ScanDisk won't finish, keyboard is unresponsive (System resources?)

When I try to type with the keyboard, in the url box, in the search bars, notepads, etc., the mouse goes to the busy hourglass cursor and switches back and forth between normal and busy for about 10-15 seconds, the window will go inactive, and then everything is fine and I can type. I've watched my keyboard while this happens and the lights for the quick touch buttons, num lock, etc. blink on and off until the computer returns to normal. It only does this a few times throughout the day, but it does happen every day now for about a week. It seems to work best after a reboot, but inevitably, it does it at some point.

My girlfriend said it might be a resource problem somewhere, but I (possibly because of ignorance) don't see how that could be. Nothing has changed on the computer that I can think of. Mom plays games on pogo, but she's been doing that for years without any of these problems so it doesn't make sense that it would just start all of a sudden.

I ran Ad-Aware, SpyBot, AVG with the first two finding some tracking cookies and the usual suspects, and AVG coming back clear. I also ran HJT and took some of the startup programs off checking against a list of programs that are safe to remove from the startup. I was then going to try and ScanDisk/Defrag, but ScanDisk won't finish. I started it last night around 10pm and it was still going at 2pm this afternoon. It has never taken more than a few hours.

I searched the forum and found the thread below, it seems similar to my problems, except the computer isn't really having trouble starting things, it's just the keyboard and ScanDisk thing. I checked the system resources and it was at 70% before I opened this window, 67% now.

Any ideas?

System Resource thread

HP 7960
1.3GHz P4
40GB HD (21.7 free)
128MB rambus

Oh yeah, I tried a system restore and the computer wouldn't have any of that. I also recovered the system using the HP recovery discs around September 2. I know I need more RAM, but as expensive as rambus is, it makes more sense to save a little more and just buy a new computer with XP.

 

Blinking lights on keyboard --may be a controller (on mobo) or bad connection.
Am I reading you right this used to happen once in a while and has it increased in frequency?
The on and off aspect of the keyboard lights points to more than a low system resource thooo- that could speed the response time of the pc

 

Well i kinda agree with petal but if it cannot get past a chkdsk, i would think that the hd may be starting to go. Before my last hd went it would make funny sounds, then everything would hang for a second, no mouse response nothing, then it would stop the noise and everything would be norm again. Could be your hd is on its way out. But it could als obe a rsource or kb prob too. I would start by plugging in another keyboard and seeing if the computer will still have the problem.
-the new tech guy

 

Thanks for the responses. Petal, it never did this until about a week to a week and a half ago. What I meant was it will only do it a few times (3-4 or so) a day, as opposed to normal operation, but it does do it everyday now since it started.

New Tech Guy, I think you may be onto something because the computer started making funny sounds within a week before this started happening, so uggg. It sounds like the fan is having a heck of a time, like a bad whirring sound. Is there any way to check for that sort of thing?

Thanks again.

 

Well wait im confused, is this the fan makeing the noise or the hd? I would say check the fan first scince if that is going its cheap to replace. If the fan is going you can tell because it wont be like spinning like it should. It may be lower but I seriously think its your hd. Mine started doing weird stuff like that like about a year before it finally croaked. It would just keep making the noise at totally random times and then go back to normal. If it was the fan it wont make a noise it will just go out all together. I know this cause the fan on my dad's gateway power unit just died without makeing noises at all. So If i were you i would back up the hd soon cause its a good chance your on your way out. But try the fan first scince it may only be 5 bucks to fix rather than like spending 100 bucks on a new hd. Plug a new fan into the suspected failing one and see if the problem stops. Also, while your in there not a bad idea to make sure your internals are clean so they can cool down beeter. Just suck out any dust with a vacumn cleaner.
-the new tech guy

 

Back-up now!

If your hd is dying, you will appreciate it later. The scandisk hang sounds ominous. Back up your settings too with something like Acronis. If it turns out to be a loose plug, its good practice anyway.

Then I'd buy a new HD, install windows on it, make your sketchy hd its slave, move old data to new HD,. run scandisk.

Regarding resources. Have you black vipered?

