Do I need to format? (AGAIN?)

[Gizmo]

I dowloaded and installed Paint Shop Pro 8, restarted and got an error message saying something about an installer file not being found. I clicked OK and nothing happened. I then hit Ctrl+Alt+Del and is BSOD'ed on me, saying "System is Busy". I then restarted and everything went fine before I decided I wanted to uninstall and get shot of Paint Shop Pro 8, so I did that, no problem. What about the "System is busy" BSOD though? Do I need to format?

[Gizmo]

Anyone??

[needhelp]

Why dont you do a restore

[Gizmo]

I just tried doing that. All system restore checkpoints didn't work. Any other ideas?

[GaryRouth]

If you're no longer getting errors, you might be fine. Sounds like the installation script was looking either for the Windows installer or perhaps it's own third-party installer, & couldn't find them where it expected them (the System Is Busy was probably its background process searching for the file - you can get that message when a Cd-drive is having troubles reading, too). . .

Some installation routines work better than others. When they rely on a newer version of the Windows Installer, they usually prompt for it (versions are available at the MS download sites)

Are you getting any other errors or malfunctions?
. . . Gary

[Gizmo]

Thanks Gary. And nope, not that I recall. I do remember I was playing a video in WMP and it got choppy a coupla times, refreshed it, played it again, same thing happened.

I do remember the system freezing on start up, I restarted and everything ran fine. Sometimes the system hangs on shutdown but I'm guessing that's cos of spyware. Thanks very much though.

[Gizmo]

Ok, I was just cruising along, like normal, surfing and everything else, and I clicked on a banner while I was in a chatroom. I tried clicking out of the web browser window that popped up after I clicked on the banner, which worked and then it BSOD'ed on me. This time a file name SYMEvent had caused the error. SYMEvent is my symantec live update system. Why would that be causing any errors?

[GaryRouth]

Might as well do a run of AdAware (http://www.lavasoft.de) or Search&Destroy (http://spybot.safer-networking.de) to double-check the spyware angle.

If your Norton version has a repair option (for reinstalling), you might try that too, and then run Live Update right away. Some pests are getting pretty good at wrecking the well-known antivirus programs. If the Norton is out-of-date, & money matters, you can try using a Norton removal tool from their website & giving a free scanner a try (AVG wouldn't task an older system much http://www.grisoft.com)

Are the BSOD's all of the same type? - any "general protection" or "page fault" errors?
. . . Gary

[oh - one more thing - if it's been awhile since you've visited Windows Update, head over there & let it get you some new file versions & patches. Running a repair install of IE can't hurt, either, if you've had unwanted guests rummaging about in the files (& empty your temp files first)]