Tech Arsenal 1/Tech Arsenal (Arsenal Computer).ISO/tek-19/nu7_prob.zip/NU7_PROB.TXT

Text File | 1993-04-28 | 18KB | 372 lines

                If  you  are  using  AutoCAD rel. 12 and have the
        new  Norton Utilities  ver. 7.0  you're about to find out
        that  Smartcan does  NOT  work  with it !  After "holding"
        for eternity at  Symantec I  finally got a Tech to inform
        me that the way to fix the problem was to edit the Acad12
        batch file, turning smartcan off when I start Acad & then
        back on when I exit !
                There are also numerous  messages on the Symantec
        BBS of "divide overflow"  problems using the new smartcan.
                I've found this problem to exist with the version
        that's being shipped with  Norton Desktop for Windows 2.2
        as well.
                However,  if you still have a copy of the version
        that came with NDW 2.0 it DOES work !

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Messages on the Symantec BBS: =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Maybe someone can help me out with this one.  My Erase Protect is set
for 2 Days and if I look at the contents of the SMARTCAN directory I can
clearly see that there are several files in there all dated within the
past few days ... makes sense so far.  However, when I use the EP
program to Purge these files it tells me that there are 0 files that can
be purged.  The drive is correct and everything else seems to be
correct.  Any answers or advice ???
Thanks...  TJB

/norton #79618 07-APR-93 15:11  (Reply to #78532)
From: Nortontec
  To: Teejaybee
  Re: ERASE PROTECT PROBLEM

TJB,
Try going into Smartcan and see if you can purge the files.  If not,
try running NDD on the drive in questoin to make sure that there are
no errors.  Let me know how it goes.
-mark

TJB,
Try going into Smartcan and see if you can purge the files.  If not,
try running NDD on the drive in questoin to make sure that there are
no errors.  Let me know how it goes.
-mark


The Batch Enhancer (BE) functions differently from version 6.02. Before
I had access to "BE RowCol 23 0", for example. Now I must edit all of
the lines in batch files to "BE RowCol 23 1". This is unfortunate!
This syntax, 'Be Ask "", <No key list>' allowed the user to press a key
in order to continue processing the batch file. Now, the user (ver 7.0)
must press <Esc>. Why? How are these decisions made?
Does anybody have problems running NCache2 and Windows 3.1 enhanced
mode? NCache and Windows 3.1 enhanced worked together? What is the tip
here?
SmartCan /Status reports different SmartCan capacity than does Norton
Commander or the [Purge] option within SmartCan. In addition, after
installing NU 7.0 each of the SmartCans (on three logical drives) contain
64 MB of saved files, which was impossible.
Where is NStart and NExit for NDos.Com? Install did not create them.
Someone point me to the page in the 181 page NDOS documentation where
the creation of these files is discussed?
How can I define EscapeChar= in NDos.Ini to function as does
Command.Com?

  * There is a file attached to this message but the *
  * SIG-Op has not yet approved it for downloading.  *


I ran into the identical problem on my clone 386/25mhz with a Phoenix
bios of about the same vintage. If you look in the READ.ME file that
comes with the Norton 7.0 upgrade, you will see it has a section titled
Nep NDIAGS Switches.  Look at a switch called /NOKBTYPE. The explanation
describes our problem and the switch is the solution.

I'm not entirely pleased with NU 7.0.  Some of these problems are
repeats of other peoples, but I'll post them anyway.

All these problems are in light of the fact that I've tried other
configurations.  TSR's, No TSR's, Clean boot, Boot from floppy, etc.

My equipment is a Gateway 2000 386/25.  Micronics Motherboard, ATO VGA
Wonder video, Phoenix BIOS, Ultrastor ESDI disk controller.

