Harry,

I believe that everyone knows by now that if they do not have at least two copies of all your books, they will live a dank, dark, dusty, disgustingly dismal life. For those that do have all the Lorayne works and have studied them, could you please name a couple of other titles that you feel are on the must have list, by other authors?

Randy: All lyour stuff, of course. What a silly question. HARRY.

Hey Randi: I have a computer question. I'd start a new topic for it, but I don't know how to do that. Can you tell me how? The question I have is this: The last two nights I've had trouble shutting down my computer. I have Windows XP. What's happened is: I click Start, then "Turn off computer." It starts to do what it's always done - "Windows is logging off."
Then, it comes to "Windows is shutting down" and it justs stays like that! It doesn't shut down. And, the screen is full, no "Start" or anything.
I called Earthlink. They had me unplug the power to the computer, wait a few minutes, then plug it in. What happened is that the computer started up, as it usually does. Then I did the "close down" and it worked as usual.
The next night, same thing. had to unplug. What is happening? Will I now always have to unplug the computer in order to shut it down? HELP! HARRY.

Konbanwa Lorayne-san,

Please click "Post New Topic" near top of the menu page, and you can start a new topic.

You don't need to unplug, but keep pushing switch for several seconds and the computer will shut down.
Only thing you can do for this trouble would be re-loading Windows or to pray.

Hideo Kato

Hideo: Keep pushing WHICH switch? HARRY.

Harry, it's computer's main switch.

Hideo Kato

H.L.What's happened is: I click Start, then "Turn off computer."

Hi Harry,

Well, I see you are already a "new topic" expert-- with your traditional learning curve of .00073 seconds!

I'm no computer guru, so my answer is vague. The lastest updates / bug fixes from Microsoft may help, and there are a few "utility" programs such as "Fix-It Utilities" that can help keep your PC up and running.

I'll confess to not understanding the user interface, and hitting "start" when you want to stop. Something like hitting the accelerator pedal to slow down and avoid hitting that truck that is hurtling towards you? Just not exactly "intuitive" to me.

I'm glad they made "Windows" easy, though. One of the first books I picked up on Windows was some 1423 pages long on how "easy" it is to get the most out of it.

Mr. Lorayne:

Computers ruined my life. Of course, they also paid for the roof garden apartment on Roosevelt Island when I was editor-in-chief of an international computer magazine and living in NYC several years ago.

Too bad I don't still live in the city. I could swing by and probably resolve this one for you in 20-30 minutes. However, I moved to LA-LA Land.

As Hideo suggested, if you push and hold your power button IN, the computer may power down without unplugging it. Don't release the button until the unit powers down. However, this shouldn't take more than 30 seconds or so. (This doesn't solve your problem but it may get the power off without unplugging.)

As Randy suggests, Microsoft updates may also help. To get those, click on your Start button (lower left of the screen), and hold your mouse cursor over "All Programs." A submenu should open. Toward the top of that submenu, you should see "Windows Update." Click on that and it will open a web page to the Windows update site.

On that web page, click "Scan for updates." Give the page time to crunch a bit of data and, when available on a new page, click "Review and install updates." On the next page that appears, click "Install Now."

The "critical updates" are the ones that are likely to be pertinent in this case.

If this doesn't resolve the problem, I suspect that a program has gotten loaded on your computer that won't close when you request a shutdown.

As Jonathan notes in the other My Computer thread, you may have a Spyware problem. The software on this page could help:

http://www.lavasoftusa.com/software/adaware/

Finally, I hate to send you to Nerd Purgatory but you might peruse this (admittedly propellerhead-oriented) page for some help:

http://aumha.org/win5/a/shtdwnxp.php

Good Luck,
Bob Lindstrom

PS -- If you want to take this offline you can email me at: boblinds@verizon.net

PPS -- Love the books. I have so much Lorayne material on my bookshelf now I'll have to live another 50 years to get through it all.

Hi Bob: I sure wish you WERE here in New York City. But - I've been doing, trying, the Windows Update thing most of the day today. Perhaps I've getting there. It took me hours to get the computer to tell me that I'd successfully completed the Service Pack 1 Setup Wizard. Now I'm in the throes of "installing" the other updates. The problem is that the "Downloading" happens almost instantly. But then the "install progress" is a "forever" thing! I'm doing it right now. First the long horizontal "install progress" bar remained empty for a long time. Finally, after, I don't know, 20 minutes, I saw nine blue markers in that bar. It's been 20 or so minutes, and last time I looked there were 14 blue markers. Does that mean I'm making progress? And, yes, I did disable my Norton Anti-virus.
C'mon. It's gotta be faster to get through my material than it is for me to get these d--- updates installed! Regards, HARRY.

