Ben89

For the past week, it has been freezing randomly mostly when I'm watching youtube videos or listening to music causing me to have to manually shut off the computer, AND it randomly restarts both when the OS has loaded and I've been on the computer for a while and during the start up process. Very odd situation. Should I just reformat the computer? This is a vista machine by the way.

__________________

DBWebDev

Shove in a Linux Live CD and see if you get the same problem. At least that way you'll know if it's a hardware issue or a Windows one.

Ben89

I'll try with ubuntu, thanks

__________________

SpamHat

Try windows 7.

Garrett

Vista = Fail. On second thought, Windows = Fail

__________________

xentech

Until you inevitably need it to run software that is Windows only, then it succeeds.

Drake

Might try removing Flash and reinstalling it. Youtube = Flash.

How are you listening to music? Itunes? Winamp? WMP?

evo190

If it's not software related, it's probably overheating or a HDD issue. I have a laptop that overheats and shuts off, before that the HDD was about to die and would shutoff/restart. For the heat issue I bought one of those USB notebook coolers.

adamx12m

Definitely make sure you have upgraded Flash with youtube. I've had firefox lockup my vista machine several times awaiting a network request with video. Vista acts strange at times with network drives where it will just appear lost accessing files thus giving the impression your machine is locked. Also regularly update codecs with klite mega pack.

ncmedia

Have you upgraded your MSN or AIM recently?

I had a similar problem a while back with a machine, and after heavy troubleshooting, and visiting a PC shop with the machine, we figured out by simple process of elimination that for some reason, just that particular version of MSN made my machine do pretty much everything you are describing. *Check your start up disc/aps, something that is booting on start up could be conflicting with your OS, take everything out of there that doesn't truly need to boot on startup.

If it's not MSN, simply start deleting processes, and not running anything but one ap at a time until you find the culprit. If it's not software related I agree with evo, fan/cooling could be gone, power supply could be on its way out, it's shutting off to protect itself from overheating any further.

__________________

awesometbn

You could try shutting off services that you don't need. Below is a file I created called services.bat that could help you to reclaim control of your machine. Use at your own risk, you may have to customize it for your own purposes.

[high=php]
@echo off
cls
echo Stopping services to free up memory . . .
echo.
net start
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Apple Mobile Device"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Bonjour Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "iPod Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Automatic Updates"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Background Intelligent Transfer Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Distributed Link Tracking Client"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Error Reporting Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Event Log"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "FLEXnet Licensing Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Print Spooler"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Lavasoft Ad-Aware Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "LexBce Server"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Remote Access Connection Manager"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "System Event Notification"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "System Restore Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Shell Hardware Detection"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "SSDP Discovery Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Task Scheduler"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Themes"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Windows Audio"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Windows Time"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "VMware Authorization Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "VMware DHCP Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "VMware NAT Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "VMware Virtual Mount Manager Extended"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "COM+ Event System"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Fast User Switching Compatibility"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Network Location Awareness (NLA)"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Cryptographic Services"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "IPSEC Services"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Help and Support"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Security Center"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Windows Management Instrumentation"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "COM+ Event System"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "NVIDIA Driver Helper Service"
echo.
echo =====================================
net stop "Protected Storage"
echo.
echo =====================================
echo.
echo This is the ideal minimum list of running services,
echo.
echo DCOM Server Process Launcher
echo DHCP Client
echo DNS Client
echo Event Log
echo HID Input Service
echo Network Connections
echo Plug and Play
echo Remote Access Connection Manager
echo Remote Procedure Call (RPC)
echo Secondary Logon
echo Security Accounts Manager
echo Telephony
echo Terminal Services
echo TrueVector Internet Monitor
echo Workstation
echo.
echo And here is the current list of running services,
echo see if there is anything else you want to stop.
echo.
net start
echo.
echo Done![/high]

The other idea is to make sure recent security updates for Flash and other things have been applied. Since this is Windows it wouldn't hurt to go through the motions and do a regular scan for spyware and antivirus. There's a lot more you can do, if this is related to software instead of hardware, than just giving up and trying to reformat.

__________________
Let us help you run your own music teaching studio. Trombone or guitar or piano or *any* instrument you can teach! A more efficient studio means more money in your pocket.

Reason for avatar: http://www.wickedfire.com/sell-buy-t...-pictures.html

Fatbat

Random hangs and freezes sounds like a heat problem to me.

Have you opened the case and cleaned out your fans and heatsinks lately? This is very important and quite often something people overlook when their computer starts acting up.

Get some compressed air and clean that shit out, especially around the CPU, the video card, bus, ram, etc. Just give the whole thing a thorough cleaning and I bet your problem goes away.

__________________
BRAD SHAW - GRAPHIC DESIGN [ WEB - PRINT - IDENTITY ] >>>

Ben89

Yeah I did that just recently and I made sure all the fans were working.

But here's the thing, I probably fucked up the computer because I would always leave it on overnight. I just leave it on because it's relatively quiet and takes way too long to start up again in the morning.

__________________

HarveyJ

I'm with Fatbat on this one...
Make sure there's plenty of open space around the computer and that there's no dust inside it. Dust seems harmless, but it retains a lot of heat and prevents airflow.

If noise is a concern for you, and you're not willing to go liquid or gas-exchange cooling, then get the Asus CF Silent Square Evo.
They look fucking cool, you can barely hear them when they're in overdrive, and I've never seen my CPU temp go above 40C, even when it gets that hot here during a Summer's day.

__________________
After 10,000 years I'm free!

papajohn56

Nope, that's when VMWare or Crossover succeeds.

__________________

jryan21

It could be a device conflict, but the kind that only happens when a dozen or so conditions are true.

If you have an add-on sound card, try putting it in a different slot. Also, if you are checking for heat buildup, check around the GPU on the video card as well. Power supply, too.