PC Issue - Stalling?

[Vince, Pt. II]

I'm running Windows Vista Home Premium (SP1) with Intel Dual-Core 3.0 GHz CPU, 4 Gigs of RAM and an ATI Radeon 4800 series Video Card (drivers were updated about three days ago). I use Firefox 3.0.14 and run NoScript (1.9.9.14), ForeCast Fox (0.9.10.1) and FoxTrick (0.4.8.9).

Recently, my computer has been "stalling," for lack of a better word - it locks up for 30 seconds to a minute, not responding to commands (though the mouse is usually responsive, I can neither click on anything nor use keyboard commands). Once it has snapped out of the lock, it's absolutely fine, no data is lost and I can continue as normal. This happens most often while Firefox is running, but I have seen it happen while playing Borderlands as well. This started about a week ago, and I had not installed any new software at the time, nor had I visited any suspect websites.

Any ideas what could be causing this? Cursory internet searches are returning me nothing.

[Vince, Pt. II]

To further diagnose the problem...

Occasionally it is just Firefox that has stalled - I can alt-tab to different windows I have open and interact with them as normal. Other times, it's the whole system. I have yet to be able to determine what the cause is for these stalls - while it typically happens when I am navigating away from a page, it occasionally happens randomly as well.

[CraigSca]

Have you checked CPU utilization when this occurs - though that wouldn't explain the ability to alt-tab our of the stalled process. Stupid question - does the window say "not responding" or is it fat, dumb and happy?

[Vince, Pt. II]

I've actually had both issues. Occasionally the window will update with a "(Not Responding)" in the header, and at other times, it just sits there fat dumb and happy. Also, sometimes Firefox gets shaded out with white - like a 70% fill or something - while it's not responding. Other times it doesn't. It's strange, because it SEEMS like it's the same thing happening each time, but different "symptoms" go along with each instance.

[SackAttack]

Firefox has been locking up on me of late, when the browser opens, and sometimes for no reason at all. My guess is the stalling is tied somehow to Firefox.

[CraigSca]

I'm running 3.5.4 with no problems. Maybe upgrade?

[thesloppy]

Does it 'stall' during hard-drive access? Might be a symptom of a failing HD. Does it stutter during youtube videos, and the like, that use heavy disk caching.

[Vince, Pt. II]

No stutter during disk caching...it only seems to happen when I'm running games or surfing the net.

[sabotai]

Originally Posted by Vince, Pt. II

No stutter during disk caching...it only seems to happen when I'm running games or surfing the net.

Are you leaving Firefox open while playing games when this happens? Do you have any Addons installed for Firefox?

[Vince, Pt. II]

Thanks for the heads-up on 3.5.4, I had no idea there was a newer version about.

The in-game stall can happen with or without Firefox running, though it seems more frequent with Firefox open (that's pretty anecdotal evidence though). The only add-ons I use are NoScript, ForecastFox and FoxTrick, they're all up to date.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Vince, Pt. II

Thanks for the heads-up on 3.5.4, I had no idea there was a newer version about.

The in-game stall can happen with or without Firefox running, though it seems more frequent with Firefox open (that's pretty anecdotal evidence though). The only add-ons I use are NoScript, ForecastFox and FoxTrick, they're all up to date.

Yeah, I don't get any freezes unless Firefox is open. It just updated, so we'll see if that continues.

[CraigSca]

Are you playing Borderlands online when it hitches? I'm just thinking out loud - if it stalls during Firefox, could it be a network issue?

[Sweed]

Originally Posted by Vince, Pt. II

Also, sometimes Firefox gets shaded out with white - like a 70% fill or something - while it's not responding. Other times it doesn't. It's strange, because it SEEMS like it's the same thing happening each time, but different "symptoms" go along with each instance.

Running vista 64 with 4 gig of ram and I've had the firefox transparent white screen with system freezing. Have not had it happen with any other applications. I was talking to my son about it just last night and it's something he hasn't seen at all with vista. I think every time it's happened to me is shortly after waking the computer from sleep and then opening firefox.

Just went to check my firefox version and see that 3.5.4 is presently downloading. Have to wait and see if it takes care of the problem.

[Vince, Pt. II]

Originally Posted by CraigSca

Are you playing Borderlands online when it hitches? I'm just thinking out loud - if it stalls during Firefox, could it be a network issue?

