Weird Pc crash

Nuclear Winter · April 10, 2003, 15:50

Hello,
I am having some problems with my pc, and I tought you could help.
When I had 128mb ram on my PC (winxp and new PC)It would crash very frequently, sometimes even while using the net. It did get so slow when those crashes happened (almost a freeze, in fact) that even though teh mouse would move OK, the PC would get unusable, as for example it would crash while viewing a page on the net, I´d click to minimize the window of IE and it would take aeons for it to complete the task.I had to reset the PC . It seemed to be related to video cards or to low memory (as programs that were more RAM-video demanding would crash faster). Changed the videocards lots of times, updating and such, then I increased virtual memory (this made it crash a little less while netting, and even allowed me to play civ2), And as people told me it was surely a lack of RAM I have today sucessfuly instaled 512 mb ram. Though it is still crashing.
I am using Win Xp, Nvidia´s GeForce Mx100/200 updated, Intel (R)
Pentium(R) 4 CPU 1.70 ghz
Tsr´s open are taskmgr.exe
CTFMON.exe
hpgs2wnf.exe
HPGS2WND.exe
ccApp.exe
svchost.exe
nvsvc32.exe
ccPxySvc.exe
spoolsv.exe
Explorer.EXE
Nsium.EXE
ccEvtMgr.exe
svchost.exe
svchost.exe
svchost.exe
svchost.exe
lsass.exe
services.exe
winlogon.exe
csrss.exe
SMSS.EXE
system

Please help me,
Nuclear Winter

Richelieu · April 10, 2003, 15:53

Far fetched but : how big is your hard drive and do you have any space left ?

Nuclear Winter · April 10, 2003, 16:14

Total Hard disk space 16,5 GB
Used Hard disk space 11,0 GB
5,52 GB free

Richelieu · April 10, 2003, 16:20

I am guessing that all devices in Device Manager are OK, you ran Windows update and checked for latest BIOS update also ?

Urban Ranger · April 10, 2003, 22:53

You have too many programs running at the same time. What's this "svchost" thing and why are there 5 instances of it?

Kirnwaffen · April 10, 2003, 22:56

svchost is the alias windows uses for its services. There is typically one instance for each active service. Disabling is not recommended, unless you know specifically which services you do and don't need.

Kirnwaffen · April 10, 2003, 22:58

And I don't see anything in there that's atypical for XP. That's actually pretty minimal.

Kuciwalker · April 10, 2003, 23:14

You have an XP system with only 128 megs of RAM? Where'd you find that anachronism :P

(my really really old Win95 comp had 128 megs)

Kirnwaffen · April 10, 2003, 23:20

Other things to check:

Motherboard brand/type
Type of RAM
Processor temp
Other hardware installed

Are you certain it's a P4 and not a Celeron?

Urban Ranger · April 10, 2003, 23:27

Quote:

Originally posted by Kirnwaffen
And I don't see anything in there that's atypical for XP. That's actually pretty minimal.

That's a lot of who-knows-what is running.

Kirnwaffen · April 10, 2003, 23:54

Well, the hpgs stuff can go, as can ctfmon. As for just about anything beginning with cc, I'd leave it. That prefix (along with "nav") typically relates to Norton software. You could try disabling these as a troubleshooting step, as they tend to use a lot of memory. I don't think NSUM.EXE is necessary, since I'm not running it, but I'm not entirely sure. It has something to do with media player. Other than that, I don't think you should touch anything else.

Urban Ranger · April 11, 2003, 00:00

You don't actually need any anti-virus shield running at all times. You can zap that.

Kirnwaffen · April 11, 2003, 00:16

I think the benefit from disabling Norton in this case would be negligible. 512 MB should be sufficient RAM to run anti-virus during a memory intensive game, let alone a web browser. My reccomendation is still to disable as a troubleshooting step in order to ensure that the program isn't corrupt, and if it isn't the problem, re-enable. My gut feeling is that this is a hardware/OS problem of some kind, rather than a problem with a specific app.

By the way NW, do you have SP1? As I recall there was a known issue with IE before SP1 which could cause it to eat CPU cycles like no other.

Richelieu · April 11, 2003, 06:52

BTW : What error message (if any) do you get when it crashes ? What are your Virtual Memory settings ?

Skanky Burns · April 11, 2003, 06:59

Doesn't the event viewer show things that are causing problems, and sometimes what is causing crashes?

