Computer running slow and locking up

Sorry as my beautiful Girlfriend just pointed out, its a crappy Gateway.

Adding RAM memory does not usually require any additional fans/cooling. It is difficult to diagnose this remotely from your description, but if you have eliminated viruses, then I'd strongly suspect adware/spyware. Try downloading the latest Adaware or Spybot Search and Destroy and run a full diagnostic. Also try deleting any unneeded files using the disk utility and then run scandisk and defrag afterward. Good luck.

Bob

Yes but there was no fan and the hard drive gets really hot. Also adaware or spyware would not cause a computer to not be able to format a harddrive.

Bob Shuman wrote:

When the unit is acting up, what temperature does the bios setup screen say the CPU is at? What speed are the fans running, the bios setup screen may also show this?

If you already know the problem, why are you asking?

Short of replacing everything how do i know the problem?

CJT wrote:

You seem already to have concluded the hard drive has overheated.

snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com:

What's "really hot"? AFAIK,HDs should not get "really hot".

what OS are you using? what is the speed of the processor? what is the make of tha HDD? How old is this computer?

furnish me with these details n maybe i could give you something that would work!

Check CPU is BIOS detected at it's correct speed, and the speed of the RAM is correct for the motherboard. You can get a free utility 'cpu-z' from

If correct, I'd blame the CPU fan/heatsink. May be running slowly, or the heatsink is no longer making much contact with the CPU, as the thermal paste has fallen off. Take it off (carefully), clean and remount it with a small bit of thermal paste.

Modern CPU's, if run hot, will run down their internal clock architecture to save damage - this causes a very slow running machine.

If your hard drive feels hot, it would not hurt to add a fan. The primary cause of total hard drive failure is excessive heat, and a lot of manufacturers don't pay much attention to this as they should.

-- Adrian C

Hi,

With a brand new hard drive installed the overheating issue with the old hard drive has been bypassed, forget about it, pretend it didn't happen.

When you formatted the new hard drive what error did it give you?

When the computer locks up do you hear any clicks, squeaks, beeps, clanks, or clunks? Does it give any error messages?

When I build/modify systems I put a fan blowing in at the bottom front and one blowing out at the top rear, above the power supply if possible or as close to the CPU as possible or there isn't any room above the power supply.

An excellent place for online computer help is:

Later,

-Landon

Have you got an old hd that you can install a FRESH copy of windows on? If so try this and see how the computer acts. By what your saying you have copied your partition from your old drive to the new, and have just transfered your corupt file from one drive to the next let me know