On Monday 08 April 2002 11:49, you wrote:
>
> strace is one of my favorite things about a Linux system and the lack of
> same is one of the things I hate most about having to use a Windows box,
> particularly when applications mysteriously fail, which we know *never*
> happens under Windows....
Today I spent about 4 hours (a continuation of a project that has now logged
over 24 hrs freebie service time) chasing down the following situation:
Started with a totally nasty virus that clobbered a partition table on a
Win98 machine. I had to low level it with Linux before I could touch it with
Windows.
Reformatted / reinstalled all the software in the world and returned the
machine running like new.
All systems "go"
Client (friend with cerebral palsy) puts "a disk" in it. Can't tell me which
one, can only make sad faces to let me know that what happened next was
somewhat upsetting.
Went over to the group home to see what is what. Lots of stuff on his
computer I didn't put there. (I want to drive home the point that, when I had
originally returned the computer to him, he only needed to make the
connection to his ISP to have EVERYTHING working.) Windows does not recognize
his modem ... and can't be talked into it. It's an Askey PCI modem but the
version of Windows he has installed only knows about the 14.4 Askey modem ...
and can't be coaxed into using that driver for the 56k modem that's actually
installed at the moment. (insert softly muttered imprecations here)
Okay. I drove home (6 miles one way) to get a couple candidates for a
replacement modem, a screw driver and some software drivers. The internal IDE
modem I brought won't work because he has a (bad word ... use your
imagination) motherboard with only PCI slots ... and only three of them.
Thank you, Gateway.
So I plugged in my nice external serial port modem.
So his video died. Apparently he has a solder trace problem. Or ghosts. Trash
maybe two hours futzing with that. Go home and get some sleep.
Today, I took a spare expansion card pci video controller with me and plugged
it in. It doesn't work ... but it was enough of a threat that now the stupid
on-board video is willing to work. I plugged in the expansion card and it
didn't work but, for no particular reason, I think plugged the signal cable
to the monitor back into the onboard controller and voila ... picture! Cool.
It doesn't seem to make sense, but cool anyways ... one less thing to worry
about.
Just in time for the frimpin frappin ringa dinger CD rom to disappear off the
face of the earth. I need to make it plain that I got a driver off the Win 98
CD rom and then went to install an application and the CD rom was simply
gone. The computer wasn't even turned off between accesses and both occurred
within a minute or so of each other. I was at the keyboard and know that
nothing stupid had come from that source.
Time to get rude ... so I tried to re-install Win98 from my CD. It found a
FAT problem and fixed it (it claims) but will go no further. It is, after
all, an OEM CD and is too haughty to be used to freshen a corrupt install.
So I tried using the setup.exe file already on the HD. That's when I found
out that my original installation had been completely trashed by someone with
an upgrade CD. After I point out that my CD key isn't working, John finally
volunteered that another fellow had been trying to fix his computer.
If John was not my spiritual brother greatly afflicted with CP, I'd have
walked out. Just walked out and told him to get the other guy to come fix his
stupid computer. The other guy happens to be a close friend but I now have
about 30 hours work into this computer to save a silly 400mhz Celeron with 96
meg of ram. That's too much effort for too little computer. And I am stopped
because someone equipped with an upgrade CD has come along behind me and
changed the serial number the O/S expects.
Instead we placed a couple of phone calls and got the product ID number.
--------------------
I absolutely agree, stuff NEVER mysteriously breaks under Windows ... that's
why only Linux has strace available.
(tongue FRIMLY in cheek)
Bill
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