Speedisk.  I love this program, but it seems to be very unpredictable in
version 7.0.  I have has transient problems before, when it would claim
a verify error.  I'd run NDD and find no error.  Running Speedisk again,
it picks up where it left off with no problem.  *Except* this time.  Now
I've got DOS 6.0 and a Doublespace compressed drive.  Speedisk stopped
with a verify error, telling me to run Calibrate to fix it.  I exited
the program, and ran CHKDSK /F.  CHKDSK reported no errors.  I changed
to the root directory (I was several directories deep) and the whole
system went kablooie.  The entire directory tree I had been in was wiped
out, along with several others.  Microsoft could be wholly or partly
responsible, since Doublespace is their product.  But wasn't Norton 7.0
thouroughly tested with the beta DOS 6.0?  All in all, I still don't
trust disk compression of any sort.  But now I don't trust Speedisk
either.  Could this problem (and the former transient problems) be
related in any way to the ESDI drive?  It's onboard cache?

NDIAGS.  I run it; the system instantly reboots.  This reminds me of a
few program I wrote in a C class.  They weren't supposed to reboot the
computer, but they did.

NDOS.  I had the same run-in with the NStartPath item.  It didn't matter
much to me, since it automatically uses the nstart.btm in the c:\nu
directory.  NDOS itself does seem a little slow though.  Slower than
version 6.0 at least.  Listing a directory gives a maddening little
pause.  Could it be that I'm spoiled when it comes to speed and my older
system is falling behind the newer software?

I still believe in Norton Utilities regardless of the bugs.  I'm a
creature that craves stability though (as much as a computer user can
be) so the little bugs are annoying.  Looking at the loopback plugs I
bought with NU 7.0 is annoying to since the program that uses them sends
the CPU into the twilight zone.

I was impressed with receiving a free copy of NU 6.01 in the mail after
NU 6.0 had a few problems.  I hope you haven't changed that policy.  I
also hope you can test the bugfixes on Gateway equipment.  I guess you
would though since they are a big company.  Geez, wouldn't it all be
much easier if equipment makers tried harder to find standards and
compatability?

Well, thanks for listening (reading...).

BTW, NCD also seems slower, along with any program that accesses
directories.  Is this Doublespace slowing things down again?  On the
fly, background, unnoticable compression.  Unnoticable?  *I* notice it.

Dnison Penndragon

Sysop,
I have installed the new Norton Utilities on my machine and although
there are a lot of new NICE things, the upgrade is not smooth.
1) BE ROWCOL is picky-picky-picky.  I have a batch file that uses a
combination of @EVAL and %@ROWS to determine the middle point of my
screen since I switch between 80 column and 132 column.  Well when I
tried to pass a value of RowCol 11.5, 13 I got an out of range message.
Since there is now way to do an @ROUND() in NDOS....what do I do????
2) Help now calls up the DOS help system, not NDOSHELP.....
This is all I have come up with so far.....but if this keeps up you will
be hearing from me again soon......I will try to log back in next week
and see if you have a reply for this message
Richard E. May
DMR State of Connecticut

I need some help. Have loaded Norton Utilities 7.0 on my Dell 466DE.
During the initial loading all went well except for a missing clusters
message. (The first loading was preceded by a Norton Speedisk
application). I allowed the Utilities to correct the missing clusters
and took all default suggestions. All aspects of the Utiliies seem to
work except NDIAGS and SYSINFO will not run. The programs start to load
then thew screen blanks and I have to reboot. Have tried completely
reloading the programs and even reloaded the original autoexec and
configs. No sucess. A response on Compuserve suggested tring
SYSINFO/Port which run- except the printer stopped and the screen frooze
when it got to win.ini. Rebooting and starting at that screen got me to
the end on SYSINFO. However, the Compuserve suggestion to try
NDIAGS/NOKBTYPE was not sucessful, althogh I did get to a new screen
which said something to the effect "Checking System Contents" before it
locked up.
Can you give me some ideas as to what to do next? Also what do I do
about the "lost clusters" (I erased the diskette a day or two before I
discoved all the programs under 7.0 wwere not working) When you respond,
please bear in mind I am a novice, so I will need rather elementary
steps. Sorry for the situation, but i would really appreciate any help!!
Thanks

I have a 386 with 4 M RAM and math coprocessor.  When Smartcan is
enabled, I get "Divide overflow" errors with several programs, such as
WordPerfect 5.1. This does not happen when Smartcan is disabled, but
then my files aren't saved! Any ideas?

