# winxp home question about Music files



## texastami (Sep 13, 2002)

I have winxp home which keeps crashing... every 5-10 minutes... ARGH! Don't even get me started... 

Anyhow... I have the memory, space and mgz to support winxp pro - (checked with a professional!!) 

Can I do it and not lose the WMA files I have on the computer? DS has some music ripped to computer, but it keeps crashing and we cant get them burned to CD - its a totally maddening situation!!! I AM GOING CRAZY trying to get this situation handled! 

Can I do the xp pro install and not lose the music files????? (Crossing my fingers that you say its possible!!!)


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## Gary in ohio (May 11, 2002)

What do you think XP pro is going to do that home isnt doing. Fix what you have, reload home if you need to, XP isnt going to give you anything to stop it from crashing.

What is crashing, how is it crashing? 

The answer to your question is NO you can load XP and save the data on the disk in most cases, If you have your data on a separate partition then yes, but otherwise no.


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## donsgal (May 2, 2005)

texastami said:


> I have winxp home which keeps crashing... every 5-10 minutes... ARGH! Don't even get me started...
> 
> Anyhow... I have the memory, space and mgz to support winxp pro - (checked with a professional!!)
> 
> ...


It sounds an awful lot like a virus of some description that is causing you the problem. Take the money that you are going to spend on XP Pro and buy the BEST anti-virus software you can find (my vote is TrendMicro PC-illian). Also, download Spybot Search and Destroy and LavaWare Adaware Personal (both are free) and run them. Finally, if you cannot get the darn thing working, then I suggest that you find the FASTEST internet connection you can locate and transfer your music files to one of the many, many online file storage services (it should only take a few seconds to transfer a 4 or 5mb file via DSL, Cable or T-1 connection). Then do a complete reformat, reinstall on the XP OS. Buying the PRO version is not going to solve your problems, I'm afraid.

Best of luck. I feel your pain.

Donsgal


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## texastami (Sep 13, 2002)

Crashing - screen goes to black/blue/green stripes of all sizes (each time different) and it locks up... no matter what you were doing, you must restart...

Seems to happen when you are doing too much of something.... '

We got the music off that he wanted... and we installed PRO - ran for several hours without incident...

HOWEVER, as soon as I hooked up to the internet and loaded his 'MP3 player software again, it crashed - (but in fairness, it was crashing on a regular basis being hooked up to the internet when our 98 went down...)

I have all the necessary spyware/adaware/virus stuff on it... finds nothing each time.... 

We thought perhaps it was "overheating".... maybe the fan is not working or something? Seems to crash more frequently when we have been using it....


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## Nevada (Sep 9, 2004)

I'm willing to bet that it's a hardware problem, not a software problem. We need to try to guess what it might be from when the problem occurs. You are correct that it's possible that it's a heat problem, either involving your main processor or your video adapter.

The first thing I would do is open the case and vacuum out any dust bunnies. Take a look at the heat sink for the main processor. Sometimes those become matted with dust, which prevents the fan from cooling the heat sink. If your video adapter has a fan, look at that heat sink too.


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## arabian knight (Dec 19, 2005)

Check to see just WHAT version of WMP you are using~!!! WMP 11 is JUNK and I repeat JUNK~!

Not only has it slowed My machine up TERRIBLY to the Point Of Crashing. But 2 Of my friends computers as well~!!!!! 
We ALL Backed back down to Media Player 10~!!!!! And NOT one of us have any problems since!~ And there is even a Page on MS on just how to do this Without Losing ANY saved music in WMP.. 
So I would Check to See just What version you are running.
The Problem with WMP 11 is the NEW URGE they added takes FOREVER to load and all of us all running very good machines of 2.4 GHz or higher in speed have plenty of Ram and are running Windows XP with sp2~~~~
So IF MS has to have a spot on their website how to Set Back WMP there MUST be LOTS of problems out there with MP 11~~~~~~~
BUT the downside is Every once in awhile there will come up on the Screen when using Media player "Do You Want To Update" No No NO
And I even did the update Twice for WMP to version 11, and still it was Bad bad bad!
And NO there is No Virus causing what we went through with WMP 11


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## Gary in ohio (May 11, 2002)

Sound more like a video card problem than an XP problem. you Can you boot into safe mode and have it stay up? Might be a video driver issue as well.


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## Nevada (Sep 9, 2004)

Gary in ohio said:


> Sound more like a video card problem than an XP problem.


I agree. The video adapter was my guess as the most likely culprit. I only suggested the dust bunny clean-up first because doing that won't cost anything.


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## arabian knight (Dec 19, 2005)

I agree with the video card. I just posted what I did "Just In Case" the problem was occurring IF and When WMP was up and trying to run.


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## donsgal (May 2, 2005)

Nevada said:


> I'm willing to bet that it's a hardware problem, not a software problem. We need to try to guess what it might be from when the problem occurs. You are correct that it's possible that it's a heat problem, either involving your main processor or your video adapter.
> 
> The first thing I would do is open the case and vacuum out any dust bunnies. Take a look at the heat sink for the main processor. Sometimes those become matted with dust, which prevents the fan from cooling the heat sink. If your video adapter has a fan, look at that heat sink too.


Normally a thermal won't cause the symptoms that the OP describes. Normally you will just get the blue screen of death "Windows has enountered a problem.... yada yada yada.