 

New Tech Guy, I'm not sure what exactly is making the noise, I was just using the fan as a descriptor the sound. The noise sounds like a fan would revving up and down, only very roughly, like it's sick with a eaten up gears and no grease. I can't back up right now because the CD-R on this computer has never worked. I did some looking into it and found out that these burners are pretty quick to go. I will be backing up within a week or so though, I'm going to use an external burner my girlfriend has. I'll definitely check out the fan though. Would something as simple as the fan going out do something like this because of heat? I know heat is bad, but dang.

idiot_doug, I've never Black Vipered before. Is that solely for XP systems? I'm on ME.

Thanks for the replies and patience guys.

 

I forgot to mention that two of the past week's AVG checks came back with complete checks, 0 files checked and 0 viruses, and 1 error each. The error is that C:\ cannot be opened, not checked. Not scanned. But it has worked fine since those two.

 

The MG synapsis, only XP, of BlackViper is the best thing left, since BlackViper has gone missing.

Here's an archive.org page about ME

And here's the BlackViper archive.org archive.

 

Umm i really think its the hd at this point cause this sounds very ominous. Back up now while you still can! Like if you have an old hd laying around maybe clone it. Best way by far to back up cause it only takes a half and hour and everything in the system is on that hd. Once that is done buy a new hd and clone back onto the new hd and viola you just had a painless repair of your system. I for one learned this because when mine went, i could not access it at all as a master drive. But once i got a new hd and windows loaded up, by some miracle the old hd worked as a slave and i was able to save my files. But i would highly recommend getting a new hd and cloning the data from the bad one to it so you dont lose anything. If you have a seagate drive utility cd, you can use diskwizard on it to copy the data to the new one.
-the new tech guy

 

Thank you very much New Tech Guy. At this point I think that's all I can do since it may be a while until new computer day arrives.

Do you have any suggestions for computers? I've read a little bit about Athlon processors, Celeron, Pentium, etc., but I have no idea what's the best for the buck. We only use this computer for the internet and playing games on the internet, music and other small things like that. But I'd still like to keep other options open too, for example I heard Celeron is crap with just about anything other than the net, like video editing, gaming, etc. I would appreciate any advice you have. The spending limit will probably be around $500.

Thanks again for your help and patience.

 

Well you can check places like tigerdirect and newegg for barebones systems which are computers that come stripped and you cutomize them any way you will. As for processors, go with the amd 64. Plenty of power in that thing for a small price. If you cant afford the amd 64 you can just get a pentium 4. But that all depends what your gonna do on the computer. What do you plan to do with it?
-the new tech guy

 

Probably 95% of it will be the internet. The rest will be little things like documents, pictures, music, etc. I'm not into gaming so I doubt there would ever be any games installed on it, the only exception I can think of would be one of those Casino games that has all the different types of poker. I might get into video editing a little later on, so that's a possibility I'd like to keep open, although I could just go with what I need, and upgrade later if needed, so no big deal there I guess. I like writing batch files for little puzzles, quizzes and games, nothing elaborate though so I doubt that matters. That's about it.

 

I should ask how close to idiot proof is building a barebone computer? I'm not lying in my signature. I can follow directions very well and am a great learner, but if it's real "computery", it will go right into one ear and out the other. I can't seem to grasp anything when it comes to computers. If it's just put this here and that there, install the software type stuff, that won't be any problem (hopefully).

Also, is there a number I would be looking at after a barebone purchase? How much more would I need to put into one to get a working fully functional computer?

Thanks again for your help.

 

Well a barebones system just comes the bare minimal needed to run a system. That consists of a fully set up and running motherboard, an hd, and a cd rom drive. (You may even be able to just use the harddrive that you need to get for your current system and save yourself a few bucks). But you can probably just get a ram upgrade for the system you have now with a new hd and you will be fine. let me know if that helps
-the new tech guy

 

Try scandisk then defrag, both in SAFE MODE. When really fragmented, lots of things interfere and slow it down.

 

jp, it is the hd. A safemode scandisk will not fix the problem. After a few years of daily use on the hd it will begin to wear down and basically break down. My lingered for two years making funny noises and halting up before it finally went belly up. Usually hd's will start to act funny like that when they are beginning to break down. Which when they do that, it means its time for a new hd or to get one in the near future.
-the new tech guy

 

gay2jp, thanks for the tip, both ScanDisk and Defrag were able to finish in safe mode. They both still took forever, but they did finish. Unfortunatly, it didn't fix the problem. I'm just going to buy a new hard drive and some more memory.

