computer freezes all the time

[JBoze3131]

okay. i just formatted my HD and reinstalled windows 98SE, because my system was running slow and it kept freezing, and it needed it overall.

i thought that would take care of the issue with the computer freezing, but now 2 days into it, its freezing all the time...more than before. im shocked that im on this long to even type this out.

i have everything is it was before...except i dont have my tv tuner card software loaded and it was already in the machine, and im not sure if it recognizes it or not...i guess it does, since it installed the win98 cd tv tuner card program...or, it tried to but told me to load it from the cd if i wanted, and its never done that before i got the card.

anyhow, i checked the settings and 2 unknown devices are listed...with the yellow q marks. i disabled both of them, not sure what it could be...so that shouldnt be a problem, im guessing. i deleted them both, but everytime i restarted it reinstalled them without drivers and did the same conflict thing.

its a gateway computer- 450mhz PIII, but it only has 64MB of ram...maybe that could be the issue? not enough memory maybe?

when i first reinstalled...the first day, it ran great...but yesterday it started freezing. and now its doing it more and more...when i double click and open my computer, c, and try to go thru files...when i open an mp3 with winamp, when i do nothing at all (sometimes it freezes doing this stuff, sometimes it doesnt, but it always freezes the past 2 days within 10 mins, usually less than that).

i ran scandisk and it fixed the errors found (i think it said it found some), ran norton, it came up clean. new definition list and all. ran adaware and deleted the few items it found...restarted windows only when i booted my computrer (before i reformatted the machine, i used to always get it to stop freezing by restarting windows only right after it booted up.) nothing works...

i tried uninstalling winamp and win. media player but that didnt help...i reinstalled those two.

i guess thats all the info. , oh- it runs fine in safe mode, no problems at all, just in normal mode it always freezes (i saved this and am editing it now, in case it freezes while im typing this out!) i searched google for windows freezing and various terms, and cant find much help...all the usual, run adaware, scandisk, antivirus, etc, which ive done. my only guess is not enough memory, but that doesnt make too much sense to me since im guessing that wouldnt cause the machine to freeze everytime i start it up. ive got dr watson loaded...reading about it on some site, and i thought maybe it would log when it froze and maybe would tell me something, but it doesnt do that. is there a program online thatll log when it freezes and maybe show whats causing this? maybe there are settings i can change to better use the memory that i do have or something? any ideas?

btw, on my other post...about the e drive not loading...its loading most of the time now, tho sometimes it still wont load (1 out of every 10 times maybe- which shows you how many times ive had to reboot in the past day!)

[Laurey]

RAM would possibly be an issue depending on what you use your computer for, but shouldn't account for THAT many problems suddenly. If it was fine when you first re-formatted, then the next question is what have you installed since then?

as to your TV tuner - do you have the most recent drivers/software for it? I didn't catch the brand, but the ATI radeon cards have had a few upgrades in the past few years that have cleaned up a LOT of problems.

Take a look at the programs you've installed since you were running well.. especially 'intensive' ones (graphics, music, movie, word processing, flash creation, etc). Did you update Win98 w/all the appropriate patches (especially critical ones)? When you re-installed.. did you update drivers for your hardware? how about any software patches?

And finally.. I didn't see you mention a defrag (may have just missed it).. if you haven't done one.. do one.. how fragged was it?

-L

[JBoze3131]

one thing about updating windows- whenever i go to the ms.com site to update..when i hit scan for updates, it always goes to 100%really quick, then says error. i cant get windows update to work at all the past week, i think this was happening even before the reinstall.

as for programs- winamp, IE, windows media, spinner, Paintshop pro 8, aim, yahoo mess., slimbrowser, ad aware, real one, microsoft reader, and a cpl others- like the software that came with my digital camera and stuff.

the tv tuner card is the ati tv wonder ve. it wont work for some reason. it hasnt worked for months. when i hook up cable to it, the video wont show up right...its all messed up (i think last time i checked its just all static,and its not on the wrong channel or anything dumb like that :) ).....i didnt even install the software for it, since its useless.

as for drivers and stuff- i guess i should have the updated ones. other than my monitor which i had to update drivers for, i cant think of what else that i need to check on....

and finally, im not sure about fragmented...not even sure how to check that. but, i havent run defrag at all. i didnt think youd need to do that until some time went by and things had a chance to move all over the drive and get out of place and all.

