Screen freezes

[Pete]

I've been getting a lot of screen freezes lately, especially when
scrolling WebPages or large documents. At these times the cursor on the
screen freezes and nothing works including ctl-alt-del. I have to
physically turn the power off on my laptop and reboot. Any clues?

Pete

 

[Malke]

I've been getting a lot of screen freezes lately, especially when
scrolling WebPages or large documents. At these times the cursor on
the screen freezes and nothing works including ctl-alt-del. I have to
physically turn the power off on my laptop and reboot. Any clues?

Hi, Pete. Unfortunately, this isn't enough information to get a specific
diagnosis. You could have viruses and/or spyware on your computer or
your laptop could be overheating. There's just no way to tell from your
post. Here are some general troubleshooting steps:

What does a scan with a current antivirus program (meaning a version not
earlier than 2002 and using updated virus definitions) show? Also,
remove spyware with Spybot Search & Destroy from
www.safer-networking.org and Ad-aware from www.lavasoftusa.com. Be sure
to update these programs before running them. These programs are free,
so run them both since they complement each other. It is best to run
antivirus and spyware removal tools in Safe Mode. You may also want to
run CWShredder and HijackThis from http://aumha.org/freeware.htm.
Although CWShredder is no longer being updated, it will still clean
older variants of the CoolWebSearch malware. Please read the
instructions carefully. Also, make sure you've visited Windows Update
and applied all security patches. Do not install driver updates from
Windows Update. Make sure you are running a firewall.

Since you have a laptop, the normal hardware troubleshooting steps don't
apply since you can't open the computer and check on everything.
However, you can observe if fans are running and/or if the laptop is
getting really hot.

If you want more help, then repost with a lot more information about
your computer, what changed between the time things worked and the time
they didn't, and what you've already done to troubleshoot.

Malke

 

[Guest]

Malke makes a lot of good points but you should know that your description is
enough to diagnose your problem. You have an outdated driver on your machine.
What happens in 99% of the cases is that a driver is called upon to perform a
higher function that XP knows your stuff is capable of doing but in fact the
driver does not have the function written into it so XP calls for the
function and waits for the driver to supply it and the driver can't so it
waits for another call to it and around and around you go and thus the
freeze. Now this is in simplistic terms and without any techie terms but
that's the general idea. Usually you can tell which driver has caused the
problem by going into your event viewer in the administrative tools found in
your control panel. There will be three logs that become available to you
after double clicking event viewer to open it. The two of most interest to
you will be "system" and "applications". Double click either one to open it's
events in the right panel and look for any red X's. In particular look for
any red X's that correspond to the time of your lockup. Double click them to
open it's details window. Now most of the information there will look foreign
to you but you may be able to see a program or name in the module line that
will give you the clue you need. Go to the manufacuters site and get the
latest XP drivers. Another good way to trouble shoot this is to get a free
program like Everest Home Edition from Lavalyst and after you install it you
can go into it and look at all the parts that go into making up your system.
It will provide many links to the drivers for your system. This is definately
a driver problem. {]:~)