Desktop issue....

[0rion]

Been having problems with my desktop freezing. Ran antivirus and antimalware and both came back clean. Did a clean install with win 7 ultimate, updated bios, and pulled all the plugs off the board and reseated them. Still freezing up and seems to be getting worse. It will freeze everytime it goes into screen saver mode....either going in or won't come out. When it freezes up it won't let me ctrl-alt-delete or anything....have to hard boot it. It's also randomly freezing now when on the web.....froze up just trying to type this post so I had to reboot and retype it. When the threads autosave now it gets kinda glitchy and that will sometimes freeze it but not always. It's a 4 year old emachine so it may just be time for a new desktop but before running out and buying a new one I wanted to see if there's anything I'm missing troubleshooting this one. I really don't think it's a virus....the clean install should've ruled that out. I'm wondering if I have bad memory or something like that? Not sure exactly how to test memory but I'm sure there's software out there that will do it. I'm also wondering if maybe it's just a bad install of windows? I may try to do another clean install and see what happens. I do know it starts up a little differently now and has a funny look to it when the "starting windows" splash screen comes up...almost like it's in safe mode but not sure. Any thoughts, ideas, or suggestions?

[KahanaReef]

How is your graphics card? Latest updated driver installed?

[0rion]

Tried a video driver.....no change.

[wileyCoyote]

i've found some screen savers that come w/ windows suck, and cause problems on my computer.... can you try changing to a different screen saver, and see if the crash/freeze still occurs... who knows, these things are probably poorly designed code-wise, and some probably run into rendering issues w/ the vid card...

[KahanaReef]

Is it on board or a card? Are you sure you have the right driver?

I had a similar issue that started out that way but on a laptop. It turned out to be the NVIDIA graphics chip. Maybe try Action Center in the control panel and see if it finds anything

[Z28Thunder]

Is it on board or a card? Are you sure you have the right driver?

I had a similar issue that started out that way but on a laptop. It turned out to be the NVIDIA graphics chip. Maybe try Action Center in the control panel and see if it finds anything

I agree with all that has been said above. I wonder like Dena if your video card is not going out? I had my nvidia geforce 8800 GTX do the same thing. I went and bought a cheap card to see if it fixed the issue and it did. Others told me to do a fresh install of Windows 7 Ultimate but I knew it was not the OS. Turned out to be the card. I was not happy because that 8800 GTX was not cheap and a rocking card. And is now a boat anchor (trust me it was a huge card),

[KahanaReef]

That is what I was thinking too. If he's got a card and it's not on board, just get a cheap one or borrow one from someone and slip it in and check it out

[Z28Thunder]

That is what I was thinking too. If he's got a card and it's not on board, just get a cheap one or borrow one from someone and slip it in and check it out

Aye if you know some that can let you borrow one real quick give it a try. I like you Dena use to keep all of my computer hardware. But with all that has happened in the last year I have gotten rid of a ton of JUNK. So I had to buy a cheap one first..

If it is on board and a PC not a laptop you can just disable it in the bios.

[KahanaReef]

I needed to get rid of all my stuff. Twice I had acquired way too many parts over the years and they were just taking up space and collecting dust. Everything gets outdated super quick. So, no more computer grave yard for me in my office closet. Down to one box A few cards, OS disks, one MB, a couple of processors, and some cables, memory, etc... No more extra towers or monitors laying around. It's liberating

[0rion]

It's onboard graphics. I'll have to see if i have a video card somewhere. If i do it'll be an ancient one.

[Z28Thunder]

It's onboard graphics. I'll have to see if i have a video card somewhere. If i do it'll be an ancient one.

Depending on how ancient it may not work in Win 7... But you can always try...

[Z28Thunder]

No more extra towers or monitors laying around. It's liberating

It was not just the computer stuff here. 30 years worth of collecting and then not using. But yes It is liberating to be free of all that junk. I have a new motto here. If I have not used it in the last 6 months it gets donated or trashed.

[wileyCoyote]

one other thing to try might be updating directx...

[Smittro]

How old is the comp?

Make sure you even have the right port for a graphics card.. PCe port, etc, etc.

Is your comp even up to running a 64bit os?

What's your procesor speed? Ultimate win7 maybe too much for your old comp to handle.

Installing the wrong video driver can cause issues too.

Gotta have the right hardware for your software to function properly, otherwise you could be running your os in a limited capability state.

If you're unsure about any of this, expect the blue screen of death soon..lol

[Smittro]

Never mind I see it's an old e-Machine.

If it's using the intel celleron processor it's too old/slow for any version of WIN7.

Did you try running windows update?

e-machines are what is left of the old Gateway computer co.

Also,, ever since the site was changed it's been clitchy.

Most of the time you have to refresh the page just to edit a post.

Jumps all over the place will the page loads etc, etc.

[0rion]

Thought i posted this but see now i didnt. Not used to using the phone so i hit "done" & forget to hit reply. Anywho......i've been running win7 on it for a year or so. Just something that started recently. I'm just gonna get a new desktop....not worth the headache farting with this old POS

[KahanaReef]

But... now I want to know if it's indeed the graphics card

[0rion]

http://m.bestbuy.com/m/e/product/fea...=1218661380588

Think i might go buy this. Keep in mind i'm not a gamer or tech nerd. I just need something to surf the web on & download some shit from time to time.

[NE-Firebird]

http://m.bestbuy.com/m/e/product/fea...=1218661380588

Think i might go buy this. Keep in mind i'm not a gamer or tech nerd. I just need something to surf the web on & download some shit from time to time.

I get:
Sorry, the page you requested was not found.

BTW: If you buy a Windows7 machine now, an upgrade to Windows8 is either super cheap (?$20?) or free.



Also: Microsoft is offering an XP/Vista/Win7 upgrade to Win8 for $40 starting ~Nov until ~Jan (Limit: 5 licenses per person! :-P).

NOTE: The CPU and BIOS must support the "NX" bit!
Screw the stupid "requirements" page. Basically, that means that all Pentium4 systems are not upgradable (only a very very few P4s have the NX bit ability, and don't forget that the the bios must also support the NX bit).

I have a nice 2GB ram, 3.2GHz dual core with hyperthreading Dell GX270 SFF that I was going to put Win8 on and give to my niece. Nice machine. Fine and perfect for everything - except for "hard core games". You can pick them up on ebay for under $100. Add in $40 for Win8 upgrade, and you'd have a great low cost machine for a student that was also easy/cheap to fix and maintain.

But, only one P4 that fits that socket has the NX-bit ability, and it's 2.8Ghz single core and no hyperthreading. Fine, that's still "good enough". Well, the bios doesn't support the NX-bit. So, Win8 will not run on the P4 and GX270.

BTW: That 2.8GHz P4 single core also supports 64bits and has over twice as many transistors as the 3.2GHz dual core. Yea, 64-bit ability comes at a real cost.

[KahanaReef]

That is what I get too.

I don't know how much I like Win8. Seems like it's packed with all kinds of super duper spy technology. It probably has the ability to watch you while you sleep