I wasn't able to play Borderlands online at all until this afternoon. Not a network issue, I don't think.

[SackAttack]

It's not freezing as much as it was doing with 3.5.4, but it still does do it sometimes. I'm inclined to believe this is a Firefox issue, since there are several of us reporting having that issue with that common factor.

[Vince, Pt. II]

I'd be wholeheartedly behind you (and initially I thought that's what this was), but it's happened to me with Firefox not even running. I didn't happen all yesterday though, so maybe updating to 3.5.4 fixed it.

[Vince, Pt. II]

So today had a strange thing upon startup. Black screen with grey text on it, telling me that my computer has failed to start because a Registry file was missing or corrupt. Instructions stated to insert my Windows Install CD, restart, and then click on "Repair my Computer" when prompted.

I followed the instructions...but the computer started up completely fine with no problems with the Windows CD in the drive and didn't prompt me to do anything. It also started up about a minute faster than it had been starting up of late. It almost sounds like I might have a virus or something that may be causing this - but I'm just baffled by the apparent randomness of the slowdowns and stalls. Some days, the computer will run like a well-oiled machine. Other days, it just has a few stalls. Finally, some days it runs like it's stuck in superglue.

Should I be worried about the supposed missing/corrupt Registry file? This morning, since the weirdness, it's running extremely well.

[Vince, Pt. II]

Thread resurrection here... I completely started over with a fresh install of Windows 7 on the formatted hard drive, same system as above. I have only added Steam, Firefox (with NoScript), Adobe Flash, DirectX and MS Office. I am already getting these "stalls" again. Is there possibly a hardware issue here? Bad memory stick or something?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Vince, Pt. II

Thread resurrection here... I completely started over with a fresh install of Windows 7 on the formatted hard drive, same system as above. I have only added Steam, Firefox (with NoScript), Adobe Flash, DirectX and MS Office. I am already getting these "stalls" again. Is there possibly a hardware issue here? Bad memory stick or something?

Sounds for all the world like typical Firefox related memory leak issues to me. At this point it doesn't matter what version I run, I'm going to have either slowdowns or crashes at some point when it's been running for any length of time. And if I hit any page with a Java script that runs (i.e. like various online games & such) I might as well expect it within a half hour or so.

But just in case, doublecheck all your running processes after the reformat to make sure that you don't have some crap running in the background that's adding to the problem.

[gstelmack]

Download ProcessExplorer from Microsoft (part of the SysInternals Utility Suite) and see what it says is going on. Could be trying to access a non-existant network resource, could be some app doing it, could be almost anything. ProcessExplorer will tell you if there is a CPU spike, and if so who it is, what files are being accessed, etc.

Could also be hardware, but that would more likely be a crash. Unless things are overheating, you could try a temperature monitor to see if the CPU is throttling back.

[JediKooter]

Push down on the stick and give it more throttle?

[Vince, Pt. II]

So I apparently suck with computers, because the fresh install is giving me problems that are no longer restricted to just Firefox. I've had two Blue Screen crashes, both immediately after coming out of sleep mode. Disabling Sleep mode has eliminated this problem, but that seems like a "Doc, it hurts when I do this." "Well don't do that!" sort of fix. Now I'm getting startup problems. I went into my BIOS to change the boot device order from CD-ROM/Hard Drive to Hard Drive/CD-ROM, and it fired up fine. After a lengthy Firefox stall, I decided to restart it and had a bunch of problems, culminating in this screen:

Windows has encountered a problem communicating with a device connected to your computer. This error can be caused by unplugging a removable storage device such as an external USB drive while the drive is in use, or by faulty hardware such as a hard drive or CD-ROM drive that is failing. Make sure any removable storage is properly connected and then restart your computer. If you continue to receive this error message, contact the hardware manufacturer. Status: 0xc00000e9 Info: An unexpected I/O error has occurred.

Now, I have no external hard drive, and the only thing that is connected via USB is my printer, which is not on. Removing the USB for the printer anyways, the computer has fired up fine and is what I'm typing this out on now. What's the easiest way to determine whether it is my DVD-ROM or Hard Drive that is the issue?