From the description it sounds like a video card going bad. It sounds like new computer time to me....

Oh and to the OP, there are about a zillion freeware MP3 players out there that will do a good job. Try out Coolplayer at http://www.softpedia.com/get/Multimedia/Audio/Audio-Players/CoolPlayer.shtml 

donsgal

donsgal

To


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## texastami (Sep 13, 2002)

We will try safe mode - 

How do I replace the video card? Big bucks?


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## Nevada (Sep 9, 2004)

texastami said:


> We will try safe mode -
> 
> How do I replace the video card? Big bucks?


It doesn't have to be expensive, and replacing the video adapter isn't rocket science. I would still do the dust bunny check before spending any money.


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## donsgal (May 2, 2005)

texastami said:


> We will try safe mode -
> 
> How do I replace the video card? Big bucks?


Spend a LOT of time finding a good, competent, reliable computer fixit guy. Ask everybody you know. Research, research, research. There are a lot of flaky, wanna be, know-nothing guys out there who think they can fix computers. Trust me, I have met most of them.

donsgal
older and wiser


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## texastami (Sep 13, 2002)

Ok, so dust bunny check is done..... lots of dust... fan is operating normally NOW... (was very slow if not moving at all prior)

Second, DS worked with it and did some stuff (he's 19 and thinks he's a rocket scientist...) Really doesn't have a clue, but whatever he did, it is working BETTER.... 

He changed some of the settings for internet service... he's defragged in safe mode... and cleaned up some stuff.... (I wasn't here while he did all this but he was able to do his music for almost 2 hours and it didn't crash...)

Now, I went back and loaded all the stuff it needed-

Avast, spybot, adaware, and the newest updates from windows - wouldn't you know.. CRASHED 3x in less than 1 hour!!! ARRGGHH!!!!!

so, I went back andn booted back up and here we are.....


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## Nevada (Sep 9, 2004)

texastami said:


> so, I went back andn booted back up and here we are.....


Terrific! Post back with any problems.


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## texastami (Sep 13, 2002)

Still crashing.... DS is able to load his MP3 player using the software... used it for about 3 hours with NO PROBLEMS... online, surfing the web, etc.... 

I tried installing AVAST, Spybot, Ad-aware, CCcleaner, and some other software we use ...... 

As soon as it was all installed, every 10-20 minutes, it would freeze to blue screen with lines... 

Once I uninstalled everything, he can work for up to 2-3 hours again... it surfs fairly well.... 

(This is our BEST computer... has 16G memory, Pentium 3, 780 Mhz processor; runs winxp pro with SP2)

I would really like to see if I can't solve this problem- buying a new one is out of the question....


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## 14yearpcmaker (Mar 11, 2007)

texastami said:


> Still crashing.... DS is able to load his MP3 player using the software... used it for about 3 hours with NO PROBLEMS... online, surfing the web, etc....
> 
> I tried installing AVAST, Spybot, Ad-aware, CCcleaner, and some other software we use ......
> 
> ...


16 gigs of memory....wow..didn't know they mad a macine that held that much memory....512mb of ram is plenty for me.


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## Nevada (Sep 9, 2004)

texastami said:


> 16G memory, Pentium 3, 780 Mhz processor; runs winxp pro with SP2


The 16 gigs has to be your hard drive. There was no way to add that much memory to mainboards that supported P3s.

XP will run with a 780 MHz processor, but I certainly wouldn't call it plenty. I'm more concerned about the memory at this point. Right-click on your My Computer icon and select Properties. On the General tab, look near the bottom and report back here with exactly what it says under Computer.


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## texastami (Sep 13, 2002)

I am so sorry!! I meant hard drive.... been a long day! 

Ok, here's the dirt on this computer I am having so much trouble with! 

intel pentium 3 
368 MB Ram 
733 Mhz -
16g hard drive

I went into Systems - Advanced - Performance - Settings - Visual - and changed from Let windows choose TO Adjust to best performance....

I also changed the advanced tab - was background services changed TO Programs 

Memory Usage - WAS system cache - changed TO programs....

Booted back up and he was able to download music for about 3 hours and surf fine.... and then he took a break for awhile... and when he came back, went to open Mozilla and crashed... 

I rebooted and crashed almost immediately.... we just turned it off and let it sit... (haven't even tried to restart)


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## arabian knight (Dec 19, 2005)

16 gig hard drive is mighty small for downloading music on and 733 is pretty slow also.
The Ram is pretty good but that would be better if it was 512mb
You have Home XP that is using 2 gigs or more alone on the HD. 
And again I ask What is the Version of Windows Media Player?
When Downloading music is WMP Open? And What version is it?
Like I said before WMP 11 is not good at all. 10 and lower are great.


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## texastami (Sep 13, 2002)

arabian knight said:


> 16 gig hard drive is mighty small for downloading music on and 733 is pretty slow also.
> The Ram is pretty good but that would be better if it was 512mb
> You have Home XP that is using 2 gigs or more alone on the HD.
> And again I ask What is the Version of Windows Media Player?
> ...



The music is not stored on the hard drive permanently.... it is loaded via SONICSTAGE (the MP3 player software) and then put on his MP3 immediately- he then deletes the files from the harddrive library through Sonic - 

WMP is not open when he is doing this.... 
We have WMP9 and I am quite content with it.... never given me a bit of trouble....


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