emachine crash?

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Computer

Crash

desktop

hard drive

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singerkat85 February 6, 2005 at 22:55:15 Pacific
Specs: Windows XP, a lot

My boyfriend got an eMachine desktop 6 months ago after his old computer died. I don't know the model.
Lately his computer has been running obnoxiously slow, and it didn't like to play media files; they were always skipping and sounded of overall bad quality.
He completely exponged his computer of any and all virus/trojan/spyware. After that he cleaned out every unnecessary thing in his memory. After doing that, it still ran slowly and wouldn't play media files right.
A couple days ago, he took out the hard drive of the computer and noticed a hardened plasticy yellow goo all over some of the wires and do dads inside it. (he knows more about computers than I do)
Did his hard drive crash? Does he need a new fan? What is wrong with the computer?

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Janos February 7, 2005 at 00:01:36 Pacific

It is very hard to tell from your descriptionas to what amy be wrong.,
Yellow goo ?? Wher in the case ?? On What components, is it on the mother board ?? etc
Otherwise little I can help you with at this point.
Regards
IF IT AINT BROKE, DONT FIX IT

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Ed in Texas. February 7, 2005 at 01:02:47 Pacific

Angela, "yellow goo" sounds like a good scientific description to me! SWAG, If the goo appears at connections, it may be nothing more than some sort of anti-oxidant protection. If, on the other hand, it seems to be some sort of resin oozing out of components, seems likely to me that things have suffered from overheating and there may be a fan dying somewhere.
HTH
Ed in Texas.

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Mechanix2Go February 7, 2005 at 01:28:22 Pacific

Hi Angela,
As in earlier replies, depends on the goo.
Many components are coated with a "varnish like" material to protect against oxidation, mold etc.
If only one component looks suspect, you might swap a known-to-be-good one into it's place.
But before going through all that, I would do a clean install of the OS and programs.
The theory is that there may still be problems caused by the malware/virus.
HTH
M2

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cyrixtanasi March 2, 2005 at 11:14:06 Pacific

I am HIGHLY experienced with eMacs due to working for a support company that handles 100% of eMac support calls and my line is eMac dedicated line.
I know what I'm on about.
Follow these steps before swapping anything or restoring system.
from the desktop click Start>>Run>> type "msconfig" and hit enter
System dialogue will appear.
At the top of the dialogue there will be a tab saying "startup" click this/
New information has appeared in the box. On this box there should be no more than around 10 startup items.
If you like, once you have opened this, you can email me directly and I can advise exactly which ones to disable during startup.
This should massively reduce the cpu usage as spyware/adware may still be starting up with windows even AFTER removing with any tools.
I can't see the computer needing new fans or HDD's or anything major like that.
Also if you have the system recovery CD/s that came with your eMac you can do a full recovery and that should solve the problem.
Please don't hesitate to contact me on the above address for more advice.