[paulselhi]

try moving the irq's around, if you have any free ones try moving the vid card

as yhings are ok in safe mode then it does seem likely that you have a conflict, disable things one by one and try to narrow done the source of the problem this way

make sure you have plenty of free space on the drive that holds your temp file, if programs have problems with temp space you will get errors

normal defrag will not defrag your pagefile, try diskeeper for this, also make sure it is big enough and to stop it from fragmenting set it's min and max to be the same so it is built fully at start up

your RAM is very low, buy more and check that is is ok and seated properly ( continualy leaping up and waving it's arms screaming for reinforcements will hit system performance :p )

if windows update is giving you problems go to the ms site and do a manual update

check for the latest drivers for all your hardware as well as firmware fixes

is your bios up to date, check with the motherboard manufacturer for updated bios and also look at the MB guide, has anyone tinkered with the settings ? more often than not changes to the bios that appear to give performance boots can degrade the system

your processor could be overheating check the cpu fan is ok and the heat sink is seated properly, if your MB has heat sensors install a monitor ( many free on the net) to keep a check on temps but i doubt if this is the issue

finally go to pcpitstop.com and get a free health check

[paulselhi]

and finally, im not sure about fragmented...not even sure how to check that. but, i havent run defrag at all. i didnt think youd need to do that until some time went by and things had a chance to move all over the drive and get out of place and all. [/B]

you should defrag regularly, i do it about once a week, it really speeds up performance, then again i regularly load and unload 300 MB plus files but even though i dony use the c drive for these the c drive still fragmnents quite quickly and does enjoy a good defrag

[paulselhi]

defrag is found under system tools

[JBoze3131]

okay. i ran diskkeeper and defragmented the drive. i went to pcpitstop and tested the machine before doing that and it noted that it needed that. it also said low memory(64MB) and a few other things that i took care of.

i changed the setting in IE to 75 (the setting someone mentioned from 5-80)....

now, after i ran diskkeeper, it says low memory and also uncached (speed?) is low.....here is the summary. not sure what i need to do to deal with this problem. its weird, because i dont think it said that uncached level being low the first time i ran it. i disabled norton auto protect, since it said that might affect it. so thats not the issue.

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Drive LettersThese are drive letters associated with hard disk drives. This list does not include drive letters for floppy disks or other removable media such as CD-ROM, DVD, Zip or Jaz drives.

Description Drive C
Partition format FAT32
Cluster size 8 KB
Drive label GATEWAY
Size 9772 MB
Free space 7775 MB (80%)
Drive health OK
Last scan Mon Jul 29 2002
Data fragmentation 5%
File fragmentation 1%
Last defrag Mon Jul 29 2002
Junk files 50 MB (1%)
Cached speed 15.47 MB/s
Uncached speed 1.25 MB/s (50%)



Percentages shown for free space and junk files (temporary files, browser cache, Recycle Bin files) represent the size relative to the total disk capacity. A disk with 50% free space is half-full (or half-empty, if you're an optimist).

Our full tests only perform disk health checking on the C drive. We recommend that you check the health of your other drives using our Disk Health page.
Data fragmentation measures the percentage of data on the disk that is contained in fragmented files. File fragmentation is the percentage of files on the disk that are fragmented. Some disk optimization programs such as Win98 Disk Defragmenter intentionally fragment files to place them in the best position to ensure quick program loading, so the fragmentation measures may be non-zero even after running a disk optimizer. For more details see our Disk Health page.

Cached and uncached speed is measured in megabytes per second (MB/s). When a percentage is shown for cached and uncached speed, it compares the performance of the drive with those of systems in our database with the same processor and clock speed. (Our database currently has 62610 similar systems.) A rating of 200% means a disk is twice the performance of similar systems, 50% means it's half the performance. Cached disk speed generally measures the efficiency of the system's processor and memory system, not the performance of the hard disk. Uncached speed is most affected by the physical hard disk and the disk interface.

Disk DrivesHere are the physical disk drives that we have detected on your system:

Drive 0
Drive letters C
Removable media No
Brand/Model WDC WD102AA
IDE details Master
Serial number WD-WM6570596893
Revision level 82.10A8


For IDE drives, IDE details show whether the drive has DMA enabled and is an IDE master (single drive, or master drive in a master/slave pair).

Disk ControllersHere are the hard disk controllers that we have detected on your system:

Vendor Product
(Standard hard disk drivers) Primary IDE controller (dual fifo)
(Standard hard disk drivers) Secondary IDE controller (dual fifo)
Intel Intel 82371AB/EB PCI Bus Master IDE Controller


CD/DVD DrivesHere are the CD and DVD drives that we have detected on your system:

Model Type Max Read Speed Max Write Speed
NEC CD-ROM DRIVE:28G CD-ROM 7056 KB/s (40X) N/A
IDE-CD R/RW 8x4x32 CD-RW 5648 KB/s (32X) 1411 KB/s (8X)

[paulselhi]

the tv tuner card is the ati tv wonder ve. it wont work for some reason. it hasnt worked for months. when i hook up cable to it, the video wont show up right...its all messed up (i think last time i checked its just all static,and its not on the wrong channel or anything dumb like that ).....i didnt even install the software for it, since its useless.


are you using anothet vid card or on board card ? if so physically remove the duff tv tuner, it is being detected by the system but is not loading drivers hence the ? in device manager, this could be the cause of your conflicts

again the technique to troubleshooting is to make a single change at a time and then reboot and see if that cures things, if not go back as you were then make another change and test..slowly slowly, catch the monkey...

