bgeer@javelin.es.com (Bob Geer) (12/21/90)
Just installed Win3, had a problem many may have had, but I missed all previous discussions...also, I haven't successfully aftp'd yet (in case a Win3FAQ's available), nor have I received e-mail external to this co. yet. I did a generic install (I didn't edit the files the Win installer created/changed) of Win3 on my DTK 386-20 ma-board w/ 5 meg ram, DTC RLL disk controller w/ Seagate 277R drive, ATI VGA Wonder 512k w/ mouse, no LANs, no TSR's, no device drivers or memory managers (that I loaded -- not sure what winstall did), just a vanilla 386 machine. I was playing with multiple sessions -- WordPerfect, Windows Paint, & GWS shareware gif viewer. I tried to alt-esc while GWS was running (displaying a .gif in 640x480x256), the screen went "funny" (wierd colors, mostly), & I had to re-boot. Now, I get parity errors from my disk, CHKDSK shows lots of bad first allocation thingys, & naturally some programs & directories are not accessible anymore. I have a backup, so I can recover ok...but, I'd like some suggestions & comments on how to avoid this problem (other than doing daily recoveries). What guidelines do y'all suggest on using multiple sessions & with which programs? Thanx in advance. -- <> Bob `Bear' Geer <> bgeer%javelin@dsd.es.com...dsd.es.com!javelin!bgeer <> <> Alta-holic <> speaking only for myself, one of my many tricks <> <> Salt Lake City, <> "We must strive to be more than we are, Lal." <> <> Ootah <> -- Cmdr. Data, learning schmaltz <>
buddington-paul@cs.yale.edu (Paul Buddington) (12/21/90)
In article <1990Dec21.022146.7301@javelin.es.com> bgeer%javelin@dsd.es.com >I was playing with multiple sessions -- WordPerfect, Windows Paint, & >GWS shareware gif viewer. I tried to alt-esc while GWS was running >(displaying a .gif in 640x480x256), the screen went "funny" (wierd >colors, mostly), & I had to re-boot. First, switching out of a high-resolution graphics mode into windows is dangerous - Windows doesn't always know how to handle the mode. Avoid this if at all possible. Second, I would guess that your hard disk corruption was caused by two things: 1) the graphics problem, and 2) the fact the your GIF viewer was probably making heavy use of the hard disk at the time you tried to switch. Moral: Avoid switching tasks during heavy hard disk access or when in a high resolution graphics mode. Solutions: 1. (Best solution) - Find a Gif viewer that runs under Windows. I'm working on this right now. If you can find a good program, it should run in the highest resolution possible, as long as you have a Windows driver for your video card. 2. Modify (or create) the .PIF file for your GIF viewer. Make sure the following items are set properly: Display Usage - Full screen - if you try to put a high-res screen in a Window, you're bound to screw up something On the Advanced options screen: Video memory - High graphics Monitor ports - High graphics Allow fast paste - Disabled Allow close when active - Disabled Disable ALL reserved shortcut keys except: Ctrl-Esc - to allow you to bring up the task list Alt-Space - to allow you to bring up the control box for the current window (These two keys will give you an escape in an emergency. But don't use them unless you have to!) These settings should keep you safe (no guarantees). One exception to the above rules: it's usually okay to switch out of a program like a Gif viewer AS LONG AS IT'S IN TEXT MODE when you switch. Hope this helps! Paul Buddington Yale University
crp002@muvms3.bitnet (12/22/90)
X-VMS-News: muvms3 comp.windows.ms:8132 > From: bgeer@javelin.es.com (Bob Geer) > Subject:Win3 killed my disk -- suggestions? > Date: 21 Dec 90 02:21:46 GMT > Message-ID:<1990Dec21.022146.7301@javelin.es.com> > Just installed Win3, had a problem many may have had, but I missed all > previous discussions...also, I haven't successfully aftp'd yet (in > case a Win3FAQ's available), nor have I received e-mail external to > this co. yet. > > I did a generic install (I didn't edit the files the Win installer > created/changed) of Win3 on my DTK 386-20 ma-board w/ 5 meg ram, DTC > RLL disk controller w/ Seagate 277R drive, ATI VGA Wonder 512k w/ > mouse, no LANs, no TSR's, no device drivers or memory managers (that I > loaded -- not sure what winstall did), just a vanilla 386 machine. > > I was playing with multiple sessions -- WordPerfect, Windows Paint, & > GWS shareware gif viewer. I tried to alt-esc while GWS was running > (displaying a .gif in 