Okay, I'm at a loss here. My laptop has been giving me trouble since yesterday morning. If I use it for more than five minutes (give or take, I'm estimating here) it completely freezes up. I can't enter task manager when it's frozen.
I assumed it was the browser at first, since that was what kept freezing. That wasn't it. Then I noticed my McAfee "Real Time Scanner" kept disabling itself. A google search showed that this has happened before to others, and the suggested solution was uninstalling and running a dif virus/malware program to catch the problem. I did that, using malware bytes, and it removed one infected file. I restated my computer... Still freezes up.
I have also tried: disc defrag, cleaning up disc space (got rid of a lot of temp Internet files), running Avast, super spyware, and deleting the infected files they found.
I *can* run my laptop in safe mode w/o freezing, but it's a PITA and u can't do everything I'd like to do.


I have a dell inspiron 1525 running windows vista and office 2007.
So... Is this a case if my laptop suddenly being too old (worked fine before this!) or is there something I can do to fix it?
(pardon spelling errors, using my iPod and the autocorrect sometimes screws up what I am trying to say)

Is it possible that something may be overheating? Have you cleaned your fan/heat sink recently?

If it's overheating, wouldn't it do the same thing in safe mode? And it's overheated before and just shut off completely.
But no, I have not cleaned the fan recently. To be honest im not even sure how to do that.

Okay I jinxed myself because I was running safe mode and it froze on me. But I felt the entire thing over with my hands and nothing felt hot or even warm... It was only in for two or three minutes.

*only ON for two or three minutes

Since overheating is not your prob, it is likely a software problem or a bug causing trouble that your scanners didn't pick up. I am betting on software issue though. Have you installed any new programs recently before that started happening? Something may have changed Windows system files which can cause a conflict that results in a system freeze/lockup. While there are MANY things that can do it, I am betting you have a corrupt file somewhere causing the trouble. Might be best to just back up any data you want to save and reinstall everything from a restore disk (if you have one... o.O). One thing I used to try, was going down the list of installed programs and look at the dates and for anything you don't recognize. PITA I know, but it can be helpful. Sometimes a program can update itself and be causing the issue. Might even be a windows update that is doing it. Check your recent updates (MS puts them out every tuesday) and google some of them. Might have been a driver update or something that is doing it. Ha... I could go on and on about possible reasons. :(

Yeah, I think it's probably a software thing. I haven't personally installed or updated anything before this happened, unless it's a regular update that happens automatically.
Anonymous Source suggested (on a comment in my diary) that it was the McAfee causing the problems, so I'm attempting to uninstall that.

I know I probably should do the entire restore, but that's not really an option until I can afford to get something on which to store my files. I have way too much stuff on here and nowhere to put it yet.

Yeah, cleaning the heat sink can be kinda frustrating if you're not comfortable taking it apart. The only other thing I can think of (besides what everyone else has mentioned) is the CMOS battery, and it's probably not even related to that. The only reason it even comes to mind is because one time when I turned on my computer, it froze right on the splash screen (didn't even boot all the way up), and then almost EVERY time I tried to boot it after that, it froze in the same place. I had no idea what was going on, and my boyfriend told me to 'wiggle the CMOS battery'... I did, and it hasn't done it since.

Try doing a system restore from a few days before.

Have done it twice- once from a couple days ago and when that didn't work I did one from over a week ago (sept 30)

Okay, well the computer appears to be working all right for the moment, but i definitely need to think about finding something on which to store my files.

Nevermind. It worked for about 10 min and froze again. I'm starting to think it's just too old. It's freezing in safe mode, too.

Hey guys.. I'm not sure where to post this question but I was wondering how you customize your page with colours ect?

i'm pretty sure i have the same laptop. it freezes on me once in awhile too. i have no idea how to fix it :/