InBox

By DON McALLISTER

Welcome to InBox, where we attempt to answer your internet questions.


Q: Steve has repeated Out of Memory errors, but his machine has a reasonable amount of memory. Could it be a virus? His Norton anti-virus software scan has found no infection.

A: Yes, Steve, infection is a common cause of memory errors. If your anti-virus program is not up to date or the infection is disabling it from finding anything, a clean bill of health may mislead you. Try Trend's online scan, which will run an up-to-date check on your drive (From Trend Micro HouseCall). You'll have to stay online during the process, but it may find what is hiding from Norton's view.


Q: Many readers are getting email claiming they are sending out infected files.

A: The return address listed in some infected email doesn't necessarily contain the real sender. I, too, have received a few that claim to be from my machine. These virus infections are clever. They use names from either the infected user's contact list as a return address, or put in a bogus address. If you receive a suspicious email, don't immediately blame the return address as being the infection source. Look at the full email header, which in Outlook Express is done by a right click on the offending email and then selecting Properties/Details. Check the email addresses listed within and see if they match the return address you saw in the short form of header. They probably don't.


Q: When Paul is accessing web pages, all that shows is text. He has tried resetting the Internet Explorer browser defaults with no success.

A: Someone removed a tick in a check box, Paul. Open Internet Explorer and got to Tools/Internet Options/Advanced/Multimedia. Place a tick beside Show Images and hit OK.


Q: Richard wants to send a file, but its 7MB size creates a huge task for the modem to handle with any speed.

A: Compress it with one of the many Zip utility programs available, Richard. One of the best is WinZip.


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