Time to buy ..

LittleJo

Hi,
My 6 year old PC is really having problems. It boots up OK then freezes after a few minutes. I have had Task Manager running and it does not show a high load.
I have to reboot it and it takes several tries to get through scandisc.
It then works OK.
I have AVG , Adaware and Sygate firewall running.
I ran several virus checkers from the sticky at the front including SPYBOT,
all of which say no errors.
I defragged the disc and have 75% free space.
I am running XP.
What do you think, time to change?
If I do, who do I buy from and what spec.
Thanks for any help.
Jo

iviv

Before anyone else mentions it, have you gone through the malware removal guide at the top of the forum?

Though 6 years is fairly old in computer terms, and you'll certainly get a large speed boost if you buy a new PC, but the question is if you need it. What do you use it for? If its just for general web browsing, emailing and using Word, then you should be able to get away with a simple RAM upgrade or something which should last a couple of years while being much cheaper than a new PC.

However, it could be the hard drive on its way out, which would be a Bad Thing(tm). Have a run through these tools which should sniff out any hard drive errors.

II_D2_II

@ iviv
if she is to get a RAM upgrade, this will just start her off for many upgrades to come causing her to pay more than she would of for a new PC,

i would suggest just purchasing a new PC from Dell or PC World, if it is for home use that is i.e Emails,internet etc...

LittleJo

Hi,
I ahve been throuh all the malaware stuff,
Thanks for suggestions, just trying hard drive stuff now.
Do not really fancy PC World somehow.
Thanks
Jo

iviv

Not necessarily. If its been working fine up to now, then there's no point in splashing out on a new PC if you can avoid it. RAM is dirt cheap at the moment, you can get 2Gb for £25. The processor would be too complicated for the average home user to upgrade, and no point in the graphics card unless gaming.
While you are correct that you don't want to get into an endless circle of upgrades, with a 6 year old computer as a base you wouldn't be able to squeeze much more out of it anyway. But for £25 its worth it as it'll hold it off for another year or so.

samhale

If you still have the windows XP installation disk, I recommend you reinstall XP. It'll be much faster, like having a new computer.

iviv

samhale wrote: »

If you still have the windows XP installation disk, I recommend you reinstall XP. It'll be much faster, like having a new computer.

If you're saying format and start again, then yes. Formatting is a bit extreme, but not as much as buying a new computer. Its like having a spring clean but throwing everything out. You'll need to backup any files you want to keep, but assuming its a software problem, the computer should be easily sped up.

LittleJo

Hi,
Waht I do not understand is why it freezes at first, then after several reboots runs perfectly.
Jo

iviv

For some reason, thats shouting ram problem at me, though I'm not sure why. Best thing to do is probably just test everything. Hard drive I covered earlier, next up is memtest to blitz the ram, see if there's a faulty stick. You'll need to leave it running overnight to get a thorough test. And if it shows up errors, you'll need to run it on each stick, see which one is the bad one.

LittleJo

Hi,
Carried out all the tests, nothing found.
Come today, same thing , boots up, freezes, takes 3/4 goes to reboot, then runs OK.
Any suggestions o good on-line supplier?
Jo

fwor

One possibility is that there is a hardware driver conflicting with a recent Windows update - I've seen this happen with a graphics driver before, and produce similar symptoms.

If you go to the Windows Update website and check for updates, you can then look to see if their are any Hardware Updates for your PC. You have to go to the website for this, as hardware updates never seem to get distributed automatically.