Ask A Geek

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: My roommate dropped his netbook (one with an actual hard drive, not an SSD) and now it is acting very weird. The netbook boots normally and everything shows up correctly when the computer is started but right after the desktop appears it runs unbelievably slow. You click on the Start menu or an icon and nothing happens for fifteen minutes.

When a window finally does appear, the simple act of even moving it can take a half an hour. Nothing appears physically damaged. After trying to reboot it a few times it sometimes goes into the Blue Screen of Death. At first, I thought it might be the RAM got dislodged, but I checked that and it is in place.

The BSOD says “KERNEL_DATA_INPAGE_ERROR” and gives a few unhelpful paragraphs. Then a few strings of hex numbers, which I do not know how to make sense of (I’ll send them if they may be relevant). Booting into Safe Mode, most things seem to work fine (just with the exception of it being Safe Mode). When it boots back normally it is ridiculously slow again.

There are no noises, and no outward physical damage to the computer.
Unfortunately, we are currently studying abroad in a country where any help from the manufacturer could take over a month.

The computer is an HP Mini 1000 running Windows XP. I am a CS major (first year), and although an A student, am feeling a little like a failure.