Always have to restart after 8 hours.

Hi. I hope I've got the right section for this. I'm having a problem with my pc, where I can't use it continuously for more than 8 hours before I have to restart. Any longer than 8 hours, and the display messes up. Icons will disappear or turn black, other icons will still be there but there'll be nothing underneath to say what they are, text on internet pages will just turn into lots of lines.

I thought it may have been something to do with Virtual Memory, so I increased my paging file and that hasn't worked.

My AV is updated everyday, and when I do a full sweep, nothing is ever found, I also run Ad-aware, Spybot, A2 regularly and have spyware blaster intalled. They find nothing.

Sometimes after the 8 hours, my system will crash completely, and just before, AVG will tell me a virus has been detected in a particular file. When I restart and scan that file, nothing will be detected.

I had some help on another forum, and the error message I was getting after a crash (8193) seemed to suggest it was a problem with Volume Shadow Copy and COM+. COM+ would not start, but I managed to reinstall it. It's now fine although MS Software Shadow Copy Provider, which I believe is linked to VSS, and should be started, fails to start (error ID: 1053). When I check event viewer after a crash, I don't seem to have any errors now.

I emailed Microsoft. They were as much use as a chocolate teapot. I've been going round in circles, trying to sort this out myself, as I want to learn, but short of taking my comp to the tip, I just don't know what else to try. Can anyone help me?

Windows XP Home
SP2
2.80 gigahertz Intel Pentium 4
8 kilobyte primary memory cache
512 kilobyte secondary memory cache
60.01 Gigabytes Usable Hard Drive Capacity
16.44 Gigabytes Hard Drive Free Space
512 Megabytes Installed Memory
NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 [Display adapter]

I hope this is all the info you need. Thanks for any help.

 

Hmm could it possibly be cooling again? Maybe if you take the computer a[art and clean out the inside of it it may help a little. Try that and see if there is an improvement and come back and tell us what happened when you are done.
-The new tech guy

 

What is the name of the infected file?

 

The infected file was lame_acm. I uninstalled Lame and deleted the files, so that I could reinstall it later. It still crashes though.

 

I could be a memory leak with a particular program. Have you paid much attention to taskmanager under the proccesses tab?

Also, does this 8 hour stint happen when you are connected to the internet?

When you say your computer crashes, does it reboot?

Do you ever receive a BSOD? If not, then Rightclick on my computer, then select properties (or go to control panel (classic view) and double click on system. Then go to the Advanced tab, then under "Startup and Recovery" click the "Settings" button.

Next make sure the following under system failure is unchecked. "Automatically Restart".
Now, if you have an acutal crash you computer should give you some information, it would be most helpful for use to help troubleshoot this situation.

Also, do you have any .dmp files located under:

%SystemRoot%\Minidump ?

Another way to check to see if your computer will autorestart upon an error, just go to the following key in the registry (regedit)

HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl\Autoreboot

If Autoreboot is set as 1, the computer will reboot upon a crash, if set for 0, it will display the BSOD infomation.

 

It happens wether I'm connected to the internet or not.

When it crashes (it doesn't always, sometimes I restart my self), it does reboot.

I don't know what a BSOD is, so I'm guessing I haven't had one. I have just unchecked Automatically restart.

I can't see any files under %SystemRoot%\Minidump.

Can you tell me where Processes tab/taskmanager is , so I can check it?
Thanks.

 

Right click on the taskbar and select task manager, then make sure the Processes tab is the selected tab, then, I'd check to see if this is a memory leak by watching Mem Usage (click two times on the Mem Usage section, so that the highest amount is at the top.

You can also check CPU usage, though, ignore "System Ide Process)

 

Got it.

Memory usage:
firefox - 24,888k
explorer - 24,228k
svchost - 19,884k
avgemc - 17,192k
motivesb - 11,340
RxMon - 11,080

All other are under 10,000

CPU:
All 00, except some keep changing to 02.