New Tech Guy, is there a specific brand of hard drive you recommend for quality?

Thanks.

 

It all depends on your taste. I use a seagate and the drive is very quiet so if you want a quiet system but yet good performance go with them, also maxtor and western digital are good names. It all depends on your taste.
-the new tech guy

 

I haven't read every post on this thread, so I may go over old ground, but if you know the brand of your hard drive, then download a manufacturer's utility and test it's integrity.

We have most available here from the downloads section.

 

Insomniac, I opened the computer and the best I could see is it is a Fujitsu. I looked on MG homepage and saw there is a utility for an IDE and a SCSI drive. How do I know which one I have? On HP's site for this computer, all it says about the hd is it is 40GB. Also I looked at the description for both and the one for IDE says to boot from a DOS disk and I'm not sure how to do that, could you point me in the right direction please? Thank you.

New Tech Guy, I haven't used computers long enough to develop a taste yet so I'll borrow yours and get a Seagate. And it doesn't hurt that Circuit City has the 120GB hd on sale for 30 bucks until Saturday. Thanks for the advice.

 

No prob i think your looking at the same one that i have! Its 120 gigabyte and its a 7200 rpm drive right? I know that way cheaper than i got mine. Bestbuy for 100 bucks but i think im gonna get my money's worth out of it scince i may give this old computer i have a new cpu, board, and ram and a few stupid things like a new cd burner and give to my lil sis then get myself a nice laptop . Anyway, thats a good deal on the seagate. Go for it. Anyway concerning the drive, It is probably a standard scsi scince that is a standard for most systems. Try the seagate though. That drive should be scsi and work fine.
-the new tech guy

 

Yep, that's the one!

I'll give the SCSI tester a go and see what happens.

Thanks again for all your help, I really appreciate it.

 

ok good luck!
-the new tech guy

 

Oh yeah, I wanted to ask... Is there a benefit to making the old hd a slave to the new one? And is that even recommended since this one could be on its way out? What exactly does a slave hd do?

Also, from what I read, I don't even need to copy all my files and things to cds do I? If I'm understanding it all right, I can just use the Seagate cd and it will copy my old hd to the new one? Sorry, this is all new to me.

As of right now, the way I though it was going to go is I was going to get my girlfriend's external burner, copy all the pictures, music, etc. and then install the new hd and take the old one out.

If I can do all this without needing to burn copies of everything, I should be able to do this tonight.

I swear I'm almost done testing your patience.

 

How do you figure that out, and what makes you think it's a SCSI drive?

If it was, you would more than likely know about it.

It would probably be just a standard IDE drive.

 

Oh yeah i meant ide. Thanks for the help insomniac. sorry bout that he is looking into the same drive i have installed on my pc and that drive is ide. IDE is the standard, not scsi.
-the new tech guy

 

No its no problem that you ask these questions anyway. We get alot of people who arent exactly tech literate. Its no problem explaining all this to you. But once you buy the new hd, you wont need to burn at all. Install discwizard which should come with the hd on the utilities disc and hook up the seagate as a slave drive. Then Install discwizard to the bad one and from teher the manual tells u what to do. Good luck. And a slave is basically a secondary drive. Al it does is add extra space. If you wanna try to use the old hd for that before it dies go ahead but you really should say bye bye to it once everything is copied. Just be sure to run error checking utilities such as scandisk and a registry cleaner scince i have noticed that when i make backup clones with discwizard it has tendancy to give alot of registry errors, most of which have to do with ms office. But if you have a ccleaner (which you can get here) run the scan for registry issues option a few times and it should clear out the system.
lemme know if there are more problems
-the new tech guy

 

I think I'm going to go ahead and wait till next weekend so I can get that burner and back up some things then put the new hd in, add some more memory and reformat.

Doing that, I would just need to install the new hd without copying the old one right? Then format the new one and add all my crap on to it? Unless I shouldn't do it that way... This computer has never been reformatted (4 years old) and my girlfriend (more savvy than me) says it would be a good time to do it and it would make a big difference.

While I have you, I ordered 256 MB of ram. Can I add that to my existing 128 for a total of 384, or does it have to be in even increments like 128, 256, 512, etc.?

