Another 'What's wrong with my PC?' thread

[fossyant]

Sounds like the hard drive

 

[MontyVeda]

Sounds like the hard drive

could well be... I've run the windows error checking to on the C drive, which seemed to find things and do things and re-jig things... just have to wait and see if it's made any significant difference.

 

[CopperBrompton]

Surely any exploits have to get through first

Honestly, do some googling. There are already a number of exploits that can switch off your AV software without it or you being any the wiser. Continuing to run XP is madness.

 

[fossyant]

My XP machine took an age to boot when a 'spare' hard drive started to play up, and it wasn't the OS drive.

 

[Rezillo]

I'd go along with the hard disk starting to fail. Try a SMART utility - Speedfan http://www.almico.com/sfdownload.php
is a useful all-rounder. Click the SMART tab and select a disk to look at.

 

[fossyant]

If you only have one HD, I hope it's backed up.

 

[MontyVeda]

If you only have one HD, I hope it's backed up.

Yes, I have just the one HD, which is backed up on to my other three HDs


The PC seems ok so far, since i did the error checking/fixing thing on my C drive... but.. oh no... that'll that there fate tempted

 

[crdf]

The PC seems ok so far, since i did the error checking/fixing thing on my C drive... but.. oh no... that'll that there fate tempted

What I meant by checking the HDD is not for errors on only C. And if you used a windows feature you used the wrong tool. You need to see (in your hardware devices) what brand is your HDD and then get a tool from the manufacturer (there will be a free one on their website) to check the HDD. And I don't mean only drive C but the whole drive, since the memory reads everywhere (use such a tool overnight or when you are gone for a long time).
What you have as a part of winXP is a tool to fragment the hard drive. All this does is to switch around bits of information to make the reading easier and faster.

 

[Bobby Mhor]

Just had that freezing type problem..
Astromenda was the problem...nasty little fecker..
Ran Malawarebytes Free and voila, quarantined the blighter now whizzing after a dose of CleanUp, Registry clean and a defrag, oh and did a full scan with an antivirus et aussi...
How did I get it?
Haven't a scoob but its gone..
Trojan type viruses are notorious for continually try to access the 'net and therefore slow your puter right down...

It is worthwhile every so often if you use the traditional tower to give it a good clean every month, dust and oose is not your friend...

 

[Acyclo]

Common sense suggests that if heat HELPS at some point or other then it's a hardware problem. Most likely the motherboard. Time for a new system I think.

 

[MontyVeda]

What I meant by checking the HDD is not for errors on only C. And if you used a windows feature you used the wrong tool. You need to see (in your hardware devices) what brand is your HDD and then get a tool from the manufacturer (there will be a free one on their website) to check the HDD. And I don't mean only drive C but the whole drive, since the memory reads everywhere (use such a tool overnight or when you are gone for a long time).
What you have as a part of winXP is a tool to fragment the hard drive. All this does is to switch around bits of information to make the reading easier and faster.

i used the windows tool on both particians in the first instance... then downloaded the tool from seagate, which painfully 'encountered a problem and needs to close', and therefore did nothing

currently trying a full reinstall... but suspect a new HDD is in order, or as suggested above, a complete new mo.bo/cpu too.

at least I've got a back up lap top so still have internet access.

 

[crdf]

Try that Seagate tool after re-instaling.

 

[MontyVeda]

after reinstalling it began to freeze after a couple of minutes of booting... over and over. Will bung a new HD in when i got some funds.