win98 (not se) won't shut down

[maggyf]

a few weeks ago something happened to my aptiva with windows 98 (not se version). when i try to shutdown (or reboot), the thing just goes into a black screen with a "dos-like" cursor in the upper left corner.

another thing that is happening is that on startup, i get a box with the title "InstallShield Self-extracting EXE" and the message: "this will install adobe acrobat reader 3.0. do you wish to continue? yes no". this box happens just after the startup antivirus scan finishes.

i don't know if these two things are related or not.

i was trying to remember what happened when this first started. i was having trouble with my printer (deskjet) and had to re-install the print driver and may have gotten the wrong one off the internet. but the printer works now.

this was also about the time my spouse was playing on the internet and couldn't tell me exactly the sequence of what happened when (shutdown not working or the installshield msg on bootup).

any help would be appreciated. thanks

 

[Tubot]

The shutdown problem may be related to your video driver, you could try re-installing or download new drivers. Also if you can find a copy you should try to do the Win98SE upgrade. For the Acrobat, have you checked to see if any thing related is in the Startup group? Or if you a able check the run key in the registry.

 

[Kento]

Click start--run--type msconfig--ok. Open the startup tab and see if you see any entry for adobe acrobat. If it's there uncheck it then click ok and restart and see if the error is gone. If there is no antry for it there click start--find files and search for wininit.ini. Right click on wininit.ini and click rename and rename it to wininit.old. Then see if the startup error is gone.

 

[JonathanB]

Lots to read here, but may help.

http://www.geocities.com/~budallen/tsshutdown.html

 

[dinosnake]

Also, if you have a virus scanner installed and 'scan drives on Windows exit' is selected that will commonly cause problems. This is a common setting in McAfee and Norton. Turn it off. Your mileage may vary...

 

[Arachkid]

Hello MaggyF:

It seems to me that you need to eliminate the Acrobat Reader glitch from this scenario to see if it is in any way related to the shutdown problem. I would go with what Kento suggested, but if that doesn't work or if you're not comfortable doing that, go to Add/Remove Programs and if Acrobat Reader is there, remove it. Version 3.0 is hardly current and you can always download a more recent version from the Adobe website. If Add/Remove Programs doesn't show Acrobat Reader or if the removal doesn't work, I would try reinstalling version 3.0 from wherever you obtained it originally, rebooting and then try Add/Remove Programs again to remove it.

You might also check out the folowing link:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?id=kb;en-us;Q202633

Good Luck

 

[MiklK]

I am betting you can't go into Standby either, is that right?
I have an Aptiva and had something similar a year ago - wound up using the Aptiva Product Recovery Disk to re install everything. Kind of an elephant-gun for a ouse approach, but i was frustrated! <smile>
Do you have the recovery disk? You can select to reinstall specific files, rather than everything, if you can figure where the problem is (or where it probably is)
If you're going to maintain current software, definitely get rid of that pesky Adobe intrusion, as Arachkid suggested. And personally, these days I am not inclined to shut off my anti-virus much, at least around e-mails...
Finally, even though your spouse may have been involved in the development of this problem, I would not suggest re-installing or writing over her ... (lol) Mikl
bigpygme@earthlink.net