Also, how do hard drives come out? The illustrations in the manual show it coming out through the front of the computer, but there is a plastic facial plate on the front. Will I just pop that off and take it out that way or do you take them out through the side?

 

Well i think that you should just clone scince you wont have to reinstall anything that way. Also do that because now dont hold me to bible for this, that most hp's have a recovery partition on the hd and if you just throw winxp in there you will lose that recovery partition. I know new hps have that not so sure bout older ones though. But still use the discwizard. If you reformat you will have to reinstall everything which takes ages. So do the copy from the old hd to the seagate then you have your entire system on the new hd just as it is on the old one and nothing needs to be done but error checking. Although the final choice is up to you. But my recommendation is to reformat and concerning the ram, you should be fine with what your ordering. You did order it from hp right. Order it from them so that you can be certain that what you get is compatible with the computer. But you should be fine. Fill me in with new developments as they come.
-the new tech guy

 

Well I got the hard drive and memory in with no problems at all. Both are working great. But I'm still having the same problem (typing). Not near as bad or as often, but it is still occuring. It's ScanDisking and Defragging like a champ though. What's normal for system resources to be at? After I had everything clean and fresh I checked and it was running at 62% which seemed low. So I went through my startup list and unchecked the crap I don't need and that helped, but it's still at 76% after a reboot with nothing running. Is that good, bad or average?

Should I try a new keyboard for the typing problem or is that problem somewhere else?

Also, I reformatted and everything, but my speakers still don't work sometimes. I have to restart a couple times and then they'll work. At first I thought maybe it was no big deal, and figured after a fresh install, they'd work fine, but no. Could that be the sound card gettin' ready to go?

This new hd rocks!

 

Yeah that would be a good thing to try. As for the Sound card, have you tried the latest drivers for it? If that is not solving it I would go to the hardware forum and see if they can do something about it there. But my guess is that if the updated driver doesnt help, that is on its way out as well. I got a cheap one for 15 bucks and it supports 4.1 surround and works fine. Give the drivers a try and see what happens and im glad u like the new drive. As for system resources, do you mean 76% free or 76% being used?
-the new tech guy

 

in a way, ive got the same problem, in that scandisk will only finish SOMETIMES , im not sure why. Also, the defrag never seems to get past 2 or 3%, again, not sure why. My keyboard works fine.

Im running Windows 98 on a Pentium 4 1.8 gHz, with (i think) a 30 gig hd. if you need more sytem info, ask and il try to find out.

Thanks in advance

 

Strither, I'm joining in a little late at this point but if you still have that harddrive, I have a suggestion or two. The reason that your system won't finish scanning or defragging is that windows or some other program is writing to the drive. There's a program called voptxp, I'm not sure if they have it here or not, but it's a gooood program for fast defragging, under the tools menu you'll find a thing called close all apps. give that a run and then try defragging or scanning again. also another good program is regseeker, that'll clean yer reg out good. check it out, but whatever you do be careful. The program takes a backup of it's changes so if your computer starts acting up just reinstall the backup. oh do this before you defrag. Use these on any system.


kench

 

Thanks for the advice Kench. I'll keep it in mind, but I'm not using that old hd anymore, but I am going to keep it in case I have to send this one in, that way I'll still have something to goof around on until I get the new one back.

New Tech Guy, sorry bout that, it's 76% free. No, I haven't tried updating the drivers yet so I'll do that and hopefully it'll work. If not, I'll go to hardware and see what they sugguest.

Thanks again for all your help, you rock!

 

76% free recouces if fine. As long as there is enough leeway to go around. But a new keyboard would probably fix the flashing problem. As for the old hd. I dont think programs had anything to do with it not finishing as xp doesnt really mind anything going on in the background when it is doing scandisk/ defrag. So really the hd was pretty much dead man. And lil bugger, please post your problem in your own thread as solving two problems at once in the same thread can get very confusing. And it is no problem offering help! That is what we are here for!
-the new tech guy

 

Although wait... As for lil bugger and kench, i think that kench already gave the solution to lil bugger's problem as i know that win 98 doesnt like background processes when it is serviceing itself. Just kill them background process (good idea is to just run the checks and scans in safemode if they work properly) and lil bugger should be fine.
-the new tech guy