[pfgpowell]

My daughter has asked me to sort out a problem with her Samsung R530 laptop which so far has behaved well. When she is online, it keeps freezing and that is that: she has to shut it down by pressing the on/off button to get going again, which is not a good thing.

All I could do was use a utility called CleanMyPC to get rid of all rubbish and then rebuild the registry. That speeded it up considerably but it still freezes. I then gave the whole system a complete virus scan overnight using Avast, and this morning again rebuilt and defragged the registry (for good measure), but it has again frozen on me.

Short of getting her to back up all her files etc and wiping the disk and reinstalling the OS, I don't know what to do, but I thought I would tap the combined knowledge available here before such drastic surgery. Any suggestions? The Samsung otherwise behaves well and is well looked after.

[stud u like]

Cookies and spyware freeze computers up.

[pfgpowell]

Originally Posted by stud u like

Cookies and spyware freeze computers up.

Yes but wouldn't the Avast scan have flushed those out?

[Stig]

Originally Posted by pfgpowell

All I could do was use a utility called CleanMyPC to get rid of all rubbish and then rebuild the registry. That speeded it up considerably but it still freezes. I then gave the whole system a complete virus scan overnight using Avast, and this morning again rebuilt and defragged the registry (for good measure), but it has again frozen on me.

Short of getting her to back up all her files etc and wiping the disk and reinstalling the OS, I don't know what to do.

Firstly, utilities such as CleanMyPC are just as likely to make things worse, not better. Defragging the registry is just crazy!

You don't say what browser you are using. If Internet Explorer, you can do a reset which solves many problems. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/923737

An OS reinstall is the ultimate fix. You likely have a recovery partition which would do it for you in minutes. You can then reinstall only the programs you need, and not the other junk that accumulates on daughter's PCs!

[whoever,hey]

What the hell is defragging the registry!!!!!!

Try http://www.malwarebytes.org/ and http://www.superantispyware.com/

[pfgpowell]

Originally Posted by whoever,hey

What the hell is defragging the registry!!!!!!

Try http://www.malwarebytes.org/ and http://www.superantispyware.com/

It's an option with Uniblue Registry whatever sorting out software.

Look, to 99pc of us Windows 7, Mac OSX and the bloody rest of them are voodoo: we push the buttons blah-di-blah and do as we are told, but we don't have a f***ing clue what is actually going on (and I suspect a large number of those who do know what is doing on, don't know what is going on).

So with a problem like mine - which has now got worse in that the laptop freezes at start-up sometimes - we'll try anything. If I'm asked to stomp on a frog while reciting the Lord's Prayer backwards at midnight, I'll give it a whirl if there's even have a chance of sorting out a problem which is driving me crackers. And it's not even the laptop I use, anyway, I use Macs.

So any other suggestions or do I get in touch with our local friendly community witch?

[stud u like]

Originally Posted by pfgpowell

Yes but wouldn't the Avast scan have flushed those out?

Not often and not always.

You often need more than one program such as malwarebytes.

This is due to some programs having more definitions than others.

[sy278]

First of all download Malwarebytes as advised above, save it somewhere you can easily find it, like the desktop.

Next boot the system into Safe Mode to eliminate all but the base windows core to stabalise the system to try and stop the freezes at start up to alow you to work on it to try to fix it, do this by following process at: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/w...r-in-safe-mode

Once windows is in safe mode undo the 'issues' that Uniblue has likely introduced to the registry by using windows system restore: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-AU/w...system-restore

Once the system restore has completed and booted back into Windows, reboot into windows safe mode again and then run malwarebytes, as advised above, to clear out malware that may be causing the freezes.

Then test the system.

Which browser are you using? If its Internet Explorer, try starting it in 'safe mode' to see if that fixes the issue. If it does it may be an Add-In thats causing the problem. Do this by holding the Win key (the one with the windows flag on it) and pressing R key, this will open then Run command, next type "iexplore –extoff" without the quote marks and this will open up IE without add-ons.

