Constant Freezing Laptop

[Kraai]

Hi all

I searched the forum for solutions, but it seems that every one with a pc freeze problem is maybe unique?

I have a laptop, Fuji Siemens Amilo pro. It is an Intel(R)CELERON (R) M, processor 1.60GHz, 448MB of Ram. OS is windows xp pro service pack 1, updated to service pack 3. Harddisk 37 GB, With 29 GB free space available.

The pc freezes just after about 5-10 minutes after starting up from cold. Almost no applications are running on it when it freezes, the only thing running may be IE7 and Windows media player and a heat sensor checker. There are about 33 processes running at default. I checked each process out, and they all are legit.

Sometimes, when the pc freeze like this, and I try to boot it up again, the boot-up just go into a neverending loop.

I have to do a repair each time the boot-up loops, using the xp cd, and more than once, I did a clean install as well, after deleting the xp partition, and reload windows xp again on newly created partition, using NTFS.

None of above solved the freezing problem, so I opened up the PC and dusted it out, making sure the HD is firmly in place, the fan is good, and that there are no dirt blocking the air vents.

I downloaded a heat sensor meter to monitor all sensors in real time, and found that when the PC Freeze, the HD temprature is around 35-37 degrees Celsius, memory usage around 49-60%, CPU usage between 0-2%, but the HDD usage suddenly goes up from 0 to 100%, and if it stays at 100% for a couple of seconds, everything freezes.

I would appreciate any comments or advice from anyone.

Kind Regard's

[Chaky]

Try running the chkdsk at command prompt (start menu/run):

chkdsk C: /r

It will prompt you to run the chkdsk on next restart. Type Y.

That will check your HD for bad sectors and it can take a long time to complete. If everything is OK, it shouldn't take more than 15 minutes, depending on the drive capacity.

I suspect that it will find (and mark) few bad sectors.

[Kraai]

Thanks Chaky, Chkdsk ran before by default, but I did not give it much attention, I scheduled one now as per your suggestion, the pc freezed up while chkdsk were busy, so I restarted, and chkdsk is continuing now. Will post again when process was succesfull.

[Kraai]

OKay, chkdsk found a lot of bad clusters in various files and repaired it. After chkdsk completed, and the system boot up again, it freezed again at the windows screen. I switched it off and left it for about 10 minutes, and then boot it up again. So far, its running for 95 minutes without freezing, doing normal stuff like email and webbrowsing on it.

If the laptop doesn't freeze again, then chkdsk might have been the solution, I will post back if anything changes.

[sittas87]

Ill recommend that you do another chkdsk. If it finds bad sectors again than do it for a third time. Reason for doing chckdsk more than once is, if it finds bad sectors all the time then you know its the HD going bad that will soon probably die on you.

Cheers

[Chaky]

Glad to help.. I suggest that you replace the dying HD.. It will get more and more of bad sectors. The disk's surface is deteriorating, so you will need to do regular surface scans. Once a week, I'll say.

From now on, it is a lottery with that drive. If the bad sector appears in boot area, it will become unusable at all and the data on it will become unsalvageable without professional help. (read: $$ + time)

You can still use the drive though, but it is unreliable, especially as primary drive. My advice is get a new one and use this one only for non-important data.

[Kraai]

Hi all

Thank you very much for the valuable advice. The pc runs now for about 24 hours without freezing up, and I do take note of running a chkdsk more than once, and/or regularly, as well as the warnings to save important data from it while it lasts.

From now on I will not use it to save any important stuff on it, but think of using it for normal internet purposes untill it dies.

Again, Daniweb came out tops to solve my problems, and I am very gratefull for this friendly forum and all volunteers helping clueless people out like myself.

I am marking this topic now as resolved.

[Chaky]

Great..

BTW, I still have one hard drive that has been dying in a similar manner for last 10 or so years... and it is still kickin'...

[sittas87]

cheers :)