PC keeps freezing and slowing down

ambergardener15 said:Maybe I can help you out. Personally, I run Windows 8 and it works fine for me.
1) Maybe your PC is just overheating and freezing up because it can't handle something.
2) You might have some app or service hogging all your CPU. Check the Task Manager (CTRL + ALT + DEL) and see what's eating your processor.
3) Could be a virus. Try booting into Safe Mode (I think you hold SHIFT while starting up), which only loads the basics without all the extra junk. Then run some scans with Malwarebytes, Avast Antivirus, or whatever else you've got.
4) Check your browser extensions—just strip out anything you don't actually need.
5) Honestly, it might just be a dying hard drive.

Anyway, let me know if that does anything.🙂

Taylor Nelson5 said:So, here’s the deal... you wonderful people who (thank God) seem to know everything, please give me one good reason why I shouldn't just smash this laptop into pieces right now. 😵
The issue is that my computer runs perfectly fine for maybe two or three days, and then, out of nowhere, it just hits a wall and crawls along at a snail's pace; once it finally manages to open CCleaner and I run a cleanup, things go back to normal for another couple of days. When I’m running CCleaner, most of the errors I see are related to Internet Explorer, which I don't even bother using. I’m not doing anything fancy on there—just Facebook, Skype, Google, YouTube... that’s about it. By the way, I'm stuck using Windows 8, and honestly, I can barely figure out how to navigate it...
It is just absolutely miserable... please, someone help me before I actually break this thing while it's still in one piece. 🙏🙏🙏
THANKS

wiredcanyon94 said:She mentioned she isn't exactly a pro when it comes to the version of Windows she's using, so I suspect these instructions might fly right over her head.

wiredcanyon94 said:Look, if you actually paid for it—there’s your reason not to smash it. If you didn't? Smash away. Dad can just buy you a new one.

As for the actual issue, someone else already posted some ideas earlier. Hopefully, one of those works. Though, since you mentioned you aren't exactly a tech wizard when it comes to Windows, I can't promise much. Generally speaking, if it's just acting sluggish every now and then, you probably just need to clear out some digital junk. (Not the physical dust, obviously.)

Good luck!

ambergardener15 said:Maybe I can help you out. Personally, I run Windows 8 and it works fine for me.
1) Maybe your PC is just overheating and freezing up because it can't handle something.
2) You might have some app or service hogging all your CPU. Check the Task Manager (CTRL + ALT + DEL) and see what's eating your processor.
3) Could be a virus. Try booting into Safe Mode (I think you hold SHIFT while starting up), which only loads the basics without all the extra junk. Then run some scans with Malwarebytes, Avast Antivirus, or whatever else you've got.
4) Check your browser extensions—just strip out anything you don't actually need.
5) Honestly, it might just be a dying hard drive.

Anyway, let me know if that does anything.🙂

Taylor Nelson5 said:It feels like it's probably the hard drive since everything else seems to be working okay.
ps. it took me forever to figure out how to get out of Safe Mode.

Lawrence Barnes64;53824084 said:What kind of laptop are we talking about here? How old is the thing?
You can't exactly get rid of Internet Explorer, and honestly, why would you even want to?
It sounds like some nasty virus is just piling up junk files in the background... have you checked how much actual breathing room is left on the C drive?
There's also a chance System Restore is just hoarding useless data; if there's an HP 250 label on it, you might be able to find some specifics there.
As for the storage, it's pretty much wide open, with about 440GB of free space.
I haven't a clue how old it actually is since I don't have my friend around to confirm, but it hasn't been used much lately—just basic stuff like Facebook and YouTube. I run CCleaner on it and it stays functional for maybe two days before things go south again, but that's clearly not a real fix. And then today, it finally threw this at me:
explorer.exe - system warning

Lawrence Barnes64 said:if you're still running Windows 8 up there, you seriously need to push that update to 8.1 right now, honestly, it’ll probably fix everything unless you've already caught some nasty bug or something...
do you even have an antivirus installed on there? if you're flying totally unprotected, I'd say just grab Avast Antivirus free, it does the job.

Lawrence Barnes64 said:So, I'm just getting this totally blank error message from explorer.exe? It literally says nothing else, just shows up out of nowhere and then asks me to hit OK. Any idea what's going on?