PC locking up

[medley]

Weird problem really. Haven't installed anything for about 2 days. Just browsing websites and then all of a sudden my whole pc locks up. Nothing that strange all though it hasn't done that for about 2 months or so. After about 5 seconds it comes back and everything is moving again. So i close all the websites and programs down and restart the pc thinking the problem will solve itself. Load back up and still the problem persists. Lock ups every minute and then they get more and more frequent.

I go into safe mode and see if the problem still persists and unfortunately it does. I've ran a virus scan and hijack this and everything is fine. Straight after the first lock up I can't load any programs at all. I can only use the one that was open at the time.

I've realised the CPU goes right up to 100% when this lock occurs. Could it be a dodgy ram slot or something? Theres no .exe using more than your average percentage in the processors lists.


Anyone know any suggestions/solutions? I've done a quick google search but the problems are not as specific as this.
Ran a temperate check just then as well and everything is fine. Removed my USB hard drive too to make sure but still seems to be doing it.

I haven't formatted for about 2 years which would almost definitely solve the problem but I don't really want to format it right now.


Specifications:
Windows XP 32 SP2
AMD 3800+
2gig RAM

 

[medley]

Thanks for the posts. I'll try all of that (takes awhile with your PC freezing for 5 seconds after minute or so!) and reply back if the problem persists

I used avg to virus scan although it took ages cause of the freezing

Just a little edit:

Turned on my PC this morning and I got this msg:

invalid boot.ini loading from c:\windows

Went into MSCONFIG and all 3 .ini files have no text in at all. Is that a major problem? Because of this I do think its some sort of corrupted windows file rather than a hardware problem, although I did just clean out some parts to be sure. Come to think of it, about 3 hours before the problem started I got a explorer.exe crash when i clicked on an old .avi file i had made. May be it triggerred something or may be corrupted a file.

I didnt have system restore on either! I dont remember turning it off cause it can be quite useful. ****!!

 

[medley]

sounds like a corrupted boot file have a look at these links see if they are any help if not im afraid it looks like you will need to do a fresh install OS have you got a spare drive to backup important data?

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/330184

http://rselby.net/boot.htm

http://www.eggheadcafe.com/forumarchives/windowsxpbasics/jun2005/post23177842.asp

Ye I have backed up the most important stuff already if my PC wouldn't boot up or something. Could this boot.ini file be effecting the lock ups as well? Seems to me like I'll fix this problem and then the freezing will still be there. I'm going to try and fix this using the XP CD anyway

edit:
Fixed the boot.ini and the windows start up message has gone now. The system.ini & win.ini are still both blank, not sure how to fix them as google is giving me instructions based on a windows 95 setup

 

[medley]

i have been in your situation so many times and to save a lot of time hassle and getting stressed i would personally just reinstall XP as long as you have stuff backup you will be ok just what i would do

Since I came back on the PC, it hasn't froze yet for some reason. But if it does I'm definitely formatting. I've got the XP CD in the drive, ready to go if need be. Got the most important stuff backed up, just a pain installing service pack 2 and updates and reinstalling about 50 diff programs. Doesn't take aslong as you thought it might be still a pain to sort out. thanks for the help