The Viceroy · April 11, 2003, 07:21

I ran XP with 64Mb and 500Mb HD free on a P2 350 for a while, a tad slow, but it never crashed in that way.

Turn off as many services as you can anyway, as that will help.

Most likely cause is a naff driver .. did this start as soon as you installed XP, or was there some event which occured after that point (you can always use recovery if you know of a date when the system was working fine).
Was it a 95/98 update to XP??? that can cause problems with incompatible device drivers.

When you start noticing the slow down, hit CTRL-ALT-ESC and see which process is eating the processor .. if its a service, you may want to try and find out which one.

Event viewer as Skanky Burns suggests may also provide info on failed services.

Daz · April 11, 2003, 08:27

Im kinda new to this forums, but I've somehow gotten the impression its Skanky's fault.

Anyway... maybe ist RAM? I had trouble vith PC-133 Ram cause my MB liked only PC-100. Thats something you can easily oversee...

Rogan Josh · April 11, 2003, 08:45

I am surprised that people say that that list of programs is a minimal set for running XP. When I run ME I have only 4 or 5 processes running in the background after boot. (I am in linux at the mo so I can't check what exactly right now.)

Try doing a minimal boot (ie. switch off everything you are allowed to, including the virus checker) and see if things improve. I am guessing it will. Then turn them on, one by one, and see where the problem is.

Zopperoni · April 11, 2003, 10:23

Perhaps your hard disk is very fragmented. Try doing a thorough defragmentation:

1) Turn off your Virtual Memory
2) Reboot
3) Run Defragmentation
4) Enable Virtual Memory again
5) Reboot
6) Run Defragmentation again

Urban Ranger · April 11, 2003, 10:59

It could be the CPU overheating.

Nuclear Winter · April 11, 2003, 15:22

I disabled the virtual memo
I now have 512mb ramDDR333, as said.
I am sure it is a P4, and I have the Bios patch, not SP1, going to look for it.
Also, the defrag analisys says it is not needed to run defrag...

Rasbelin · April 11, 2003, 19:19

Okay, I'll check up again with you tomorrow, NW.

So far I couldn't find anything, except for the disk caching settings which should be okay now. However I wouldn't rule out the usual problem that the user has bugged the system with plenty of extra files, no to only a few OS patches, loads of temporary files, maybe a few failed starts and no defragmentation done for ages. As for the processes, all seems pretty normal.

Nuclear Winter · April 11, 2003, 22:07

Edit : Just happened to fail once again!
Cr/p!

raghar · April 12, 2003, 12:29

It's because of your name Nuclear winter so your pc frozen ower.

Have you checked Directx? Your sound card drivers? Try to run Directxdiag. Do exist regcleaner for WinXP? And you could try complete check of your HD for bad sectors.

I hope you have your virtual memory on special partition or permanent.

Urban Ranger · April 12, 2003, 12:56

Question: when do the computer crash? Randomly, or after long periods of usage?

Zopperoni · April 12, 2003, 12:59

Quote:

Originally posted by raghar
I hope you have your virtual memory on special partition or permanent.

Doesn't having the pagefile on another partition, slow down your system?

Nuclear Winter · April 12, 2003, 13:28

Crashes more frequently when viewing many webpages at a time, or when using hi-memo programs.But sometimes it crashes at startup.

raghar · April 12, 2003, 16:41

oups

I meant

FAT32ext c:
d:
e: special logical disk just for your swap.

Something like that.

Zero · April 12, 2003, 18:14

Quote:

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
It could be the CPU overheating.

CPU overheating is correct. All dell laptop seems to show same symptoms that is descirbed. Does he have a dell inspiron btw?

Nuclear Winter · April 25, 2003, 16:09

Nope, my cpu has 2 coolers and I checked on the PC´s auto-check and the temperature is always at 40C.
Besides, after a weird series of problems after installing SP1 (no it is not pirate, the ID check went all ok),I was forced to format my harddisk and install only windows at hand : WinME

.
It still fails, with the notable diference that now programs won´t even open, that the PC crashes always I try to close a program that is not answering, that my soundcard (though driver is properly updated) is not working, and that most of the programs (with the exception of low resource ones)stop to answer when I try to open them (this includes trying to play a MP3 file on WinMediaPlayer, and Winamp 3 crashes when I try to open it).
I have checked My HD when I formated it, on another PC, and scanned it for problems with a full analysis program, and it has reported to be working very well.
Any ideas?