640x480x256), the screen went "funny" (wierd > colors, mostly), & I had to re-boot. Now, I get parity errors from my > disk, CHKDSK shows lots of bad first allocation thingys, & naturally > some programs & directories are not accessible anymore. > > I have a backup, so I can recover ok...but, I'd like some suggestions > & comments on how to avoid this problem (other than doing daily > recoveries). What guidelines do y'all suggest on using multiple > sessions & with which programs? Thanx in advance. > -- > <> Bob `Bear' Geer <> bgeer%javelin@dsd.es.com...dsd.es.com!javelin!bgeer <> > <> Alta-holic <> speaking only for myself, one of my many tricks <> > <> Salt Lake City, <> "We must strive to be more than we are, Lal." <> > <> Ootah <> -- Cmdr. Data, learning schmaltz <> Smart Disk Disk Cache program that came with windows will crash your drive if you partition a buffer bigger than your memory or your drive. It's in the manual. Doesn't sound too smart to me. Perhaps you need to write a nasty letter to microsoft. Mike
jcwasik@PacBell.COM (Joe Wasik) (12/22/90)
In article <1990Dec21.022146.7301@javelin.es.com> bgeer%javelin@dsd.es.com writes: >I was playing with multiple sessions -- WordPerfect, Windows Paint, & >GWS shareware gif viewer. I tried to alt-esc while GWS was running >(displaying a .gif in 640x480x256), the screen went "funny" (wierd >colors, mostly), & I had to re-boot. Now, I get parity errors from my >disk, CHKDSK shows lots of bad first allocation thingys, & naturally >some programs & directories are not accessible anymore. You didn't mention what kind of disk you're running. Is your's > 1024 Cyl? If yes, do you use a special driver, e.g. SSTOR.SYS? If yes again, remove SMARTDRV.SYS from you config.sys. A question to those in-the-know: Is there any news when Microsoft is going to fix this compatibility problem????? -- Joe Wasik, Pacific Bell, 2600 Camino Ramon, San Ramon, CA (415)823-2422 email: jcwasik@clib.PacBell.COM or [...]!pacbell!clib!jcwasik
root@hlthnt.UUCP (Steve Ginn) (12/22/90)
buddington-paul@cs.yale.edu (Paul Buddington) writes: > In article <1990Dec21.022146.7301@javelin.es.com> bgeer%javelin@dsd.es.com > > >I was playing with multiple sessions -- WordPerfect, Windows Paint, & > >GWS shareware gif viewer. I tried to alt-esc while GWS was running > >(displaying a .gif in 640x480x256), the screen went "funny" (wierd > >colors, mostly), & I had to re-boot. > > Solutions: > 1. (Best solution) - Find a Gif viewer that runs under Windows. > I'm working on this right now. If you can find a good > program, it should run in the highest resolution possible, > as long as you have a Windows driver for your video card. > Just a real quick reponse here due to lack of time. I caught a glimpse of this message and wanted add my two cents. As far as good Win 3.0 GIF veiwers, I would recommend WINGIF which is a shareware program available on most BBS or COMPUSERVE or GENIE. It's very helpful and makes excellent Wallpaper in all resolutions with a lot of options such as changing the size as well as other features such as dithering. See Ya. Steve Ginn Health-Net Systems, Inc. El Paso, Tx. e-mail: ...bbx.basis.com!hlthnt!root
rfutscher@pbs.org (12/22/90)
>I was playing with multiple sessions -- WordPerfect, Windows Paint, & >GWS shareware gif viewer. I tried to alt-esc while GWS was running >(displaying a .gif in 640x480x256), the screen went "funny" (wierd >colors, mostly), & I had to re-boot. Now, I get parity errors from my >disk, CHKDSK shows lots of bad first allocation thingys, & naturally >some programs & directories are not accessible anymore. > Crosstalk for windows trashed my disk! I downloaded a file from the VAX at work with a VAX file name. I think Crosstalk saved it with the 20 character VAX file name. After the first couple of blocks the disk LED was on almost constantly. After closing crosstalk windows reported that it could not read drive C:. I had so many crosslinked files that I had to restore my backup. I don't think windows does very much checking for valid file names. I called DCA and they said that they would check it out and call me back. I am still waiting. Robert Futscher rfutscher@pbs.org
bgeer@javelin.es.com (Bob Geer) (12/29/90)