[Stig]

Originally Posted by pfgpowell

the laptop freezes at start-up sometimes - we'll try anything..

So any other suggestions or do I get in touch with our local friendly community witch?

OK, let's start getting methodical.

When you say 'freezes', do you mean that Windows stops loading at startup, or that the mouse pointer stops moving in Windows? If so, they are possible hardware problems.

You still haven't said what the browser is.

[cnbcwatcher]

Originally Posted by pfgpowell

It's an option with Uniblue Registry whatever sorting out software.

Look, to 99pc of us Windows 7, Mac OSX and the bloody rest of them are voodoo: we push the buttons blah-di-blah and do as we are told, but we don't have a f***ing clue what is actually going on (and I suspect a large number of those who do know what is doing on, don't know what is going on).

So with a problem like mine - which has now got worse in that the laptop freezes at start-up sometimes - we'll try anything. If I'm asked to stomp on a frog while reciting the Lord's Prayer backwards at midnight, I'll give it a whirl if there's even have a chance of sorting out a problem which is driving me crackers. And it's not even the laptop I use, anyway, I use Macs.

So any other suggestions or do I get in touch with our local friendly community witch?

I'll do it for some extra cash You're lucky to be a Mac user. As for the local friendly community witch, perhaps a visit to Hogwarts is needed there

[pfgpowell]

Originally Posted by Stig

OK, let's start getting methodical.

When you say 'freezes', do you mean that Windows stops loading at startup, or that the mouse pointer stops moving in Windows? If so, they are possible hardware problems.

You still haven't said what the browser is.

The browser my daughter uses is IE. I have followed a suggestion above and reset it.

Yes, the laptop does sometimes freeze at some point in the startup, sometimes at the Welcome screen, sometimes not, sometimes works, sometimes doesn't. I downloaded one of the anti spyware utilities, ran it and it got rid of 127 adware things. I then restarted in safe mode, and ran the spyware thing again and it didn't detect anything. I have now rebooted yet again and shall hand it over to my daughter to use. If it starts playing up again - and I have no reason to think it won't - I shall just get her to save all the stuff she needs, files etc and reinstall the OS. Unfortunately, I didn't make recovery disks when I first got it, so I shall also have to track down all the drivers etc, but as I've successfully done that once before several years ago, it's nothing more than a hassle.

[Stig]

Originally Posted by pfgpowell

The browser my daughter uses is IE. I have followed a suggestion above and reset it.

Yes, the laptop does sometimes freeze at some point in the startup, sometimes at the Welcome screen, sometimes not, sometimes works, sometimes doesn't. I downloaded one of the anti spyware utilities, ran it and it got rid of 127 adware things. I then restarted in safe mode, and ran the spyware thing again and it didn't detect anything. I have now rebooted yet again and shall hand it over to my daughter to use. If it starts playing up again - and I have no reason to think it won't - I shall just get her to save all the stuff she needs, files etc and reinstall the OS. Unfortunately, I didn't make recovery disks when I first got it, so I shall also have to track down all the drivers etc, but as I've successfully done that once before several years ago, it's nothing more than a hassle.

If you have a recovery partition you won't need to reinstall from disk or find drivers.

[max99]

Originally Posted by pfgpowell

I shall just get her to save all the stuff she needs, files etc and reinstall the OS.

Her files should already be backed up - and even more so if there is a known problem with the machine.

As above, just use the built-in system recovery software. You'll find the option on the Programs menu or by pressing the relevant key(s) as soon as you switch on. Before giving the machine back to her, ensure everything is up-to-date and install your AV of choice. Remember to uninstall the trial AV or any other unnecessary software which came pre-installed.

[MrQuike]

Check your broadband speed - especially if you're using wireless. Might just need to rearrange a few objects a bit - like a metal bin, metals, fluids or even the router itself.

www.broadbandspeedchecker.co.uk


You can try a direct cable connection, for comparison, if the PC has a LAN port.