Dr. Watson Assistance

Could well be rogue files. Have a look at this WWW Link

Thanks for the fast reply. I am no computer whizz, so I don't understand much of what they were discussing, but It sounded as if the chap in question had a program called "the fall guy"??? I didn't quite get that... can someone maybe explain it to me slowly... as If I am a n00b (which I obviously am)... do I need a program called Hijack this??

Oh and - it is happening whilst I write this post. Strangely it is all still working but at the mo I have 57 processes running - 20 of which will be dwwin/drwtsn32.

So... Thanks for the kind help and fast reply but I need a n00b explanation.

Will.

not a program - the normal expression as in "he's the fall guy" - the one that gets blamed

eplained if a later reply at the link Leo posted:



In the link above, MyWay Search was the problem - MyWay has a bad rep: WWW Link - notice all the links about it concerning spyware/removal




Hijack this is a useful program to find what's messing with you from where.
If you use it, get if from a reputable download place (download.com. Major Geeks, Trendmicro (they bought it)) and you'll probably want some help interpreting what it finds before you decide what(and how) to delete

Ok - So am i going to have to remove Dr Watson? I edited the registry once to turn it off, but then I couldnt open the registry because dr watson said no... so I had to do a system restore. Sometimes this event will not happen for a couple of days, then three or four times a day sometimes.. it seems to have no link whatsoever to what I am doing!

no - Dr Watson comes with the computer - Dr Watson is getting errors due to something else - it's the something else causing problems unless Dr Watson got broke/corrupted

if you have 'adminstrative tools' showing in your start panel, click it and choose event viewer - in the left side of that window you'll have choices: application, security, system, internet explorer

the Dr W errors should be in either application or system (i got no technical skills)

click application then scroll down the right side - look for errors - if you right click on an error line and choose properties it will give a more detailed explanation and a link - see if any mention Dr W

if not, try the same for system

HEY!!! OMFG - Was just doing a google search -found this guy with the same prob and this guy told him to do the exact thing you just told me! Cool. I just did it - put a restore point behind it though... of course. I just restarted and all seems well, although it can take a couple of minutes, hours or even days to start up.

Thankyou for your help so far guys - much appreciated.



Sorry - just noticed that you said just to look. I disabled "Error Reporting" - it i easy to get back on if needs be. When I did it in the registry straight to drwtsn, it mucked up and said I couldnt open anything... literally anything without a major error. That happened almost immediatley and this has had no immediate effect so far. This could be good... or bad.

Lets hope its the former!

hope it keeps working for you.



/don't say it Yrag...

WF07, I'm not sure that disabling 'Error Reporting' will help you. I am no expert but all that will do will - to my simple mind - is stop the errors from coming up on your screen and not solve the actual problem on your system. If Yrag is around later he might have some ideas.

I would certainly run both your anti-virus and anti-spyware programs too, to see if this picks something up. Sometimes it pays to run a couple of anti-spyware progs over your computer like Adaware and Spybot (BOTH FREE). I always use at least two anti-spyware progs as sometimes what one misses the other picks up. On the anti-virus side if you want to double check your anti-virus is doing its job you can also do a second scan using a good web scanner provided FREE by ESET LINK WWW Link. As far as Hijack This is conerned there are many forums around the web where people will help you interpret the results and recommend action if you copy and paste a copy of the log file it produces........  

ooops, didn't see under the quote - forget what I just said, Leo's right - disabling error reporting does just that = no messages -=- however 'no news is good news' is bunk in this case

the event viewer was to look for and find what's reporting errors

Ok - I am currently running Kaspersky, and I'm going to do a full system scan of it all today. I will probably run spybot as well, but I am almost certain that I don't have a virus. So far all errors have stopped and all seems well.

What exactly causes these errors to occur? Viruses? Spyware? Malware?

Or could it just be a corrupt file?

And thankyou for your help btw guys. Very helpful forum.

Oh CRAP! It just happened again... whilst I was doing the virus scan.... jesus - what am I going to do?

All kinds of things can cause errors....simply running a registry cleaner can do it if it cleans something it wasn't suppose to. But when all else fails and clean install will solve all your problems and it takes less time to do than this thread has.