root@hlthnt.UUCP (Steve Ginn) writes: >... >of this message and wanted add my two cents. As far as good Win 3.0 >GIF veiwers, I would recommend WINGIF which is a shareware program >available on most BBS or COMPUSERVE or GENIE. It's very helpful and >makes excellent Wallpaper in all resolutions with a lot of options such >as changing the size as well as other features such as dithering. I haven't seen this one come across the net, & don't have CServ or Genie acccounts...I was using an older version of GWS, but GRAFWK46.ZOO includes a .PIF & .ICO files...don't know if that implies it should work better with Win3 or not. My failure mode is more clear now...I ran CHKDSK /F within Win3, which is severely no-no'd somewhere in the back pages of the manual. I ran CHKDSK because I got the following messages on screen: Parity error but segment doesn't found Press any key to continue After recovery, this message occurred again...I deleted smartdrive & no such message since. I haven't found reference to this marginal English grammar message in the manual -- does MS hire a lot of foreigners? -- but it was alarming the first time I saw it. My hard disk is a Seagate 277R connected to a DTC 7287 16-bit RLL 1:1 interleave controller, which has some 820 or tracks formatted I think at 26 sectors per track. Next mystery: why didn't Win Setup find most of my applications? I mean, if they are going to look for me, why just find a few? Why didn't it find those that already had .PIF's? Why no published list of apps it looks for in the manual? Are programmers or accountants running the documentation standards there? (-: wry comment :-) So far, Win 3 has taken more of my time than using the command line without multitasking...hope it's worth it :-) . -- <> Bob `Bear' Geer <> bgeer%javelin@dsd.es.com...dsd.es.com!javelin!bgeer <> <> Alta-holic <> speaking only for myself, one of my many tricks <> <> Salt Lake City, <> "We must strive to be more than we are, Lal." <> <> Ootah <> -- Cmdr. Data, learning schmaltz <>
otto@tukki.jyu.fi (Otto J. Makela) (01/07/91)
In article <1990Dec29.042453.1762@javelin.es.com> bgeer@javelin.es.com (Bob Geer) writes:
[...]
My failure mode is more clear now...I ran CHKDSK /F within Win3, which
is severely no-no'd somewhere in the back pages of the manual. I ran
CHKDSK because I got the following messages on screen:
Parity error but segment doesn't found
Press any key to continue
After recovery, this message occurred again...I deleted smartdrive &
no such message since. I haven't found reference to this marginal
English grammar message in the manual -- does MS hire a lot of
foreigners? -- but it was alarming the first time I saw it.
[...]
(Tried mail, no luck)
The reason for the message being in such poor English is that it probably
was written by some Taiwanese programmer. "Parity error" type messages come
from your BIOS, so you shouldn't blame MicroS*t.
The fact that getting rid of smartdrive fixed the error suggests that your
memory problem is somewhere in the extended memory -> run a memory test for
memory >1024k.
--
/* * * Otto J. Makela <otto@jyu.fi> * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * */
/* Phone: +358 41 613 847, BBS: +358 41 211 562 (CCITT, Bell 24/12/300) */
/* Mail: Kauppakatu 1 B 18, SF-40100 Jyvaskyla, Finland, EUROPE */
/* * * Computers Rule 01001111 01001011 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * */jwi@cbnewsj.att.com (Jim Winer @ AT&T, Middletown, NJ) (01/09/91)
I am running on a DELL 200 (286) with Phoenix BIOS V3.10 A09 and CHIPS NEAT EMM 4.0 V1.42 and/or V2.01. Version 2.01 of the EMM won't work correctly unless you set all memory to expanded and none to extended. So, I did. I also set both RAMDRIVE and SMARTDRIVE to use expanded. I left HIMEM.SYS in and it quit with an error (no extended) during startup. Windows came up in real mode. I started Micrographix Designer 3.01. I got a message that there was not enough memory to initialize Designer. I tried to start it again, and it started and worked fine. Thereafter, disk was trashed. I am not sure why it happened, but that is the exact sequence that caused it. I am not about to try all expanded again or EMM 2.01. I am trying to get hold of both Chips and Phoenix as the problem is clearly in one of those places (DELL is not being helpful on this one.) By the way, I absolutely need expanded for WordPerfect and Ventrua. I apparently also absolutely need extended for Windows. Since I have 8 MB, I want to set 3 MB expanded and 4 MB extended -- that's where the EMM doesn't work right. Jim Winer -- jwi@mtfme.att.com -- Opinions not represent employer. ------------------------------------------------------------------ "No, no: the purpose of language is to cast spells on other people ..." Lisa S Chabot