A: All the PCs in the WAM labs have Virus
scanning software on them. You can clean them yourself by
going to the "Main Utilities" menu and selecting
"VirusScan". Make sure under the "Settings" button that the
"Clean Infection" box is selected. Then you can just hit
the Scan button.
You can also take your disks to the Office of Information Technology (OIT)
Help Desk
and have them scan them for you.
A: First off, the homage: "Save early,
Save often" probably has new meaning for you now. The
information below applies only to PCs running Windows 95
or Windows NT and to Macintosh workstations. You
should not try to reboot a Sun or Windows NT
machine.
Unfortunately, when a computer locks up, many times there
is little you can do except to reboot.
You can try hitting
the CAPS LOCK or NUM LOCK keys and seeing if the lights
on the keyboard go on/off. If they do, then it may just
be the computer is still processing information. If you
are on a PC and you've waited for a few minutes and there
is still no response, you can try opening the Task
Manager by pressing CTRL-ALT-DELETE (all three keys at
the same time) on a Windows machine. A dialog box
should appear with a list of running programs with the
option to end them. If programs are
listed as "Not Responding", you can try killing them, but
any data you have not saved will be lost! You should be
able to close programs that are not responding without
affecting the data in your other programs.
To reboot, a Windows or Mac workstation, turn off
the power, then wait 5-10 seconds before turning it back
on. Again, Do not try and reboot a Sun or Windows
NT machine. The machine will likely take several
minutes to come back up, and the Macintosh will likely
restart itself at least once before the menu appears.
Most likely, any information since the last time you
saved is lost. If you saved your file to the local hard
drive it should still be there as long as you did not
save it in the C:\TEMP directory (anything in C:\TEMP is
erased when the computer is restarted).
If you were using Word Perfect, it is set to make timed
backups. After the machine reboots, open Word Perfect. If
a backup file exists, a message will appear when you
start the program asking if you want to open the backup
file. Other programs may or may not have backup files (it
depends on the program and how it's set up.)
A: First off, if a disk does not come
out easily when you push the eject button (PCs) or drag
your disk to the trash can (Macs), DO NOT FORCE
IT. You may damage the drive in doing so. On a
Mac you can try the CTRL-Option-1 and CTRL-Option-2 key
sequences. Otherwise,
call the Workstation Coordinator at 405-2954 to have
someone come and remove your disk.
The cause of may disks being stuck in the drives is due
to bent or broken doors (the metal part that slides back
and forth) on the disks themselves. If you can see the
door on your disk is bad, do not put it in the drive. If
you take your disk, and a new disk to the OIT Help Desk
(Room 1400 CSS) they can copy the files off your bad disk
for you.
