1998 Pentium II computer running 350Mhz; 8 GB HD; 128 MB ram.
OS - Windows ME.

Computer hangs often and only way to get back up is to drop power and go through long bootup. Re-loaded operating system. Checked HD for errors. Ran WinClean Ultra to find any errors. None found.

Can a bad battery do this? Probably original battery. My experience is that a bad battery prevents booting machine. Any thoughts on this?

Charlie J.

You will need to post more information.

When does it freeze?

Does the OS load?

Are there any error messages???

It doesn't sound like a battery issue. If it were you would probably see the system clock go funny and your BIOS settings would return to defaults.

Since you are running WinME, have you cleaned up the unneeded background garbage? It tends to run more stable and smooth if you do. Do you run any temperature monitoring programs? This could be a temp problem. Also, have you cleaned it out lately? Too much dust can cause temp and other problems...

Computer hangs intermittently often. No error messages. Everything frozen. No cursor movement. Was running Windows 98 and doing the same thing, so I loaded ME. Doesn't seem to be running hot.

Deleted recently loaded programs, but it didn't help. This is a puzzler.

Do you have a way to check the temps, you won't know if it is running hot until it does something like what it is doing...

Have you run a set of security scans? I would run Spybot and/or AdAware to see if you have a spyware program messing things up in the background. If that doesn't do it, a HijackThis scan would be the next step. Reboot before running it and use the latest version. Copy/paste the log here and don't fix anything until the experts can look it over. Make sure you install it rather than just open from a zip file or changes made will not be reversible...

Computer has never been on Internet. Used in an office to keep records and inventory info. Haven't checked to see if processor fan is running.
That's next step. Possible PS problem, or MOBO failure. Thanks for your help!

Charlie J.

The majority of attacks now-a-days are Internet/email borne...

However, if you're entering data via diskette you would still be vulnerable...

Random freezes/reboots are most often Heat, Power Supply, or RAM related. I would suggest following Budfred's suggestion regarding inspecting for dust bunnies etc...

The possibility does exist for Harddrive problems...I would get a copy of the Harddrive diagnostics from the manufacturer's web site and run those...of course, downloaded from a known virus free computer to a then write protected diskette...

I'm with Budfred. This is probably heat related. Based on the age of the system and the quality of the part. I would guess the CPU fan is where I would look first.