Very, very funny.

The problem is that you're used to dealing with magic. The difference between magic and computers is that magic WORKS!

Sadly, you're just experiencing life as we know it. Those Windows Updates CAN take an extraordinarily (sometimes PAINFULLY) long time to install (which does seem inconsistent with the fast download times for a DSL or cable modem.) On my wife's computer, I often assume that the system has locked up, only to discover that it is still silently cranking away.

I've finally decided that this is actually Microsoft's way of giving us all time to perfect a one-handed faro shuffle (or, in my case, to rehearse a loud and colorful litany of creative profanity.)

I'm sending whatever positive psychic energies that I can from the vibe-happy environs of Hollywood to your Big Apple computer.

Best,
Bob

Thanks, Bob: It finally did all the updating. But, I'm still having trouble having the computer shut off as it should. And - it's taking much, much, longer to a) get into the interntet b) get into the Magic Café and c) get to my area. Everything is taking longer. I don't get it. HARRY.

Harry, getting into the Café may not be from anything on your end. The Café server has been running extremely slow tonight. It took me almost 20 minutes to get in. It does that sometimes when the volume of people on line is high. The server is not ours exclusively so it's just plain getting overloaded.

Dave: Perhaps you can help with this little problem. I went through all the topics to find posts I haven't yet answered. Marked them down. But, when I started to try to go to them in order to answer them, I COULDN'T FIND THEM. Found some, but many I could not. Que pasa? How do I find them. A couple of them were fairly new. I just don't know how to find things that I want to answer - quickly. Can you help? HARRY.

Harry, I just spoke to Bill Gates.
He said you show him a trick and he'll show you one.
Sounds fair on the surface, but between you and me you are already experiencing the best trick he has to offer. I'd throw in an 'lol', but I know its not that funny.

Do yourself a favor - Unless you are planning yet another career (believe me troubleshooting Windoze is a career), live with unplugging it, or have someone fix it for ya.

That advice was in thanks for every word you've written this week.

Dave: I just saw how to find the missing topics. I feel a bit silly! HARRY.

Arrrgghhhh. The only thing more frustrating to me than having computer problems is knowing someone with computer problems that I can't get to and fix. Sigh.

Dave is right in saying that The Magic Café has been sluggish today. However, you still might want to have a look at the two sites I posted above:

Download and run the spyware cleaning program at http://www.lavasoftusa.com/software/adaware/

And browse the semi-incomprehensible techno-prose at

http://aumha.org/win5/a/shtdwnxp.php

On the upside, after you've struggled through those technical "explanations," you should feel a deep sense of personal pride at how badly they are written compared to the elegant descriptions of no-less-complicated sleights and moves that you've been detailing for us over the past 40 years.

I tip my hat to you not only for the remarkable body of work you've produced, but also for the zest and dedication you've applied to your guest activities this week.

With sincere respect,
Bob

PS -- And if things get ugly -- before you toss the PC in front of a passing cab -- you've got my email.

So how come I can no longer log onto secure sites?

Harry
My PC (Personal Confuser) does the same thing and I repair them as part of my job! I'll try the spyware thing, but I think reloading Windows should repair the problem. (last resort)

Mr. Biro:

First, check to make sure you're using the latest version of your browser software (particularly if you're using Internet Explorer.)

Verify that the time and date are correct on your computer, sometimes that can impact this.

It's also possible that your security setting in your browser has become restrictive or your cookie setting has become too limiting. If you're using Internet Explorer, you can check those under Tools/Internet Options/Security. Also look at Tools/Internet Options/Advanced (scroll down to the security entries.)

Also you might go to Help/About Internet Explorer and verify that your Cipher Strength is 128-bit. If not, you should upgrade.

Finally, there's a couple nerd pages for this that may or may not help:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=813444

http://www.mvps.org/inetexplorer/answers2.htm#secure_sites

As a last resort, sound an air horn that I can hear from Westwood and I'll hop in the car and head over.

Best,
Bob

Bob: I too wish you were here. Sooner or later I'm assuming the problem will be solved. I haven't yet tried to go into Tools, Internet Options, Delete Files. I will sometime today.
Through the years so many have suggested that I write all the manuals that come with appliances, etc. They're all usually terribly written. The bit of hair I have left stands on end as I read, and say, "WHAT?!"
Thanks for the kind words. It's appreciated. HARRY.