad driver (ordinary PS/2 mouse driver, usually) can get mangled by other fancy mouse drivers (like Logitech), so take care to eliminate such devices and drivers from the device manager.
You could of course try running another O/S on the system; try Knoppix or Ubuntu linux distros...
/RID
You could of course try running another O/S on the system; try Knoppix or Ubuntu linux distros...
/RID
ASKER
I tried the ACER provided Windows version of XP ... seems to have done the job. Thank you.
Here is Acer's notebook driver download page:
http://www.acersupport.com/notebook/index.html