Mystery Drive Q…
After a good deal of head scratching, we were able to fix this issue. In one instance, this problem was caused by the install of Office 2010, if this is what in fact led you to this article, you’re in for a good deal more head scratching, to the point of a bleeding scalp. Another issue we encountered with roots in our Office 2010 install, was that subsequent attempts to install programs, even unrelated programs, led failed installs. We were able to track this problem to multiple registry keys having permission errors. So in essence, this caused the registry keys to become unchangeable in the eyes of the “Trusted Installer Service”. In one case it even led to the reformatting of an entire system.
OK, now for you’re silver lining. The good news is, we did succeed in resolving a few of these issues. But relistically, if you have registry key permission errors, registry damage has been done. In which case a system restore may be your only hope. Having said that, any comments related your efforts with a similar repair would be greatly appreciated by all.
So lets get started. If in fact your issue is Office 2010 related, than the problem most likely relates to “Application Virtualization” which is a component of Office 2010. Specifically their tool to “Create a Portable Office 2010 Flash Drive”, which was used to create a portable 2010 usb drive on one of our machines.
In any case, our first suggestion would be to download and run Ccleaner. Run both the cache cleaner and the registry cleaner in “Ccleaner”. Normally we’re not big fans registry cleaners, but Ccleaners pretty tame and very user friendly. And always remember to set a restore point, as well as backup your registry.
Our first attempts at a repair were to delete the keys stored at
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HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Setup\MountedDevicesAs well as various other locations. But attempting to manually delete the related registry keys only remove the drive temporarily. After a system restart, the drives would reaper.
Next we installed “Application Virtualization”. The goal here was to try to overwrite bad registry keys, with ones from the installer. Once the programs installed we suggest that you restart your machine. After restarting the computer, remove the program using “Programs and Features”. Run Ccleaner again, registry and cache, restart, and let us know if this fixed it.
If that doesn’t work, another method we used was installing Daemon Tools. Again with the hopes of over writing bad registry keys. We used DAEMON Tools Lite. There was a point in time when the use of this program was a horrible idea, and was like computer suicide. But we’ll admit that their product has come a long way. The installer seemed to do a pretty fair job of cleaning up after itself, leaving very few stray registry keys, and program folders behind.
If all else fails there’s always the Microsofts Office Removal Tools. This should uninstall every trace of office from you’re system, and in most cases is a viable option. Sadly, in the case of the most damaged machine we serviced, the shear volume of locked registry keys forced us to reinstall the OS.
After Thought
In our dealings with this issue, we came across a few computers with the same mystery drive. Investigating these issues further revealed recent installs of a disc utilities. In one instance a recent failed removal of UltraISO caused the issue. Normally UltraISO is a fantastic product, we ourselves use it on a regular basis with no problems whatsoever. In more than one instance, this problem could have been avoided by the user simply uncheaking the option to install “UltraISO’s Drive Emulator”. But more often than not, users neglect to read through a product installers options. In fact, this is where users tend to install programs labeled as “Adware”. In the case of one machine, a user left the option to install “UltraISO’s Drive Emulator”. Normally this is a simple thing to disable through UltraISO’s options menu, as well as something that’s removed during an “Uninstall”. Unfortunately our clients machine became infected with a virus, and during our clients efforts at a self-repair, UltraISO became damaged to the point that registry entries were orphaned.
So basically, if your having this issue, review your program files to be sure something similar isn’t whats causing your headaches. A few programs we’ve seen cause similar problems are, Daemon Tools, UltraISO, MagicDisk/MagicISO, Alcohol 52%, Circle Virtual, to name a few. In most instances the aforementioned programs are extremely safe, and very reliable, and for the most part safe. But in rare instances, they have been known to cause system faults such as mystery drives, and CD/DVD drive faults.
As always, good luck in you repair efforts. We hope this info was helpful.
Disable Microsoft Software Wavetable Synthesizer, My Music’s Cutting Out…
We recently encountered a system that had an intermittent sound problem. After running for a few days, any music played would fade and recover repeatedly. After researching the problem, we started with a typical round of updates to the usual suspects. Those being sound card drivers, codec’s, any media player software being utilized for playback. At first this seemed to resolve the issue, but after just a few days, the problem returned.