[CraigSca]

Not sure what to say about this - I had problems installing a PC a couple months ago and the Windows install was telling me it was a memory issue. I made a boot-up Memtest and the memory tested out fine. Turns out it was the brand new WD hard drive. Go figure. Unfortunately, nothing told me that - it was troubleshooted by hand.

I would test the memory first and then, if that's not it, just start from scratch troubleshooting.

[Vince, Pt. II]

Ok, what's the best way to troubleshoot hardware? I'm really quite inexperienced with individual hardware issues...I know how they all go together in a computer, but that's about it. Do I simply grab replacement things and then fire up the computer with the replacement in instead and see if I have the same issues with the new hardware? Finding replacement hardware won't exactly be cheap.

[CraigSca]

Well, I wouldn't specifically buy hardware solely to troubleshoot.

The first thing I tried was removing one of the memory sticks (I had two at the time). Fortunately (well, in retrospect it was fortunate), my install failed at a specific time every time. So, I could see the failure/success of each test quite easily. Anyway, I tried memory first (using only one stick at a time) and that checked out. I eventually started taking pieces that I either had laying around (a power supply) or from other PCs (a hard drive). After using Memtest (which is a pretty thorough memory checker), I tried the power supply and then the hard drive. When I was able to attempt a new Windows install on the old drive successfully I knew that the brand new one was the culprit. Oh, I DID buy another motherboard, thinking it was that. Fortunately, I'm now re-purposing this new motherboard in a PC for my Dad.

To be frank, there are other guys here that know a lot more about me because they do this stuff everyday (I'm more of a weekend guy with this). They may be able to lead you in a better direction.

[Vince, Pt. II]

I may have to look elsewhere, as this is far from a specific problem, and it's been running fine for a couple of hours now. I also have two sticks of memory, and I DO know how to test those, so I'll get that done. Other than that though...ugh, this is frustrating.

[Cringer]

I had a similar issue with Vista about 6-7 months ago I guess it was. Stalling/pausing for 10-30 seconds then snapping out of it. For me it kept getting worse (more often). I couldn't figure it out and ended up partitioning my hard drive and installing Ubuntu (Linux), haven't looked back since. Oddly, when I did all that something I did seems to have cleared up the problem with Windows as it runs fine when I do go into it every once in a while. I deleted a bunch of stuff, fragmented the hard drive, and stripped a few things down to bare necessities. Not sure if the same would help you as well.

[Vince, Pt. II]

Yay for more problems.

So I replaced my hard drive, re-installed everything and the system was running extraordinarily smoothly for about a week - running even faster than normal. Last night running World of Warcraft, the program inexplicably locked up. I could not Alt-Tab out, nor could I use Ctrl-Alt-Del to open up the task manager. However, my copy of Ventrilo was still running in the background and my push-to-talk key was still working while everything else was locked up. After waiting a few minutes in hopes that things would resolve themselves, I did another hard restart, and began getting the disk read errors again and was unable to boot up.

I attempted to solve the problem by disconnecting the DVD drive, and it cleared up the disk read errors immediately and the system fired right up. However, upon loading Warcraft again, the system locked up almost immediately and I was forced to hard restart again.

Without re-connecting my DVD drive, I Again could not boot up the system due to disk read errors. I removed one of my 2 Gig memory sticks and it booted up fine...but then locked up upon finishing the reboot before I could open any programs.

Any ideas on what to do? I'm thinking perhaps a faulty motherboard or graphics card? The only other thing in there is a sound card.

[Shepp]

Are you sure that a virus scan or checkdisk isn't trying to run in the background of whatever you're doing?

[Vince, Pt. II]

I'm moreworried about the inability to boot. I have no anti-virus program, so I know that isn't what's causing the freeze-up.

[Vince, Pt. II]

So, strangely enough it's working completely fine this morning (DVD drive still disconnected as it's not really necessary. Both memory sticks are in there as well). I'm keeping an eye on it, but am nervous as heck that it's going to start acting up again.

[Vince, Pt. II]

So I'm stumped. Two days of flawless performance, and today it is running like frozen molasses - it just took 10 minutes (literally) to boot up. I've tested the DVD drive, the memory sticks (2 2 Gig sticks) and the Hard Drive. How do I go about checking the motherboard, processor and/or power supply? I don't want to simply buy new ones and replace them, and I have no other desktop computers in the house to draw from for scrap parts.