Ok - Scan Complete - No Threats were detected. In a way quite annyoing - if I had found something I would have known that was the problem as I scanned it two weeks ago anyway.

Do you mean a clean install of windows? My dad has got all the computers in our house on a network, so three of us and wireless network also (mines not wireless) - my point is that I am the backup computer, it could take a few days at least. And anyway, my dad is no computer whizz. Also, I haven't told him of the problem yet, as I didn't think it was necessary and he might overreact.

Also - one question... If I do a registry cleanup and then do a system restore, does that restore ANY changes to the registry?

Put it this way, can this problem be easily solved?

Sorry to keep asking questions but could it be a memory overload? I only find it happens when I close one program and then open another (like closing a game(using a lot of CPU) to opening outlook)?? Could it be that one of my memory tab things has fallen out? A hardware issue?

Maybe worth running one of the better utility programs over your system to see if that corrects the problem e.g TuneUp Utilities 2007   

Actaully I think tune-up utilities did this! It was 2004 version though I think... I did a registry cleanup and then the next day this started to happen - I did a system restore but :NOTSURE: ....

2004?  :NOTSURE: Assuming your OS is either XP or Vista I would download the free 30 day 2007 evaluation from TuneUp and run that through the system. Three years is long time and the software developers may well have changed and fixed a few things   

When you did this did it give you the option to make a registry backup? If so....click on it and that might fix your problem.

Oh...and personally....I've found system restore to be useless. Best thing you can do is buy a backup program.

Same here, WG. Over the years I have needed to use System Restore about a half a dozen times and not once was it able to 'restore' my computer to a previous time.   

Yeah - 2004 had a trial too... I will see what I can do. It happened once last night - I tried just clicking "End Process" when about 80 popped up - it did the trick, at least I could then restart my computer properly without having to do it incorrectly.

I uninstalled TuneUp now, I may give 2007 a go to see what it can do... what do you think?

WF07........Yep, Give 2007 a go. Use most of the options in 'Clean Up and Repair' and 'Optimize and Improve' sections but under the later section I would stay away the last two - 'Acelerate dowloads and Internet Surfing' and 'Optimize your computer configuration'. One of those two messed with my internet connection and it took me a while to put it right. I would then give your hard drive a good defrag and again I would recommend using a good utility like Raxco's PerfectDisk. Again there is a full FREE 30 day trial available and it defrags your drive like no other other defragger that I know.......and I have tried many of them over the years. Both programs are well known and well liked by the tech community and are very 'user friendly' and when your trials up, if you don't want them just uninstall them. Let us know how you get on.   

Well....if your at the point now that your getting 80 pop ups....thats a lot....it would seem to me that something in your registry is borked...and all these "My program will fix anything" programs aren't going to really fix anything. At this point I would just do a fresh reinstall of windows and then once your done and before you do anything else I'd get a backup program...then you can just disable system restore...like Leo said...and I agree....its never restored anything.

I just bought this -> Acronis True Image Home 11.0 <- and it works great. It will copy your entire pc and if you screw up you can just reinstall everything in no time.

Well, I'm no way ganna re-install windows... my dad would have a fit. I will try the TuneUp 2007.

And I didn't mean 80 popups - I meant 80 Processes - sorry. I just did end process to all of them. Sometimes there aren't any popups, just the "loading" Cursor pops up, when I'm not doing anything and then I ctrl+alt+del and its got them going...

After looking at this: WWW Link - I wondered - could I not just re-install another similar de-bugging program, that does the job - but better?

What is your opinion?

OMFG! I just realised something on inspecting my add/remove programs I found an update for: Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1 then underneath in a sub column is something called Dr. Watson.. Which I installed from windows update on 9/12/07. two days later my problem arises.

Coincidence? I think not. Should I uninstall, contact microsoft, is this my fault then guys?

All I have done is downloaded an update from the Microsoft Update.

Please guys keep posting, even if it not helpful to you I may find it comforting.

Thanks.

Ok Guys - sorry for four reposts, but I think its sorted. It was a mess up with logitech webcam and kaspersky anti vir, which did it... Uninstalled webcam and got the newest evrsion of kaspersky, and I think i'm all sorted.

Thankyou for your kind help!