Not only was this a problem with our media players, but it was also effecting streaming online music. Our current favorite online music service is Last.Fm. After Pandora’s recent decision to limit users free listening to 40 hrs a month.
So at this point we were able to eliminate our browsers and media players, as these were both up to date. The next thing to rule out was our hardware. This was simple enough as the hardware is a home theater system that’s utilized by other devices, all of which never have an issue. By process of elimination were left with drivers and media enhancement software’s.
As it turns out there’s an enhancement loaded by windows, our version being “Windows Vista Ultimate 64 Bit”. That particular enhancement goes by the name of “Microsoft Software Wavetable Synthesizer”. When opening your sound properties from the control panel, you’ll typically see 3 tabs across the top of the window. These are, Playback, Recording, and Sounds. You’ll more than likely be on the Sounds tab by default. If windows sounds drive you nuts, as they do us, this is a good opportunity to disable them. Simply choose “No Sounds” from the drop down on the sounds tab. In Vista you also have the option to load the startup sound separately.
Now select the “Playback” tab, and double click the upper device, usually called “Speakers”. If you’re not sure which device is your default playback device, play some music and look for the device with active levels. Double click that device and navigate to the “Advanced” tab. If selected, unselect both boxes under “Exclusive Mode”. Don’t be tempted to increase your sample rate on this tab. Typically the defaults are optimal, and increasing them could lead to an exaggeration of what we’re here to fix.
Keep in mind systems will vary in these areas depending on drivers, system setup, and so forth. So you’re settings may look slightly different. Next choose the “Enhancements” tab. Disable everything on this tab, if possible.
Now restart you computer, and the issue should be resolved. We mention earlier in the article that as part of our diagnosis, we updating system drivers and codec’s. In the long run, regular updates will lead to a much more positive computing experience, and will drastically reduce the number of errors you encounter. Let us know if this was helpful by leaving a reply below. Happy computing. 
Media Player Skips When My Browser Loads a Page..
I had this very same problem with my brand new Microsoft Vista X64 machine. At first I though it was the fact that I was using the newest version of Firefox. But after a bit of research we came to the conclusion that it wasn’t actually the browser causing the system lag, it was the audio codec. Most people are having this issue with Sigmatel HD Audio Codec. In my case it was Realtek HD Audio. Luckily for everyone reading this, the fix is quite simple.
Toshiba Satellite 1800 laptop, the display is blank but works when hooked up to an external monitor.
Here’s a question we recently received. My Toshiba Satellite 1800 laptop display is blank but it works when hooked up to an external monitor. There’s any number of things that could cause this issue. So we’ll try to cover everything we think would cause this issue.
1. The first question we’d ask is, was the operating system recently reinstalled? If so do you have the correct drivers installed for the system?
2. The second thing we would look at is the display itself. While the screen may be blank it can still be displaying an image. Take a flashlight and shine it at an angle to the screen. If you can see the “shadow” of your screen, and your mouse moving around, the problem is most likely a LCD backlight problem, or an LCD inverter problem. If the backlight went out suddenly, its typically the inverter. If the light faded over time, its typically the actual backlight. Seeing that an external monitor works, this is more than likely the answer to your problem.
3. If you can’t see a “shadow” of your display and you haven’t taken your computer apart, and you haven’t reinstalled your OS. Then it’s most likely not a display issue. The next step is to diagnose the video card. This is a little more in depth, but in most cases, if a video card is suspected to be the problem, it should simply be replaced. This doesn’t apply to all laptops. Most laptop motherboards use integrated video cards.
Hopefully this was helpful. If you have any follow up questions, please feel free to ask.
Today We Repaired An Averatec 3150 Laptop.…
The machine came to us in an inoperative state. We were also unable to get into the bios due to a lost password. We diagnosed the problem to a bad hard drive. Most laptop hard drives fail due to being dropped.
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