After having NU 7.0 up for about a week I started to have divide
overflow problems when using my "Automenu" program. Whenever a menu
selection was executed a DOS msg 'divide overflow and bad command or
filename' would appear and I was left at a Dos prompt. This was a solid
failure not just intermittant. After some trouble shooting time I "rem"
out the Smartcan line in my autoexec and all was ok...I reinstalled
Smartcan and so far so good...I noticed in msg-80913, that someone else
had a similar problem with Smartcan. I am running a AMD 386/40 with 256
on board cache, DOS 5.02, 8mb memory and Qemm386 6.02...Any Ideas?
Howie...908-457-2948


I've just installed version 7 of NU to replace version 5.
First of all, the smartcan provided has a problem that is also in the
smartcan that came with NDW 2.0: when loading smartcan high (using QEMM
6.02), there is a message about "cannot load high, not enough room".
However, smartcan does indeed appear to load high, so what's going on?
Second, the "be sa" provided with version 7 seems to have taken a step
backwards from version 5 in that it clears the screen rather than just
changing the colors. This appears to be bug since the documentation says
that there is a /cls switch if I want the screen cleared.  I have a
number of batch files which depend on changing the colors without
clearing the screen.  Is there a fix?


Does anyone have a solution to stop smartcan from saving lotus 123 and
wordperfect swap files.  if so, please reply.


If you can find out what the file extensions on the swap files are, you
can have Smartcan specifically ignore them. I did this with a plotting
program that creates zillions of vector files.


I guess I U/L'd my message to the wrong area yesterday (4/22)... I'm
using a Tri_Star 486 with local bus on both the video (ATI), and the
SCSI drive (UltraStor & Maxtor)....  Smartcan from NU7.0 causes ACAD12
to error out with different "unable to create..." messages.  If I revert
to using the SmartCan from NDW 2.0 everything's fine (which is what I'm
presently doing)......


I recently purchased Norton Utilities Version 7 for two of my machines:
(1) a Gateway 386DX/25 that had been running Version 5; and (2) a
Taiwanese
clone notebook 486DX/33 that had been running 6.01.  On both machines, I
have experienced the following problem with various routines (NCC,
SMARTCAN, FILEFIND,...): when exiting one, I get a "Divide Overflow"
message and the system says it can't find COMMAND.COM (yes, the
directory that COMMAND.COM is in is in the PATH, as well as NORTON).
I must re-boot at this point.  The problem is more than annoying... it's
baffling.  Please offer me some guidance.  I have re-installed older
versions on both machines.  My name is Harlan Hurwitz (my ID is
Hurwitz);
I can be reached during the day at [phone].  You can fax me
at [phone].  You could also leave me a message on this board.
Thanks.


Make sure that your shell line contains a reference to the directory
that contains command.com. It should look like:
 SHELL = C:\DOS\COMMAND.COM C:\DOS /E:256 /P
Yours may not look identical, the crucial part is the "C:\DOS". This
should reference where command.com is stored. I have found it just as
easy to keep command.com in the root directory. Norton utilities and
stacker among others look for the program and in the case of stacker
will put it back if you remove it.


If you can find out what the file extensions on the swap files are, you
can have Smartcan specifically ignore them. I did this with a plotting
program that creates zillions of vector files.


When I attempt to run ndiags either from the command line or
"norton" program, the machine just immediately reboots. I have a
Micronics 486/25 motherboard with 16Mb RAM. I'm using QEMM-386
with several TSR's loaded.
I hope that I can get this running since this feature was one of the
main reasons I upgraded right away.


i have the same reboot problem with ndiags with a compuadd 286-12, with
an intel above-board with 2 megs of ems, (reboots w/ & w/o the mem
enabled) and a just purchased AMI bios and a 287 co-pro.
Let me know if you find anything out!
Dave Ferguson


Meee tooo - gateway 486/25 with 16; don't look to TSR conflicts though;
the problem is TSR independent. I'm still wondering in my amateur way
about the aged phoenix bios.


From several other messages on this board concerning the same problem,
the sysop suggests using the /nokbtype switch on the ndiag command line.
Hope this helps.


