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Fixes: For people on the verge of throwing out their frozen computer

October 16, 2014

Frozen computer leave you feeling cold all too often? Here’s some hot tips from our tech pros.

It happens so frequently. A client calls in frantic because his or her computer has frozen up once again. Common causes we see include things like Malware, system overload or bad hardware. Today, we address all three.

The Dreaded Malware

To fix this, run a third party Malware scanner. There are many to choose from and most are free of charge. Quite often, a computer’s primary antivirus software misses some infections. We use Malawarebytes and Spybot as a second opinion when we suspect a computer may be infected.

Steps to run these third-party scanners usually go like this:

• Update definitions and start a scan.
• After the scan completes you will be informed whether or not infections were detected.
• If there are infections, there’ll be a button to click, removing the detected items.

System Overload

Another common cause for computer freezes is simply because too many things are trying to be done at once and the system is overwhelmed. To check this scenario, start up Task Manager in Windows and you can see what programs are running and how many resources they are using. Two big resources we monitor are free memory and processor usage. The more free memory the better, and the less processor usage the better. This is especially true when the unit is sitting idle (or simply not being used). Ways to improve your situation are to uninstall programs you do not use and also to prevent as many programs as possible from starting up with the computer.

Bad Hardware

This is the last reason for a computer freeze we are discussing today. Most computers come with diagnostic software to test the hardware in the computer. There are many different ways to access this software on a computer, but most of the time you can start the diagnosis right before the computer starts up. Best thing is to check your computer’s user manual to see how to run these programs.

As always, we hope you’ve found value in these tips. Let us know if you’re still experiencing any trouble, or if there’s anything else we can help you with. We love to solve problems!