Computer freezes while operating

Hi,
My computer gets surges in the CPU while I'm online and everything freezes. The mouse can travel around freely and click on everything, but nothing responds. The freezing seems to last for around 10 seconds. When I hit ctrl/alt/del, I can see a huge surge in the CPU but not what is causing it. About a week ago, I followed your instructions for removing EliteBar32.exe with success (thanks for great advice and tools!), however, this problem of freezing is older than the spyware problem. A few days ago it took around 3 hours to boot up the computer which I was able to repair with Norton Disk Doctor and it's fine again. I don't know if the surging problem is hardware or software related. Can anyone help me?
abri

 

First things I would do in your case is reduce everything not required when you bootup. This includes most of Norton Utilities. Turn them off until you need them - they don't need to run all the time.
Second - download CrapCleaner available this site and run it to clean out all the gunk that piles up in your machine.
Hope this helps
Robert

 

Thanks Robert!
The instructions for removing EliteBar include CCleaner and I've done this regularly every couple of days the past week. The problem of the computer freezing is older than the spyware problem; I'm guessing it started around 6 weeks ago. I shut down the Norton Speed Disk utility from the start menu but left the Norton Antivirus and NProtect programs running. I don't know how to keep the Speed Disk from loading up in the start sequence, but also, I've been using Norton System Works for years without this dramatic occurrence I'm experiencing now. One time, I thought I caught Doctor Watson running during a surge in the CPUs, but I was not able to see this again. Something is causing the surge and I think there must be a way to see what program is doing that, unless there is a hardware defect which is causing a pile-up. Is that possible? Is there a record somewhere in the computer that I could back up to, of what happened in say the last two minutes? Could I figure that out with a simple search?
Thanks!
abri

 

It sounds to me like some kind of virus/trojan that is eating up your CPU. If your computer locks up, can you get to the processes tab in the taks manager? If so, scroll through and jot down any process that you're unfamiliar with. Google 'em to see if they're associated with a virus or something.

This article details how to use the Microsoft Management Console (mmc) to view an event log. It doesn't seem to record cpu usage by the particular process, but you could see if a particular process starts and ends during your "freeze up". Check it out here:
http://www.pcanswers.co.uk/tutorials/default.asp?pagetypeid=2&articleid=34469&subsectionid=607

Good all around information. Nice thing about mmc is it is customizable. There may be a snap-in that will allow you to view cpu usage if you play around.

 

Moyupae,
Thanks! A very cool site and tool. Had no idea it was tehre. I see a lot of errors in the System folder of the Event Log. I found a trick to mark the errors which just precede the cpu surge and the freeze because I can see when I've deleted anything from the Task Manager. In the mmc under System, the recurring error I keep having is DCOM and is worded:

Access refused in the attempt of a DCOM-Server to connect using DefaultLaunchPermission. Server: {00020906-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}
User: Unavailable/Unavailable, SID = Unavailable

I don't know what this is, maybe a protocol of Zone Alarm? I installed the snap-in, but I have to figure out what it does or how I can see what it does. The computer freeze happens once or twice a day, sometimes not at all, but you've given me a way to locate what is happening at the exact time it's occurring and that should help. Thanks very much.

I have a slight handicap working with a German computer. There's a Windows specific translation site on the web, but I've lost it. If anyone has the link to this, I'd be grateful.

abri