I´m starting Click this week with an apology relating to the article that I published last week in which I mentioned an insurance quote I had received through Bartlett Davies Bicks and suggested that it was higher than I would have expected. This caused some upset and so I would like to point out that Bartlett Davies Bicks is an independent broker and the quotes they offer as with any other insurance company will vary from driver to driver. I didn´t intend to imply that they were uncompetitive in the market place as obviously this is not the case, rather that their quote just wasn´t suited for me personally.
Anyway, now that´s out the way, I´m going to repeat an article that I published some weeks ago as I´m still getting at least an e-mail a day with people asking me the same question and it´s my hope that this will alleviate the problem. The problem I´m talking about is involving a bug in Windows 2000 and XP that shuts down your computer when it´s connected to the Internet - Those afflicted will find that their computer will give them a message saying that it has to shut down and give you a short amount of time to save your work; usually around 30 seconds.
To rectify the problem we need to download a patch from Microsoft and your latest Anti-virus software updates but to do this we have to prevent the PC rebooting as soon as you go online and so the RPC restart function has to be disabled which is done as follows:
Before you go online click on `Start´, then run then and type: services.msc. When the Services window opens up, scroll down the list to the first Remote Procedure Call (RPC), right click on this and select `properties´ and then click the Recovery tab. You will see the drop-down menus labelled First failure, Second failure and Subsequent failures and these will be set to 'Restart' as default. Change each drop-down menu to 'Take No Action' then click Apply and OK. Close the Services window and now connect to the Internet.
We have to now download a Windows patch which will prevent infection from affecting your system which can be done by heading to microsoft.com and clicking the link for the `Blaster Worm´ on the main page; simply follow the instructions to download and install this patch and the vulnerability in the operating system that allows this nasty file in will be removed.
Now simply update your anti-virus software and do a complete system scan, removing any viruses that it finds; it is essential that you download the latest updates otherwise the software will not find it. If you don´t have an anti-virus scanner then download the fantastic AVG from grisoft.com />
That´s it; your PC is now clean and you sit back and relax, ignoring all the scare stories that you´re bound to hear about on the news over the coming weeks.
Computer Articles 2007