Try running the NDIAGS program with the /NOKBTYPE switch. I have the
same problem in an older machine (386/25mhz with phoenix bios) and the
New NDIAGS Switches section in the READ.ME file describes this solution.


I installed Norton Utilities 7.0 today and found problems with NDIAGS and
SYSINFO. When I ran the two utilities, the screen turned blank and the system
locked up. I re-booted the systemfrom floppy (remove all TSRs) but still have
the same problems. I used NU6.01 before and never had any problems. Please
advise!


This is a good example of why I always wait for  x.01 releases of
software products.  Most x.00 releases are really Beta versions where the
customers are the final Beta-testers.  I will wait for them to get the
bugs out!


                                                   April 15, 1993

The  new  motto at Symantec must be "The end user  is  the  final
tester."

You must have had a small, undemanding QC and beta test crew.  Or
a deadline that was set without enough regard for a quality  pro-
duct.   My Norton Utilities ver 7 arrived yesterday and  I  found
several problem areas:

1  Install.  Nothing on the 3.5 inch "Install" diskette said what
   to  type to start the install.  Later, when "disk 2"  was  re-
   quested,  I  guessed the "Utilities" diskette  was  number  2.
   Wrong guess.  Install told me that I had disk 3 and to  please
   put  in disk 2. I tried the "Emergency..." diskette,  all  was
   well.  THE DISKS SHOULD HAVE BEEN LABELED 1, 2, 3.

   I   upgraded   from   NU  ver  6.    In   CONFIG.SYS   I   had
   "shell=c:\ndos.com /a:2000..."  When done, install ignored  my
   2000 and directed NDOS to a NDOS.INI file with Alias=1024.

2  Speedisk.  "Defragment only" option is MUCH slower than ver 6.
   Version  6  took only 43 seconds  to defrag my C  drive  after
   version  7 had taken 4 minutes and 6 seconds.  (V7 times  were
   all  CPU  crunch -- the disk select LED was  off.)   This  was
   after  defrag  only  had been run several times  -  each  time
   reporting that 2 files were still fragmented.  (33Mhz 486, 16M
   RAM,  340M 1st partition on 1.2Gig Maxtor P0,  Always  non-DMA
   SCSI host adaptor, dos5, NDOS, QEMM ver 6.01.)

   It appears that the new method of moving files to the very end
   of the disk and not knowing how to defrag them after they  are
   there  is at least part of the problem.  But why so *#$%  much
   time?  High level language?

   Feature request: Even "defrag only" should consider the entire
   directory tree as a file and move it to the front of the  disk
   by default.  I would never override this default, but  someone
   might want the ability.

3  Diskedit.  Only comment here concerns new (I think it is  new)
   file  name  and cluster highlight in FAT editor.   Rapid  page
   down with many different lengths of fully qualified file names
   sometimes  will leave a few stray characters from  a  previous
   file name.

4  General.   I would rather not see a border of what was on  the
   screen when the various utilities were invoked.



Peter Butler
Butler Software Service
2608 Lindentree Lane
Santa Clara, CA 95051


Peter,
Regarding your comments about DiskEdit, Version 6.01 also had the
filename and cluster highlight in the FAT editor. My version 6.01 also
shows the stray-character effect: After a long pathname is displayed,
the tail end will remain when a shorter pathname is displayed.  Seems
that DiskEdit wasn't designed for long pathnames.


ndiags and sysinfo hang from dos line or norton integrator.
sysinfo runs from windows until disk benchmark, then hangs
ndiags does not run from windows.
have Compaq 386DX-33 (DeskPro 386/33L) EISA, 22mb ram, 2-320mb esdi
drives, iomega pc2b connected to 90mb & 44mb transportable, hp ScanJet
IIc, hp IIID to para, Toshiba T3301 connected to FD-850M, with ATi Ultra
running 8514/a on Gateway 2000 1572FS mon.
there seems to be a delay that 6.01 did not have when executing
individual commands.
Please respond.


Try running NDIAGS with the /NOKBTYPE switch.  It should solve your
problem, and also try SYSINFO witht eh /PORT switch.
-mark

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Messages on the Symantec BBS: =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-