Flashing ads cause pc freeze

Hi guys, this is driving my son nuts! He goes to
http://music.lycos.com//downloads and almost immediately there is a flashing verizon ad and bam, the pc freezes. Any suggestions? We have long had freezing issues with this pc (I can't use IE6 much, it won't even let us get into Yahoo mail, but thanks to MG's have had much success with Opera and also use Avast). Seems like anything that uses Flash will freeze too. Not ctrl-alt-del either, complete reboot. I have no sound card,but that wouldn't matter would it? Anyway, I have windows 2000 professional sp4, 367 mhz Pentium 3,(Sandra said it should be higher but I don't know how to change it),Maxtor 91021U2 Hard drive, ASUSTeK motherboard, Bus clock 66mhz, 256 memory, Rage Pro Turbo AGP 2X adapter. (Does this have anything to do with it?) Thanks in advice any help is always appreciated.
(I have enough to worry about, son just got his DL learner's permit)

 

Thanks star,
I will try the Macromedia download first. I did try installing Avant previously on a suggestion here but pc still froze. I think it was Adrenalyne that suggested Opera and that generally works very well. I'll let you know how it works, thanks again.

 

That 66MHz FSB is the issue with your P3 speed. In BIOS setup you can bump it up to either 100 or 133, but I'm not sure which since you didn't state what the CPU speed is supposed to be...

 

From you specs, it sounds the sound card is
probably fairly old. Since you said that you've
had other probelms with the computer freezing,
a very possible probelm is that the video card
is 'on it's last leg' and when something like
a shockwave app starts it's too intensive
and lock's up the cmoputer. This can also
be caused by an overheating cpu. If
a software fix doesn't work, try opening
the case and cleaning everything up, including
the powersupply, and, if you have another comp
around the house, try replacing the video card
in the effected computer with one from a
non-effected computer and see if the problem
persists.

Hope this helps,
RJS

 

Hi, I just did a quick check on Sandra and it said Processor Intel Pentium III;Speed 367mHz; Performance rating PR440 (estimated); Rated Speed 550mHz/1x100mHz; Supported speed 800mhz. Then.. says frontside bus speed is 1x67mHz; maximum FSB Speed/Max memory speed 1x100mHz/1x100mHz; max bus bandwidth 536MB/s (estimated). Okay, now I am very confused, but I think it means I should change the speed to 100mHz ? Sorry reply, takes a while, we have an issue with our connection and I can't connect til about 8pm each night (a whole different problem!!!) Thanks for your help.

 

Hi RJS,
It can't be the sound card coz there isn't one! Hope it's not the video card, already using the old monitor (13" ugh), have just got a new power supply. Could be dust from our dusty desert so I will open up the case and have a look. I updated Macromedia Flash to 7 last night but haven't tried it on son's site yet. Should I update shockwave too, or is that part of Flash? Thanks for the help.

 

That's right.

I thought the multiplier (5.5) would probably be correct, 66(fsb) x 5.5(mult) = 366 (speed it's at now)

So, if it's rated speed is 550, then 100(fsb) x 5.5(mult) = 550 (speed it should be at), so set the FSB to 100MHz

One more thing about that. All the memory that's in there has to be at least PC100 (PC133 should work too), if any or all is PC66 it probably won't boot after you set FSB to 100.

 

hi alanc,
I have 128mb and 2x64mb sdram, all pc100, so I guess I will give it a go! Thanks for your help, I'll let you know how I get on. (Now, if I can only fix this stinking connection problem, but that's another post, one thing at a time...!)

 

Your quite welcome

I'm interested in the results of your Macromedia Flash update.

Go ahead and update Shockwave if you want, it's related to Flash but you have to update it seperately.

 

Hi alanc,
did the updates on macromedia and shockwave and mostly things seemed better, but that darn verizon ad still locks us up! I'm baffled! Anyway thought I might try the MYIE2 browser and turn off flash as Star17 suggested, is it better than Opera? (My current, which I do like.) Also, as it uses IE as a base could it bring old problems? I will give it a go and let you know. (Gee always the great risk taker, that's me!) Thanks again.

 

MYIE2 (and Avant) are both front ends for IE, so you'll gain nothing from a security standpoint by using it, as IE is riddled with security holes.

I've never tried Opera but have heard good things about it and Mozilla Firefox. Either one is a standalone browser so you're much better off regarding potential security/hijacking issues. Both are available here:
http://www.majorgeeks.com/downloads5.html