Everytime I turn on my laptop, the laptop makes a beeping sound before it starts. This beeping continues until the system boots into Windows and then it stops. What do you think is the problem with the system and how do you suggest I fix it?

— Salman

Dear Salman,

Your computer making sounds during boot is never a good sign. Motherboards have a system in place called the Power-on-self-test (POST) that creates these sounds to notify the user about various hardware problems that the board identifies during boot. Usually, one single beep signifies that everything is well but a continuous beep would mean that the motherboard is suffering from a loose internal module or a shorted chip. But since you can still boot into Windows, I’m guessing that the problem hasn’t reached critical levels but you should still take it in for repair. POST codes are always related to hardware and since you can’t fix hardware by yourself, I would suggest taking it to an expert to identify the problem. You can also do a quick Google search on the type of beeps that you’re getting and the laptop that you own—because BIOS have different codes for problems—to identify the problem so that you know what the problem exactly is. This will help you deal with nefarious repairmen and guide the technician through the problem more clearly.

I have been using the Samsung Galaxy J7 and recently, I lost the original charging cable that came with the device. I bought a new cable and I’ve been using the cable with the original adapter and yet the phone charges really slowly. What do you think is the problem here?

— Swarnim Mandal

Dear Swarnim,

The problem has been identified in your question itself. Since you’re using the original charger, the only fault that you can see is in the third-party cable that you’re using. There are many grades for the cables you can buy, I’m sure you’ve seen cables that only support charging without any data transfer capabilities at all. Usually, cables from big manufactures are fine since they’re developed really well with multiple charge lines and data transfer lines. So, to explain your problem, you’re probably using a cable that only has a few charge lines. Try using an original cable to charge your phone and see if that helps, and because charging through an original cable is drastically faster, you’ll immediately notice the change. If changing the cable helps, you definitely ended up with the shorted end of the stick when buying a third-party cable. If not, your adapter might be suffering, which would mean that you’d have to change the whole setup on how you charge. But I’m almost sure that the problem you’re facing is rooted in the cable that you’re using, getting an original cable should rectify the issue.

I use a Samsung Galaxy Mega 2 and while the phone had been working well a few days ago, it started malfunctioning. When I try to launch the camera app, it gives me a ‘Camera Failed’ message. I have tried installing other camera apps as well but to no avail. How do I solve this issue?

— Samyog Adhikari

Dear Samyog,

This seems to be a problem with Samsung devices. While errors like this on other phones would have immediately hinted to a hardware issue, on Samsung devices they’re rooted in the software as well. There are many different issues that could lead to this issue, if you have any third-party flashlight apps, I would recommend deleting them. This can help because both of these softwares control the same hardware controller and there can be code conflicts that can lead to this error. If you don’t have any flashlight apps, try deleting the Camera app’s cache data by navigating to the Apps menu within the Settings app. Inside the Apps menu, find the camera app and delete its data. If this does not help, turn off your phone and hold the Volume up, Home and Power keys simultaneously during boot. Once your phone starts to vibrate, release the power key and hold the other two keys. This will lead you into the System recovery menu. Inside this menu, find an option called ‘Wipe cache partition’ and, with the help of the volume buttons, select it. Also try taking out your battery and leaving your phone off for around 15 minutes before turning it on. If both of these options don’t work out for you, connect your phone to a computer and navigate to [Device]PhoneApplidium Image Cache and delete everything inside this folder. Also navigate to [Device]PhoneAndroiddataom.sec.android.gallery3dache and delete everything inside this folder as well. These are some of the ways that you can fix camera issues on a Samsung device but if none of these options work for you, unfortunately, your camera module might be experiencing some issues. This is a hardware issue and you’ll need to take your phone in for repair if none of the above steps work for you.

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