Can anybody tell me what's wrong with my computer!? PLEASE!

[papaya]

Hi, I don't even know if I'm posting this in the right place....I hope so....I have a Gateway Notebook and for the last 3 weeks it has been freezing up. It only seems to happen when I'm on the internet. But it happens all the time. I have spysweeper and Norton, and they have found nothing......I have spoken to my ISP and Gateway, and my warranty company....Nobody will take any responsibility. This computer is only 5mos. old, and I'm ready to through it out the window. When it freezes, I can't even get it to close.....It simply stops responding.....I have not installed any new software on it except for MSN Messenger, the spysweeper, and Norton....I have done a full system restore, too.....nothing seems to work....and I have to shut down my computer 8-10 x's a day, because of this. The one thing I noticed is that the hard drive indicator light, completely stops flashing when it freezes, no flickering or anything....and it won't shut itself down or "hibernate" either, when this happens....It will just sit there. Can anybody tell me where I should be looking? Is this a software problem? I don't think so, but if I knew, I wouldn't be having such a hard time!

 

[ChineseTechie]

When does the freezing happen?? Does it freez when you open a specific program?? Do you notice a trend to when and why it's freezing up??

cT

 

[papaya]

I wish there was a pattern...all I can say is that it seems to happen more often now. Sometimes, It happens within 5 minutes, sometimes 45 minutes....It happens indiscriminately....doesn't matter what I'm doing or what site I'm on....

 

[ChineseTechie]

mmm...... try rebooting in safe mode and leave the machine running to see if it still happens. You may want to see if members with more experience can help you.

cT

 

[nimd4]

I have spysweeper and Norton

Norton sucks, McAfee generally rocks, depends what version.

Spysweeper, which? Use Lavasoft Ad-aware and Spybot Search and Destroy. Install them, update fully, reboot in Safe Mode and run full scans that have to be set from options.

Hopefully now you have learned not to use Internet Explorer and you will look for some other browsers like Firefox, Opera, Maxton, etc. Excuse the logical rudeness.

Basically after all these scans, even if successful, you'll prolly have to use the Windows XP cd to repair the installation..

 

[tdeg]

Right click on My Computer.

Select Manage

On the left hand side there is a section that says event viewer.

Select system.

Scroll though it and post back if there is anything that is red.

If you have a red against a HDD, you might have a pooched HDD. That is common for laptops as they get abused.