Ask A Geek

Q: My Dell PC has been running very slow for the past year. I have high speed Internet and I recently tried to clean up the hard drive using the clean-up/de-fragment application. It took off a ton of unnecessary files but my computer is still running very slow.

The computer takes along time to start up/re-boot and the fan speeds up as well. After the files were taken off the CD drive won’t start up, via the media player anymore. I ran a diagnostic, it tried to fix the CD drive problem but it did not work and it told me that it is disabled even though I restored all the files taken off via the recycle bin.

So I need help figuring out how come my computer is so slow and how I can go about solving my CD drive issues.

Q: I have an HP Mini which does not have a CD drive. Due to the lack of a CD drive  I can not install my Microsoft Office software without first purchasing an external CD drive. I really don’t want to buy something I won’t use that often. Does anyone know if OpenOffice and Microsoft Office documents are compatible!

A: You can download Microsoft Office 2007 from Microsoft if you own it and then use the “product key” that came with your disc to switch from trail mode to licensed mode.

If you own an older version of Microsoft Office then OpenOffice would probably be the easiest solution for you. OpenOffice can open most Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files, and can save to a variety of Microsoft Office formats. Unless you need to save to Microsoft’s new Office 2007 formats (you probably won’t for several years) or open Microsoft Office documents that contain macros/scripts (not an issue for most home users), then OpenOffice is definitely something you should consider.

Do NOT download software from P2P or torrent sites, as such software often contains viruses/malware.

Q: I have a question about my CD-DVD rom. It was working fine until I was burning a DVD and had an disc writing error and it did not complete writing my disc. Since then my drive will not read any discs. I can hear it spinning and when I eject the disc drive ,the disc is in a diff. position then when i put it in, so I know its rotating.

I just replaced the drive not even last year with a lite-on CD and DVD burner because the gears stripped out of my original and hate to have to take it back in.

I had downloaded a couple of videos and that was what I was trying to put on the DVD’s. Could that have screwed up a program or messed my drive up?

I also downloaded a couple of programs like avsconverter and a few more converters but after my comp started doing this I uninstalled them and tried to even do a system restore but nothing works. Could the eye in my drive be dirty or getting hung up?

When I try to read the disc in my burning software it keeps saying the drive is busy and won’t read it. I have also tried to play different discs in other programs like opening the drive from my comp and it pops my the tray out and tells me to insert a disc and when i push it back in it freezes my program up and they say so and so’s not responding then I push the tray open and they work fine again.

Q: I was having a problem with my DVD/CD writer. So I decided to buy a new one and put it in my computer myself.

I bought a Liteon 22x and installed it in my Dell 8300 computer running Windows XP. The computer does not see it and I’m stuck with it not being able to down load the drivers from the CD.

Q: I dropped my laptop about 3 months ago and everything seems to be working fine except my CD drive, which now only works when it wants to. One time I wasn’t even trying to access my CD drive and it just turned on by itself so I took advantage of the moment and uploaded all my CD’s . Now it wont work. When I dropped it 2 dents occurred on the 2 right side corners and the drive sticks out a little, but it still clicks in and out as it normally would, but when it doesn’t work it makes a beeping noise and like a struggling noise. Is there anything that I can do to fix this?

Q: When I turn on my computer this message appears “windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt \windows\system32\config\system

you can attempt to repair this file by starting windows setup using the the original setup CD-ROM
select “r” at the first screen to start repair.”

Also before this screen another message appears that says that no Keyboard was found. I tried restoring my computer with the restore CDs but I need the keyboard to select things to start repair. Any ideas of how to fix this problem?

Q: My computer will not automatically install a program from a CD, when I put the CD in the computer does nothing. The green light on the tray comes on but nothing on the screen. What’s the problem?

Q: Hi…
I have a Toshiba DVD ROM on my HP notebook computer. I have used it in the past but not recently. I noticed that the drive is not showing in “My Computer”. I get an error message that reads..” Windows cannot find the device driver for this hardware. The driver may be corrupted or missing. (Code 39).”.. when I go to device manager.
Can you PLEASE help me get my CD ROM running again..? THANK YOU!

Q: I am trying to replace the CD-ROM drive in my friends Dell Dimension 3000 desktop. I am able to take off one side of the case but am unable to take off the other side of the case because it is riveted on instead of screwed on. How can I get to the other side of the drive to remove the screws on that side so that I can take the CD-ROM drive out to replace it with a new one?

A: With the Dimension series from Dell the other side normally does not come off. The trick is that you have to take the front off, unscrew the single screw that holds the CD-ROM in place and then take the drive out the front instead of pulling it back though the case.

Dell has some detailed instructions on how to do this. The instructions have 3 steps that you will want to follow before actually trying to remove the CD-ROM drive. The most important one to look at, which is the step I think you are stuck at, is the 3rd step. It explains how to take the front panel off. This ones is important to read because it will show you where the tabs are and possibly the release lever (not on all models) so that you can take the front off without breaking it.

Best of luck getting the CD-ROM drive out and if anything should happen, like you crack the front panel, explain to your friend that you are sorry and that you did your best you could for free.