Computer freezes for no reason :-( Help!

[damiany2j]

I have a computer which has a Pentium 4, 2.6Ghz processor, 1Gb of DDR RAM, and a 120Gb Hard drive. The computer is one I bought from the website www.omni-data.co.uk which no longer seems to be working. I have used it fine for 3 years and suddenly, it has developed a fault. The fault is that it suddenly freezes. I cannot press control, alt or del to close any program. Pressing the Caps Lock or NumLock buttons don't turn on any lights. The whole thing just freezes without warning, and normally when I am doing more than one thing at once. It does this every single time I turn the computer on, and the amount of time it takes to freeze varies between 30 seconds and 10 minutes, but even if I do nothing, it still freezes eventually. I have run Ad-Aware and Spybot and it found nothing. A virus scan found nothing. I replaced the power supply to a higher wattage one, and the problems remained. I replaced both my 512Mb RAM sticks with 2 new ones, and the problem is still there, and if anything, is getting worse. I reinstalled Windows completely and it didnt freeze during the reinstallation process but when everything was set up again, it froze after a few minutes, despite me attaching no hardware devices except the mouse and keyboard.

I am running out of possible solutions so any advice would be appreciated. I am running Windows XP Home, and applied Service Pack 1, but not 2, because I cannot connect to the internet for long enough to download it, nor can I load it from a CD because it freezes during the installation process.

What do you suggest?

[JANINE]

I have a computer which has a Pentium 4, 2.6Ghz processor, 1Gb of DDR RAM, and a 120Gb Hard drive. The computer is one I bought from the website www.omni-data.co.uk which no longer seems to be working. I have used it fine for 3 years and suddenly, it has developed a fault. The fault is that it suddenly freezes. I cannot press control, alt or del to close any program. Pressing the Caps Lock or NumLock buttons don't turn on any lights. The whole thing just freezes without warning, and normally when I am doing more than one thing at once. It does this every single time I turn the computer on, and the amount of time it takes to freeze varies between 30 seconds and 10 minutes, but even if I do nothing, it still freezes eventually. I have run Ad-Aware and Spybot and it found nothing. A virus scan found nothing. I replaced the power supply to a higher wattage one, and the problems remained. I replaced both my 512Mb RAM sticks with 2 new ones, and the problem is still there, and if anything, is getting worse. I reinstalled Windows completely and it didnt freeze during the reinstallation process but when everything was set up again, it froze after a few minutes, despite me attaching no hardware devices except the mouse and keyboard.

I am running out of possible solutions so any advice would be appreciated. I am running Windows XP Home, and applied Service Pack 1, but not 2, because I cannot connect to the internet for long enough to download it, nor can I load it from a CD because it freezes during the installation process.

What do you suggest?

1) have u tried another mouse and keyboard?
2) this might be a hardware or software problem - more likely to be a hardware problem with your motherboard and processor. my advice is to try a new motherboard and processor.

[damiany2j]

I don't really want to replace my entire motherboard and processor!!

I'll try and new mouse and keyboard but why do you think the problem was just occured all of a sudden?

[damiany2j]

Oh, by the way, additional details:

I booted into Safe Mode, and it seemed to work fine. Beforehand, it was freezing between 1-10minutes, but in Safe Mode, I left it for 2 hours and it hadn't froze, so I think maybe Safe Mode worked fine.

I then disabled all the Services in the MSCONFIG panel and ticked 5 on at a time, and restarted in Normal Mode to see what services was making it freeze, but it froze first time, meaning it's got nothing to do with services or there's a problem with one of the first 5 services. One of the first 5 was Windows Audio, and in my Device Manager, there is a yellow ? next to an audio thing.

So, I thought it was maybe because I haven't got a driver for Windows Audio, and I know windowsupdate.com has one, so I tried to reinstall Windows from scratch again in the hope it would work long enough to visit the website.

However, during the reinstallation process, it asks me whether to Quick Format in NTFS or Format in NTFS and I chose the second one (the non-quick one) and my machine froze during that process.

I think it's an internal component thats gone wrong, but I have replaced the memory and power supply and I don't really want to replace the processor.

Any other suggestions what these freezes could be?

I don't think its software since it froze during the Windows reinstallation process.

[JANINE]

Oh, by the way, additional details:

I booted into Safe Mode, and it seemed to work fine. Beforehand, it was freezing between 1-10minutes, but in Safe Mode, I left it for 2 hours and it hadn't froze, so I think maybe Safe Mode worked fine.

I then disabled all the Services in the MSCONFIG panel and ticked 5 on at a time, and restarted in Normal Mode to see what services was making it freeze, but it froze first time, meaning it's got nothing to do with services or there's a problem with one of the first 5 services. One of the first 5 was Windows Audio, and in my Device Manager, there is a yellow ? next to an audio thing.

So, I thought it was maybe because I haven't got a driver for Windows Audio, and I know windowsupdate.com has one, so I tried to reinstall Windows from scratch again in the hope it would work long enough to visit the website.

However, during the reinstallation process, it asks me whether to Quick Format in NTFS or Format in NTFS and I chose the second one (the non-quick one) and my machine froze during that process.

I think it's an internal component thats gone wrong, but I have replaced the memory and power supply and I don't really want to replace the processor.

Any other suggestions what these freezes could be?

I don't think its software since it froze during the Windows reinstallation process.

might be a driver conflict. Safe mode only boots the necessary drivers to run certain things which is why sometimes you may notice your graphics seem larger. it wont load a great deal of program drivers which could be what is causing your machine to crash.:)

[damianjmcgrath]

So, whats your solution, considering I can't download new drivers or anything since it freezes too quickly.

Device Manager also reports nothing.

[RGPHNX]

HI ,
Have a friend download the suspected drivers for you on another computer & install them using safe mode. This might be a clue

One of the first 5 was Windows Audio, and in my Device Manager, there is a yellow ? next to an audio thing

If that still doesn't solve the problem then it's most likely a hardware problem. With hardware problems ..assume nothing.. do a basic troubleshooting & check ALL hardware components..step by step. If you need help .. see my website.
Hope this helps
RGPHNX
ps- If you still need more help- post back with ALL the specs for the hardware installed in your system (make, model..etc) & get more help.

[Catweazle]

If you have onboard audio you need to download drivers from the motherboard manufacturer (or system manufacturer if it's a 'brand name' computer). If it's an add-in sound card you need to download drivers from the card manufacturer's website.