Lost Video Island

[tjmack1986]

Hey guys. My laptop is acting all kinds of funky.

Whenever I get on youtube to watch videos, (if I'm in Firefox) it says my flash player crashed, (if I'm in IE) it says that my browser has stopped working....Also, on a side note...I honestly don't think it has anything to do with my flash player, because I can watch the embedded youtube videos on here without a problem. It just has a problem if I go to youtube itself.

If that problem wasn't bad enough, now I can't view any videos from my laptop. It only plays the audio (although most of my .AVI files will play...weirdly, in KMPlayer without problems) with no video at all (this is with WMP) In KMPlayer and Media Classic Player it'll play, but it skips so badly that it's unwatchable.

It also will not open WMM or my dvd burner at all. It says something about system requirements, and that my driver might need to be updated.

I contacted Acer, and they suggest I reinstall my Video Driver...I did, and still had the problem, to which they suggested that I do a complete system restore.

I would really rather not have to do this if at all possible. I have scoured the search engines coming up empty, but I know some of you guys are a lot better with search engines than I am. So I thought I'd ask on here, and see if you guys had any ideas (besides a restore) that could fix this.
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[littleton_pace]

Hmm. that's really frustrating Tammy! Do i virus search; you never know what virus's can impact. I just got rid of one yesterday that wouldn't open any of my applications (media player, Word, internet, etc), and I had to go into regedit and delete some rogue virus-y things that had installed; so it might be something like that. I downloaded something and the virus just came along for the ride :S

if you do a virus search and it finds something, google whatever the search finds and there should be methods on how to completely remove it from your comp. The fact that you can view vids in some places and not in others makes me think its a virus attacking certain programs.

In my experience, System Restore never helps when I have problems :S
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[tjmack1986]

I didn't even think about doing a virus search LOL! I just got rid of nasty little bugger of a virus off my brother's computer just last week.

Stupid question alert, but what's regedit?
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[littleton_pace]

regedit is a windows registry; its basically where the nuts and bolts of your programs are kept you can find it by just typing regedit in the search bar in the Start menu, but don't fiddle with stuff in there unless you're sure its a virus, cos it can muck up how programs run.
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[tjmack1986]

I did a quick scan with McAfee and it didn't find anything....but I'm going to do a scan with malwarebytes here in a bit and see if it'll find anything.
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[littleton_pace]

I've used Mcafee and I didn't care for it lol I use Avast, its free and it's been really good for me so far
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[tjmack1986]

I used to use AVG Free, but got a really bad virus that it didn't pick up, and this guy that I know that knows lots bout computers said to never use the free ones cause they don't update their virus logs as much as a paid for program.

I'm not a BIG fan of McAfee, but I found it real cheap on Amazon, for three computers, and I refuse to use Norton because it totally screwed up my friends computer, it totally started to delete things it wasn't supposed to. Her computer never ran right again after that.

I am thinking about purchasing Malwarebytes cause it's full of awesome LOL. but It's like 25 dollars per PC...and I don't really have the cash to buy it for both my computers.

I've actually had some peeps tell me that Windows Security Essential is actually really good to use, and it's free. I still have a good few months left on my McAfee LOL.

It's really stupid though, if McAfee misses a virus and you can't get rid of it on your own, they charge you like a hundred dollars to "take over your pc, and de-virus you computer" it's the most stupid thing I ever heard of. I'm like, I pay good money for your software, and then when IT misses a virus, your gonna charge me to get rid of it?
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[littleton_pace]

I got an awful virus from AVG as well :S:S Apparently a very common one with AVG, i've used Avast on my current computer, and my old one, and its really good; always notifies me of dodgy sites, detects threats right away so i can deal with them right away; but if you feel better with another program, i say use that, cos people have their own thoughts on each program Norton was too big and did too little for me; so i got rid of that real quick

i would say don't download any new virus software (even a trial) to deal with this problem now; because almost all of them will tell you that you have a virus to try and scare you into purchasing their product.

i've got a version of Windows Security as well; works great and is constantly updating, but it came with my computer.

Theoretically; a person with above average computer knowledge should be able to get rid of a virus on their own, if yuo know where to go and what to delete, unless its one of those evil ones that infects, spreads and shuts off your comp. if you can still get onto your computer, you should be able to deal with the problem yourself and not have to pay for someone to do what you could probably do yourself.

here's a link to avast, you can actually buy different versions of it that give you more freedom than the free version; but the free one works fine for me...
http://www.avast.com/free-antivirus-download
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[Brooke]

I don't like using hte free Anti Viruses because I've used some in the past that screwed me over.I believe "You get what you pay for".

The same happened to me using AVG Free; my computer crashed HARD. I try to keep update as much as I can with Anti Viruses. But I always buy mine. I use Norton because Norton has always been good to me. I know some hate it and some like it. I think it's all about perspective and taste.

But I love Malywarebytes. Picks up things others can't get.

I'd actually love to pay a hundred dollars. The two places here charge over 150 dollars.

Best Buy TOLD me I had a virus when I didn't. They saw I had a lot of music and assumed I had viruses. He told me I had over 30 viruses. If that was the case my computer wouldn't operate; Firefox was trying to download stuff on my computer every once and a while and when I removed Firefox and got a different internet source it stopped. I saw a news program were they tried to see who were the scammers and who weren't when it came to repairing computers.