I had another chance to repair a Windows XP computer for a family member.  First thought: “why aren’t they using Macs, darn it.”  Second thought: “at least I’m not washing dishes”.

It’s odd that I’ve been labeled a “Windows repair guy” since I’m really a Mac guy.  I have never owned a Windows machine.  I have owned Apple computers exclusively for the last 26 years.  I learned to use the Windows OS on the job, where this crap is the norm.

When Windows-using relatives inevitably started having trouble, I just took my best shot.  Unfortunately I was having enough success to get a good reputation.

Maybe, in the name of progress, I should act like their machines are hopelessly broken, and offer to join them on a trip to the Apple Store.  Well, not this time.  May as well get going so maybe I’ll have some sense of accomplishment tonight.

This time the symptoms were more extreme than the usual “my computer is running slow” issue.  This time, when the user clicked any EXE file, the system would, instead of trying to load the file, load AOL and try to have AOL open the EXE.  That’s not right at all.  Is this what happens when the registry is corrupted?

Then a program named shellmon.exe would start and take up 100% CPU, effectively freezing the computer.

What is shellmon.exe?  Google search results suggested that shellmon.exe is associated with later AOL installations.

Control-alt-delete to the rescue.  End shellmon.exe process.  CPU goes back to normal.

But don’t touch any apps.  EXE’s are all mis-loading.  The command prompt couldn’t be loaded.  Notepad couldn’t be loaded. No exe would do anything besides load AOL, which in turn loaded the CPU-maxing shellmon.  The scene was looking like a total reinstall, lost cause.

What started all this?  “I was just going about my normal business, and suddenly nothing worked anymore.  One time the computer told me that the index file was corrupt.”

I’m not sure what the “index” is.  Maybe it was the registry complaining?

I’m guessing a virus overwrote a couple system files.

It was time to save what I could from “My Documents”, and reinstall Windows XP.

Apple Time Capsule came in handy.  It has a Samba server, so a Windows machine can connect to it.  The Windows machine’s wireless adapter was completely unresponsive, so I just connected an ethernet cord between the Windows machine and the Time Capsule.

Fortunately AOL lets you do everything from www.aol.com now.  AOL users who have a different ISP don’t have to load AOL software.

AOL software complicates “normal” Windows troubleshooting, at least for me.  It likes to overtake the machine.  It has it’s own way of handling network and “security” issues.

AOL has a hopeless situation on their hands.  They have no power users.  Their customer support would be my worst nightmare.  The customers just get to blame AOL, regardless of whether it’s their fault.  AOL jumped on the train wreck that is a virus plagued Microsoft and Dell, and is expected to fix it all.  Poor AOL.

Anyway, this user just needs email and games.  So I suggested not reinstalling AOL.  Just learn to use AOL’s web-only interface.  So I reinstalled Windows, went through all the system updates, loaded Firefox, then had him practice using the web interface.

The wireless adapter driver was tricky.  I tried to add it in the “Add hardware” control panel, but it never even saw the hardware.  I loaded the latest drivers for it but no response from the adapter.  Maybe it was a bad PCI slot.  I shut down the system, unplugged the adapter card and tried a different slot.  I tried 2 different ones before Windows finally said “you’ve got new hardware”, and I was able to navigate to the newly installed INF file.  So once that was done, the adapter software interface came up, and I could see the local wireless networks.  Yay.  I unplugged the ethernet cable and considered the job done.

Another satisfied customer/relative.

And just as I’m wrapping this up, I get ANOTHER relative calling about AOL and Windows issues.  Seriously, people.  I need to start charging.