Windows 7 Freezing - Much Help Needed

pandaboy

Right straight off the bat. I turn my system on and it takes a while for it to boot once we get past the windows logo. After a few minutes the dekstop appears and will take a few more minutes to become responsive, after about 3-5 minutes it becomes competey unresponsive.

What I've noticed, it may be a driver issue as the wi-fi dongle has been in the back port and the machine freezes when searching for a network. However, I've removed all external usb devices and the issue still persists.

Secondly, I've booted in safe mode both ordinary and with networking and the same issue appears but maybe after a little while longer.

I purchased a second drive so as to reinstall the OS but my machine cannot do this as it freezes once it gets to the first step. I've tried installing to a usb key so as to create a boot drive and then install from there and that doesn't work either. I then installed the OS on the HD from another oc, thinking I could take it out and put it into my ill computer. But having realised the other pc is fully AMD and mine is INtel I'm guessing that's not how it works as the drive is completely unreadable.

I haven't got a second system so as to install the OS to the tumb drive and then do a fresh install onto my new drive. I'm also missing a SATA power cable for the second drive - I spent all my money on the new drive and a data cable to find that the PSU on my current system is an old model.

I dont know if anyone has any firther advice, or if someone in Cork had a spare SATA power cable I could borrow. But your help would be much appreciated.

pandaboy

Any questions, then ask away. I'm going to be online for a wee bit.

Fysh

The symptoms you describe sound like hardware to me. I'd suggest burning a Live CD of any linux distro you care to try, booting from that and seeing if you can replicate the issue. Disconnect your hard drive when you're doing this so we can eliminate problems with the drive as a possible cause.

If the issue still persists, you're looking at hardware. Possible causes include a defective memory module (test by removing all but one module, then testing each module until you pin down the one that's failing), degraded thermal interface material between your CPU and heatsink (a bit of a bugger, since you'd need to remove both to check - and if this is the problem you'll need to reapply a fresh coat, so you'd want to have it handy), or problems on your motherboard (eg problem with the front side bus).

If the issue doesn't manifest with a Live CD, your hard drive is failing and probably needs replacing. (I'd suggest connecting it to another system as a secondary drive, enable SMART data on that system and use something like the Acronis Drive Monitor to check the drive status). If it is failing (eg SMART reporting shows high remapped sector count, high error count or flagged as imminent failure) then use it as little as possible, get yourself set up on a new drive and then connect the flaky drive only when you're ready to try and recover data.

pandaboy

Fysh wrote: »

The symptoms you describe sound like hardware to me. I'd suggest burning a Live CD of any linux distro you care to try, booting from that and seeing if you can replicate the issue. Disconnect your hard drive when you're doing this so we can eliminate problems with the drive as a possible cause.

If the issue still persists, you're looking at hardware. Possible causes include a defective memory module (test by removing all but one module, then testing each module until you pin down the one that's failing), degraded thermal interface material between your CPU and heatsink (a bit of a bugger, since you'd need to remove both to check - and if this is the problem you'll need to reapply a fresh coat, so you'd want to have it handy), or problems on your motherboard (eg problem with the front side bus).

If the issue doesn't manifest with a Live CD, your hard drive is failing and probably needs replacing. (I'd suggest connecting it to another system as a secondary drive, enable SMART data on that system and use something like the Acronis Drive Monitor to check the drive status). If it is failing (eg SMART reporting shows high remapped sector count, high error count or flagged as imminent failure) then use it as little as possible, get yourself set up on a new drive and then connect the flaky drive only when you're ready to try and recover data.

Cheers for that Fysh. i'll try the memory module check. I'm resigning myself to the fact that it could be the HD as it's not bootable now, since I last posted.

i installed windows 7 onto the 2nd drive but from another system, which is AMD. i have a black screen with a flashing underscore, I'm assuming the pc doesn't recognise this drive and does not know what to do. I don't know if there's a workaround for this? I made the drive the primary drive in the bios also.

currently i'm trying to install the os to a usb key and then boot from that to address the first drives issues. i'm hoping to be able to do a fresh install of the OS to the secondary drive.

I don't know if there's a way to create a workaround for the second paragraph above. Google search is giving me quite a lot of different answers.

Fysh

pandaboy wrote: »

Cheers for that Fysh. i'll try the memory module check. I'm resigning myself to the fact that it could be the HD as it's not bootable now, since I last posted.

i installed windows 7 onto the 2nd drive but from another system, which is AMD. i have a black screen with a flashing underscore, I'm assuming the pc doesn't recognise this drive and does not know what to do. I don't know if there's a workaround for this? I made the drive the primary drive in the bios also.

currently i'm trying to install the os to a usb key and then boot from that to address the first drives issues. i'm hoping to be able to do a fresh install of the OS to the secondary drive.

I don't know if there's a way to create a workaround for the second paragraph above. Google search is giving me quite a lot of different answers.

You won't be able to install on a system with different CPU architecture and migrate the drive to your system. I'd expect it to try and start booting, then crash horribly, but if you're getting a black screen and flashing cursor it means there's nothing bootable on the drive you have - which may mean the bootloader is installed elsewhere (Windows can be an absolute bollix for this, MS for some reason don't give you obvious control of where the bootloader is placed by default).

Installing Windows of any kind to a USB key is only supported in Windows 8, and even then it's only Win8 Enterprise (Windows To Go). Any other version requires you to hack the install media in ways we can't discuss here, which would change how the Windows installation process sees removable disks like USB devices. I wouldn't spend too much time on this if I were you.

pandaboy

Fysh wrote: »

You won't be able to install on a system with different CPU architecture and migrate the drive to your system. I'd expect it to try and start booting, then crash horribly, but if you're getting a black screen and flashing cursor it means there's nothing bootable on the drive you have - which may mean the bootloader is installed elsewhere (Windows can be an absolute bollix for this, MS for some reason don't give you obvious control of where the bootloader is placed by default).

Installing Windows of any kind to a USB key is only supported in Windows 8, and even then it's only Win8 Enterprise (Windows To Go). Any other version requires you to hack the install media in ways we can't discuss here, which would change how the Windows installation process sees removable disks like USB devices. I wouldn't spend too much time on this if I were you.

yup just figure the USB issue out there, it worked until the last percent. Just created a bootable disk with the ISO of the original OS. Currently installing to new drive. should have my hands on a power cable in the next couple of hours, so i'm hoping I can retrieve my old files.

but yes, MS can be an absolute bollix. there seems to be a lot more red tape now than from the days of good ole XP.