 

Oops, have found some .dmp files. 20 of them.

 

Could it be a windows corruption somewhere within the os??Or somehow the program you took off could still be trying to run a leftover process and crashes because it cant find the files. Maybe if you look in your registry and find any entries about that program and delete em or run a registry cleaner like registry mechanic? Lemme know if that helps
-The new tech guy

 

Right, I've just taken my comp apart, and cleaned it. I've never seen so much dirt in all my life. The fans were caked in it. I'll need to leave it on overnight to check if that's made a difference.

I've found something in a folder in the registry called lameme:

default REG_SZ (value not set)

I'll wait and see if the cleaning has worked before I do anything with it.

I'll let you know how things are tomorrow. Thanks to both of you for your help so far.

 

Ok let us know and we will help you out more.

 

No change after cleaning.

I've got a few errors in event viewer.

Event Type: Error
Event Source: sr
Event Category: None
Event ID: 1
Date: 28/08/2005
Time: 15:03:00
User: N/A
Computer: SM1976
Description:
The System Restore filter encountered the unexpected error '0xC000009A' while processing the file 'sched-0001.cfg' on the volume 'HarddiskVolume2'. It has stopped monitoring the volume.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 00 00 00 00 04 00 4e 00 ......N.
0008: 00 00 00 00 01 00 00 c0 .......À
0010: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........
0018: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........
0020: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........



Event Type: Error
Event Source: Service Control Manager
Event Category: None
Event ID: 7009
Date: 28/08/2005
Time: 01:32:24
User: N/A
Computer: SM1976
Description:
Timeout (30000 milliseconds) waiting for the MS Software Shadow Copy Provider service to connect.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.




Event Type: Error
Event Source: Userenv
Event Category: None
Event ID: 1512
Date: 28/08/2005
Time: 15:39:06
User: NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM
Computer: SM1976
Description:
Windows cannot unload your registry file. The memory used by the registry has not been freed. This is often caused by services running as a user account, try configuring the services to run in either the LocalService or NetworkService account. If this problem persists, contact your administrator.

DETAIL - Insufficient system resources exist to complete the requested service.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.


Event Type: Warning
Event Source: Userenv
Event Category: None
Event ID: 1517
Date: 27/08/2005
Time: 23:43:26
User: NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM
Computer: SM1976
Description:
Windows saved user SM1976 registry while an application or service was still using the registry during log off. The memory used by the user's registry has not been freed. The registry will be unloaded when it is no longer in use.

This is often caused by services running as a user account, try configuring the services to run in either the LocalService or NetworkService account.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

 

Im starting to think after reading those error reports that it may not be the program at all in fact it could be a corruption in windows system restore. Mybe a windows repair will fix it? Only drawback is that you have to reload updates back to windows. Try that and let us know if that helps.
-The new tech guy

 

Just been backing up my files. I'm going to try a repair now.

If I don't come back, it's because I've killed my comp!

 

This is going from bad to worse.

I've backed up, and was ready to do a repair install. Windows was preinstalled on my computer, so all I have is a floppy recovery disk, and the Master CDs I created when I first got the computer. When I try to boot from the floppy, I get the message:

The following file is missing or corrupted: COMMAND.COM
Type the name of the command interpreter (e.g C:WINDOWS\COMMAND.COM

I have checked the file is there, and typed the above and pressed enter, but I still get the message.

I have tried to boot from the Master CDs, but it just starts Windows normally.

I have tried going into the Recovery option when my computer starts, but it tells me to enter the administrator password. I am the administrator, and did not have a password set up, so I have nothing to put in this field. I've tried creating a password for the administrator account, and using that, but it won't accept it.

I've even tried system restore to see if I could retore to the furthest point back that I can remember things working properly, and all my restore points except August have disappeared.

I just don't know what to do.

 

This pc seems beyond help. I think I'm just gonna live with the restarts. Thanks anyway.