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Zambo
03-Jul-06, 23:24
Can anyone offer any suggestions here?

I'm using a fairly new PC -
Windows XP, Home Edition, Version 2002, Service Pack 2
2.09 GHz
1.00 GB of RAM

The problem is that the computer keeps freezing. It seems to be getting worse now, and I sometimes only get on the computer for about 10 minutes, then it freezes. It won't let me press anything on the keyboard at all, the mouse won't move - nothing!
The only way I can sort it out is by restarting the computer, by using the restart button, as I can't even shut it down normally.

Can anyone give me any suggestions as to what is causing this, and how I can sort it?

Scandisk is run every day and cache/history/cookies are deleted regularly.

Any help will be much appreciated - I don't really fancy having to buy a new PC!

Mr P Cannop
04-Jul-06, 14:58
are you in Wick ??

william53
04-Jul-06, 15:03
you could have faulty memory or your hard disk mite be faulty

fred
04-Jul-06, 19:46
Any help will be much appreciated - I don't really fancy having to buy a new PC!

I'd goto control panel/system/advanced/start up and recovery, or whatever it is in XP and check that it's set to reboot and write to the event log on system falure. Then when it does it again see if there is anything in the event log, control panel/administrative tools/event viewer in 2000 probably something similar in XP.

While you're in control panel/system you could click on hardware then device manager and see if you can find any devices which have a conflict.

blueivy
04-Jul-06, 23:37
Zambo,

This could be many things, however it's most likely to be hardware related (as william53 pointed out). Hardware problems are never easy to put your finger on though. It could be a faulty card, memory, motherboard, hard drive or external device.

Since when has it been getting worse? Did you add anything to the PC (more memory for example) or any device (USB or otherwise)? Does it occur when you do something specific (ie can you reproduce it or does it just 'happen')? When it does happen is the hard drive doing anything (from the noise not from the activity light)?

If the machine is freezing completely this again points to a hardware problem. If it was software related chances are it would crash Windows and 'blue screen' (although I did bold chances are as this doesn't always happen).

There are number of things you can try but I don't want to write a huge message with a lot of stuff that may be irrelevant to your PC. If you want to discuss it further please give me a call on 0800 612 0601 or message me privately and I'll see if I can help you.

Fred, getting Windows to write an event in the event log only works if Windows is the culprit. As the machine is actually freezing Windows is frozen too so it won't write anything in the log (as it's caught unawares!). It may write a 'Windows shutdown unexpectedly' event when it comes back up as it realises it wasn't shutdown properly though.

Niall Fernie
12-Jul-06, 14:00
I had this problem a while ago, I swapped out all the hardware to no avail, reinstalled windows - made no difference. Turned out to be the power supply, it was not supplying a clean/steady voltage to the graphics card and so the system would hang approx every 10 minutes. If you have purchased a complete system like a dell or compaq, they may well have provided "brand names" for most of the hardware but go for really cheapo things like power supplies. I only point this out as it was the LAST thing I tried.

blueivy
12-Jul-06, 15:29
After having worked with hundreds of Dell's over the years (with deployments of hundreds of PC's to different sites) I can vouch for what Niall says.

At one site in particular I had to return almost 15% of the machines within the first year ALL due to power supplies 'popping' (which doesn't have scare you when it does go POP!)

Never had a problem with Compaq's ...