[Croc Hunter]

When ever you re-install ensure your discs are clean so all data is rewritten. Got caught out by a smudged Xp not long ago.

I thought you may be low on free space that will cause freezes but if you truly have %80 or at least 1/4 HD free space rule that out.

Heat is another suspect. Take the cover off your box and clean the fan and boards of dust. Try pointing a regular fan inside the case while you compute. If that fixes install a faster fan in your box.

Most likely though it's RAM. Just because it's detecting RAM doesn't mean it's functioning properly as Alphadesk found out recently. RAM is so cheap now if your slots permit throw at least another stick of 32 in there. I ran 98se with 96Mb for ages no probs. 64Mb RAM is realy just not enough. Look at replacing your 2x32Mb with 1x128Mb stick.

[JBoze3131]

is replacing ram and putting it in easy? it is fairly simlple, isnt it? also...how do i find out which kind of ram? at pcpitstop.com, this is what it says for my computer:

64+0+0;DIMM,DRAM,|Synchronous;T16

dimm and dram, ive seen...but not sure if theyre the same or what, and if there is more info. i need to find the right type.

[JBoze3131]

a few things. today it was running better...but then it started freezing, and now everytime i reboot it freezes. it hasnt done it yet, but i had to reboot at least 20 times and watch it freeze...went in and took out the tv tuner card that doesnt work anyhow, deleted all the software for it and the drivers for it...cleaned the dust out of the fan area...the vents...it seems to be running like it should, and its pushing out cool air, and inside its not warm to the touch...not sure if that says much.

i defragmented the drive again, dont ask me how it got screwed up again after i just did it with disk keeper.

i took the video card out and popped it back in, making sure its in night and tight. still didnt solve the issue with the gray lines im seeing. its bearable tho...the freezing nonstop isnt! cant even barely get on here and type thismessage (this is my 4th try)...im sending now, so thank god, its finally gonna go thru, i hope...

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whew. posted withoiut freezing. nice. anyhow, i called gateway and the guy told me to unhook my ethernet card and try it. i didnt do that, since i need it to get online 8dont have a usb cable for the modem).....he had me put in the restoration cd and run gwscan (which ive no idea what the diff is between that and regular disk scan?) it said no errors on the drive and i rebooted and here i am. waiting for it to freeze again.

[satis]

I'd recommend removing all hardware except what you absolutely have to have. Basically, keep the RAM, CPU, and video card, pull everything else out. Windows might complain some, but it should be ok. That'll eliminate the issue being cause by a failing peripheral (like your network card). If it stops freezing, you can put in your peripherals one by one until it starts freezing again... then you know what the problem part is.

And, if that doesn't work, you eliminate your peripherals. It'll be motherboard/graphics card/RAM/CPU problems. Personally I'm betting on the graphics card, but that's more a guess than anything.

[JBoze3131]

the graphics card in there...what do you do? just go and get like a 3d accelerator card and it acts as your video card or what? not sure if theres a difference between those cards you want for gaming and the video card itself...my guess is that theyre one in the same. when you get one of those radeon cards or whatever, they act as the video card too?

as for hardware. all i have is the nic i guess? the sound card and video card that came with the machine...

for some reason, ive been working online and it hasnt frozen yet. i dotn get it. tomorrow, ill be back in the same situation, i bet. freezing nonstop...a day of normality...then back again.

[satis]

yea, video card, graphics card, 3d accelerator, all basically the same thing. You just get better performance from the high-end stuff... which, if you don't game or do 3d rendering or whatever, it doesn't matter.

Yea, I forgot you have integrated sound and video. :/ Dunno what to tell you. You could try pulling out that nic and just seeing what happens, since that's your only real hardware. I had an issue with win98 and a specific network card I had... when I opened IE alot of times my system would freeze up hard. Or browsing, or whatever. Reinstalling 98 didn't fix it, and I had no clue what was wrong. Eventually I switched out the network card and the freezing went away. Wierd stuff happens to me on a regular basis. I suppose this could be your problem, but who knows.

Can you disable you video card in BIOS? Not that I recommend doing that unless you can get a replacement, of course. Still, if you don't even have that option it may be time to look at replacing your computer (or at least motherboard). Those gray lines you're talking about still have me worried.

[Croc Hunter]

is replacing ram and putting it in easy? it is fairly simlple, isnt it? Replacing/adding ram is easy peasy 64+0+0 means you have a 64mb stick and 2 slots free. The grey lines are a worry :/ You can get a basic Roadster graphics Accellerator card for about $40. I'd recomend a GeoForce.

To add/replace ram. Search for ram pictures on Google "dram 64" to get an idea of what to look for in your box. Locate pull and have your local comp store test it. Buy another while you're at it about $40. Even if your comp dies you should be able to plug this type of ram into the next build. sdram is most popular though.