Computer died while installing MuseScore

• Jul 27, 2010 - 04:53

My computer is running short of disk space so I decided to install MuseScore on my wife's laptop (Vista Home Premium) that has plenty of free space. Early in the installation, her computer let out a little whimper, gave off that burned electrical smell, and died. Is there any way that MuseScore could have caused this? I know it's unlikely but one doesn't dare fry one's wife's computer twice and live to tell about it.

Has anyone heard of this happening before?

Thanks,

Tom


Comments

I am sorry to hear about your wife's laptop.

I have installed many times over in the past two or three years. I have not experienced or heard of this happening.

Installing software does make use of the hard disk, but not any more than saving a large file.

Was it plugged in to a power source when it died? My desktop computer (that lives in my studio) died with similar symptoms, but not through any installation of software. It turns out that there is a power problem in my studio, as a short circuit somewhere (which could in theory be anywhere) in the wiring connected to the socket that powered my computer was what actually killed it. The Power Supply Unit is fried, so I'm getting a new PSU and replacing it. Then I have to check for any further damage apart from the PSU, as well as trying to find where the short circuit occurred and fixing that.

Could it be some sort of electrical instability?

In reply to by Electrode

I doubt that it is a wiring problem because we had the house completely rewired a while back. I had the external power supply tested today and it is good. The smell probably came from the laptop's mother board frying. The house is old by American standards but the wiring is new. HP is going to replace the mother board and anything else that needs to be changed out for a flat amount. Not cheap but they can't run the price up by "finding" additional things wrong with it. So as to not to risk harming my wife's computer, I'm going to add a second hard drive to my computer to have space for MuseScore and lots of other things.

In reply to by TomBenjey

My wife's laptop is not back from the shop yet but, yesterday, I bit the bullet and installed a second hard drive in my machine which allowed me to move several large video files to the second drive, freeing up lots of space on my C: drive. MuseScore downloaded quickly and seems to be working fine so far.

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