computer freezing, possible causes?

[al78]

A while ago, the computer* at the local bridge club I attend regularly started freezing occasionally. It didn't throw up an error message or anything, just completely froze, absolutely no way to un-freeze it other than a hard re-boot. Gradually this phenomenon happened ever more frequently, until recently it has been hanging almost every evening. I have tried running Scandisk, defragmenting the hard drive and running CCleaner to no avail. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what might be causing this?

*Pentium Core 2 duo running Windows 7, PC was bought around 2-3 years ago.

 

[slowmotion]

It's often a virus infection. The last time it happened to me, I retrieved what files I could and reinstalled the OS afresh. It's not as painful as you think. I'm absolutely NOT an expert, but that's what I did. Good luck.

 

[rusky]

Is the CPU cooler clogged up?

My money's on a hardware problem. Power supply possibly.

 

[berty bassett]

have you checked task manager to see how much cpu usage is - could it be a programme hogging all the power or clashing with other programme . is fan working and cooling it down

 

[Norm]

If it comes on ok straight after a re-boot, then it's probably software, although that doesn't usually get worse over time, it just hangs it regularly for ever.

However, if it only does it when it's hot, then...

Is the CPU cooler clogged up?

My money's on a hardware problem. Power supply possibly.

...this. Or a problem with something not quite seated properly - the RAM is the usual suspect. It could be something like a dry joint expanding when hot.

 

[defy-one]

Freezing is usually a process taking up a lot of the CPU and memory resources. Try reseating the memory, just to eliminate a bad contact. Then backup any relevant data, format the disk and install windows again.
Regards'
HP systems engineer

 

[al78]

Thanks for the suggestions, I'll try them out and see what happens.

 

[ian turner]

Install speedfand keep an eye on the voltages (making sure they don't get too close to 95% of specified value, ignore the negative entries as they don't exist) and temperatures (ignore the ones always claiming your system is on fire as those are non existant sensors). Also look under the SMART tab in speedfan and select the harddrive from the hard disk box and click on perform an in depth online analysis and see if it thinks your hard drive is on the way out.
The usual reasons are overheating (both cpu and graphics card if thats a separate card) and power. If the cpu is overheating and cleaning the fan/heatsink doesn't work then you may have to go as far as removing the heatsink, cleaning the top of the cpu and base of the heatsink with isopropyl alcohol then applying thermal compound and reattaching the cooler.

 

[goo_mason]

My PC started freezing last year, usually a few mins after booting up. Then it started happening sooner and sooner, until it would freeze during bootup. Various causes were suggested (HDD fault / Windows software issue / RAM not seated properly etc) but by booting up from and running LINUX off a DVD, I was able to find out that it STILL froze - so the HDD and software weren't to blame. Hardware components were disconnected and reconnected on at a time to see which was at fault - nothing. In the end I noticed that the tops of some of the capacitors on the motherboard looked like they were bursting open - it was a dying motherboard. Replaced it with an identical reconditioned 7yr-old 2nd-hand motherboard from eBay for £18 - problem solved!

Certainly a lot cheaper than buying a new PC....