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Computer Crashes
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| Woody4eva |
| I need some help. My computer crashes regularly, it just freezes randomly, sometimes only a few seconds after loading-up. I have no idea what the problem is and the XP error report just says it's a "Device Driver". I've got no dodgy programs running in the task manager and I checked the msconfig and only MSN messenger and a volume control are set to load. Any idea's what the problem could be? My comp is only a year old. |
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| ilalin |
| There is a virus that causes computer shutdowns, run an antivirus scan and check if your machine is infected. This is a relativelly new virus as it has been released 4 or 5 weeks ago. |
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| Woody4eva |
I forgot to say that I've already defragmented the drive, ran a thorough scandisk and ran ad-aware 6 but the problem still remains.
Wouldn't that virus show up on task manager and/or msconfig? |
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| Sebraa |
| SPYBOT Search & Destroy!! Install this beaty too ;) |
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| Vert |
***Don't take this lightly. ***
How long ahve you had your Windows XP installation (edit: damnit you answered this already :D)? If you don't maintain it well, and generally treat your OS like , it eventually s out and things break, slow down etc. Rather than trying to fix it manually, it is often easier to just format it, that way you have a whole lot more HDD space, a nice zippy fresh Windows XP install, and no more computer problems.
I usually do an install once a year, or unless I break something and have to.
Before you take such measures though, you might want to try to defrag, and maybe give us some more ideas of what could be wrong regarding your device error, or ask a friend who has computer skills to look at it. Also, do the spyware thing, install Ad-aware, AND spybot, and clear that crap off. Try to clear your IE cache, and maybe run disk cleanup on your primary harddrive.
Good luck,
es |
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| Thunder5 |
| quote: | Originally posted by Vert
***Don't take this lightly. ***
Before you take such measures though, you might want to try to defrag, and maybe give us some more ideas of what could be wrong regarding your device error, or ask a friend who has computer skills to look at it. Also, do the spyware thing, install Ad-aware, AND spybot, and clear that crap off. Try to clear your IE cache, and maybe run disk cleanup on your primary harddrive.
Good luck,
es |
Vert forgot to mention that you'd better keep your windows updates up-to-date. There are uploads coming atleast once a month. Sometimes even more. :)
You have a broadband connection? If so install a good firewall (eg sygate has a pretty good firewall for free to download and use).
and back to your problem.
Few days ago I had pretty much similar problem, it was caused by a bad hard disk, it was getting full of bad sectors. And everytime I tried to read or write to/from the disk my windows froze.
The only thing possible to do was restart. So check out your hdd manufacturers site if they have any specific program for checking their disk. (Like seagate has its Seatools) |
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| Woody4eva |
I've done the following things:
Ad-Aware
Spybot
Defragmented
Scandisk
Installed all recent updates
Deleted all temp internet files and cookies
Checked 'msconfig' for suspicious programs
So withall that done, it SEEMS to be working at the moment, but I'm not holding my breath.
Another thing, when it was crashing, it wouldn't start back up again unless I left it off for like half an hour. I tried new power leads, but still it wouldn't start up. It would turn on but the screen would remian black, I wouldn't even get the system messages at the start.
Any idea's on that? |
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| hey cheggy |
| Go to symantec.com and run the online virus scan as well. If there is a virus, it may have disabled your AV. |
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| Woody4eva |
Cheers, I did that but it came up clean.
It's not crashing as much now, but it's a bit unstable and sometimes crashes when I leave it alone for a while. But i've had no problems starting it up now, so the problem is somewhat fixed apart from it being slighty unstable.
I think i'm going to format the C: drive and re-insatall windows once my new MOBO and processor are delivered. |
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