Computer freezing - hard drive?

[Guest]

Hi, this may be very simple, but I am stuck.
I have windows xp at home for family. There aer 3 logons used, me, mum,
sister. When I log on, after a few minutes, the whole screen freezes, the
mouse doesnt move and an orange light on the base lights (usually only
flickers, when something is being used - think its hard drive, I should
probably know this but I'm more software minded). I then have to turn the
whole thing off from the mains as nothing else works, tried ctrl alt del,
esc, etc etc. The sometimes when it loads, a black scren comes up and from
what I can remember it says things like "start in normal mode" or "press F12
to boot" or "press F1 to save changes" and then a black screen saying press
any key, which when I do, nothing happens. I tried logging onto my mums log
on and so far so good. Is there a reason why it keeps freezing and what can
I do to stop it?

 

[dkwaczala]

I had the same problem with mine and I discovered that the CMOS battery
was failing. I replaced the battery and I don't get that message.
Check to see if the time is correct on your computer. If it isn't
change the battery on the motherboard and try again. Hope this helps.