Something weird happening on my pc.

...this is strange...

[giggle]

Hi

From time to time while working on my PC I'll come to a natural break and play a few games of Freecell (the free version distributed with WinXP). Over the years I've played around 12,000 games! Probably a waste of time but it helped break up the day (I work from home).

Last week Freecell disappeared! The icon was there but the link to the program wasn't. I ran a repair program (1CFP) and the icon disappeared as well. Not really a problem but it is strange.

Then yesterday, when I try to run various programs that I wrote in VisualBasic, a Logitech Webcam installer kicks off first. I cancel the installer and then the application runs normally.

Anyone got any idea what's happening?

Thanks

Mick

[bill]

You are using Windows XP right?

Under Add or Remove Programs window there is an icon for Add/Remove Windows Components. When you click that highlight/select the Accessories and Utilities line and click the Details... button. Then highlight/select the Games line and click the Details... button. From there you should be able to select the Freecell game and make it active again (along with any other games listed).

I'm not sure what is causing the webcam installer to start instead of your VB programs. Could you have associated a filetype used for the programs with the installer by mistake? (Check: How to change file associations in Windows XP [support.microsoft.com])

[edited by: bill at 12:23 am (utc) on May 10, 2006]

[kaled]

The icon was there but the link to the program wasn't. I ran a repair program (1CFP) and the icon disappeared as well.

The icon was where? Does the program Freecell.exe still exist.
Forget generic repair programs (if that's what it is). If you're lucky they won't make a bad situation worse.

The installer issue could be serious. If you haven't done so already, restart windows and see if is still occurs. If it does, test to see if it occurs with all VB programs or just yours. If it's all VB programs, it's probably a file association corruption that will need to be fixed manually. In any case, I strongly recommend that you locate the cause of this problem if only to rule out spyware as a possibility.

Kaled.

[dauction]

I think I know whats happening giggles ..

It appears your computers artificial intelligence is emerging and is telling you to stop playing games and get back to work

;)

[giggle]

Thanks for the replies guys. I followed Bills instructions to re-install Freecell, cheers.

The Installer issue is still a problem. I restarted Windows but no change. I've ran the MS Windows Defender but it didn't find any problems. It pops up at the strangest times. While working in a VisualBasic project, if I click to open up a form the installer kicks in again. I keep clicking until it closes down then the form opens up properly. If I double-click on my desktop to open up my (personal) FTP software the installer kicks in again.

[bill]

You may want to run a few other packages to check for spyware. Defender is good, but it's best to use a few different ones. Spybot - Search & Destroy and Ad-Aware are a couple of free ones that come to mind. Also try running HijackThis to see if it finds anything. If you can rule out spyware and you're sure that the file associations are not a problem then you may have to take more drastic action to fix this.

Make sure you have some good backups before you do any serious tinkering with your system.