clicking does NOTHING

[Guest]

This problem is not constant....it goes and comes. Sometimes when I try to
open programs, folders, files, whatever, nothing happens. I highlight them
and hit enter....nothing. I double click....nothing. I right
click....nothing. Sometimes the hour glass will pop up for half a second,
but nothing ever happens. Sometimes it affects ALL files, sometimes only
random ones. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to it. I usually have to
restart to fix it.
Also, sometimes the "File, View, Help" toolbar at the top of folders is not
there. It's never happened within actual FILES, just folders. There's
sometimes a white bar with a Windows symbol in the place of the toolbar, and
sometimes there's not even a space where the toolbar should be. Sometimes
this happens at the same time as the other problem (folders that won't open).
I right click on the toolbars and make sure they're all checked, but it's
still not there.
Anybody have a clue what could be causing this? No viruses, spyware,
adware, or anything else is on here--I just checked. I had this problem on
our old PC too. But not as often as I do on this one.

 

[Kevin]

To have a problem like this be duplicated on two machines, connected to the
same internet connection at different times, is suspicious. What are you
using to check for malware? Did your old system have Windows XP, as I
assume your new one does?

 

[Guest]

I'm using "Spysweeper", "Ad-Aware", and "AVG." Yes they're both XP. This
one is "Home" and the old one was "Pro."

 

[Michael Shergold]

I seem to have a similar problem when occasionally for several minutes XP does absolutely nothing as if it has gone to sleep. On initial occasions I have had to power-on reset but I've now found if I leave it after two or three minutes it will suddenly wake up and perform all those clicks and open several windows..
They then have to be closed and I can carry on quite happily.
Usually as I have hit CTRL-ALT-DEL several times the windows are all task managers where I was trying to see what was causing the problem.
I also use AVG and Ad-Aware to keep things clean..
Ongoing puzzle!!
Michael