[samwiches]

Hi,

My problem started last Sunday. Everything was fine on the previous day, but then not 5 minutes after I turned my laptop on on Sunday, it completely froze up. I couldn't click anything, ctrl+alt+del didn't work, my cursor was displaying the blue vista loading icon. The only thing I could do was force shut down. I don't know if this has anything to do with it, but my laptop won't freeze as soon if I have the power cable disconnected, it will last about 15 minutes before freezing then.

I can safely log into Safe Mode with Networking, which is what I'm using now. I've done a full system scan with Avast and MalwareBytes and neither found any issue. I also ran memtest86, which did 5 passes and found 0 errors. I hadn't downloaded or installed anything new before this happened.

Some system specs:
Toshiba Satellite
Windows Vista SP2, 32-bit
2.26 GHz processor
4GB RAM

Any help is appreciated, thanks

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use msconfig...start tab...uncheck everything except your AV and touch pad...
reboot into normal mode... feel the laptop vents for air coming out

[happyrock]

use msconfig...start tab...uncheck everything except your AV and touch pad...
reboot into normal mode... feel the laptop vents for air coming out

[Lloyd_01]

The main reasons for laptop freezing are due to:

• Age of the laptop
• How badly had it been ‘abused’
• Overheating
• Operating System files
• Hardware drivers
• Cluttered laptop registry

CTRL+ALT+DEL should do the trick. Just close out the programs that are causing the problem by hitting the end task tab. If this does not quite solve your concern, then you can proceed to completely uninstall the problematic program.

If this still doesn’t work, you may want to defragment your hard drive. You can also reboot the system and see if the problem is solved. An anti-virus program might also deep-clean your laptop so it’s also advisable to download one.

[samwiches]

use msconfig...start tab...uncheck everything except your AV and touch pad...
reboot into normal mode... feel the laptop vents for air coming out

Done, but it still froze after a few minutes. Air vents seem fine

The main reasons for laptop freezing are due to:

• Age of the laptop
• How badly had it been ‘abused’
• Overheating
• Operating System files
• Hardware drivers
• Cluttered laptop registry

CTRL+ALT+DEL should do the trick. Just close out the programs that are causing the problem by hitting the end task tab. If this does not quite solve your concern, then you can proceed to completely uninstall the problematic program.

If this still doesn’t work, you may want to defragment your hard drive. You can also reboot the system and see if the problem is solved. An anti-virus program might also deep-clean your laptop so it’s also advisable to download one.

My laptop is just over 3 years old, but I had it serviced and a few parts replaced not even 2 months ago so it's practically brand new. So my registry is pretty clear, as are my system files. And as I said, nothing is possible when the freezing occurs, all I can do is move my cursor around or force shut down. I'd also mentioned running full system scans using Avast and MalwareBytes, but I will defrag right now

[happyrock]

download and install WhoCrashed from http://www.softpedia...oCrashed.shtml' class='bbc_url' title='External link' rel='nofollow external'>here..
This program checks for any drivers which may have been causing your computer to crash....

click on it...then run...then next...put a tick in accept...then next..put a tick in the don't create a start menu folder..then next...put a tick in create a desktop icon..then install.. then make sure there is a tick in launch whocrashed...then finish...then click Analyze ...

if you get a message
This software requires the right version of Windows Debugging Tools for your type of computer. Because this is not normally installed and is not redistributable, we suggest you select the download option from below. Then the right package will be downloaded to a temporary folder and the required files will be extracted from the package automatically. You only need to do this once
click on download then try running it again

WhoCrashed will create report...you have to scroll down to see it
Copy and paste it into your next reply...

[samwiches]

Ran WhoCrashed in Vista and it said "No valid crash dumps have been found on your computer". I'll try running it in Safe Mode too, to see if that's any different

edit: Just ran the program in Safe Mode, after Vista had frozen, and got the same message

Edited by samwiches, 25 January 2012 - 03:47 AM.

[happyrock]

use the instructions here to turn on event logging
be sure to uncheck Automatically reboot...that way you will get the blue screen that has info that may help us figure out the problem

[samwiches]

I've done that. I'll boot into Vista and wait for it to freeze, then just leave it and see what happens. But it never restarts itself or anything, and I've never got a blue screen, it just freezes up and stays like that until I force shut down so I don't know if this will uncover anything. I'll leave it to hang though and see what happens

[samwiches]

Okay, the freezing this time was a little different. It started as it normally does, with everything becoming unresponsive and with me only being able to move the cursor, but then the screen went black and I got a pop-up saying there was a Security Failure. No error code, or any information as to what the security failure is/was caused by. Once I closed the pop-up, the black screen remains (I'm posting this from my phone)

Just went through it again to copy down the exact pop-up message:

Logon Process Has Failed To Create The Security Options Dialog
Failure - Security Options

Then the only thing to click is the close 'x' or an OK button

Edited by samwiches, 26 January 2012 - 09:00 AM.

[happyrock]

open up the task manager and click on processes...get a screenshot...drag the window open enough to see them all at once prior to getting screenshot

[samwiches]

Just ran a full check disk as well, and so far everything seems to have stabilised but I don't want to speak too soon

I've attached the screenshot of my processess, only thing missing was Paint which I just opened to save the picture

Attached Thumbnails

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[happyrock]

was it chkdsk /r...if so that's probably what "fixed it"

one more thing is utorrent...if you have any more issues try uninstalling it

[samwiches]

Yeah it was. Any idea what the problem was caused by/ways to prevent it in the future, or is it just one of those things that happen for no reason? Haha

I will do. Everything seems fine now though, thanks a lot for your help

[happyrock]

Yeah it was. Any idea what the problem was caused by/ways to prevent it in the future

nope but if it happens again I would suspect the hard drive is about to fail...
be diligent with your backups to somewhere other than that drive...like to dvd's or usb flash drives or to a external hard drive...
remember this...
data that you don't have at least 2 copies of is data you really don't care about

[samwiches]

I did suspect that. Last time my HD filed, it was doing similar things

Yup I do that. My laptop actually has 2 hard drives, one that I have my OS and general My Documents files on etc, and then I use the 2nd one as a backup, and I also have a 1TB external harddrive that I update regularly just to be safe

Thanks again