Laptop keeps freezing!

When I'm using the internet, my laptop keeps freezing up.
It freezes completely then the egg timer thing (I think it's a blue circle actually) comes on and the screen goes white for about 20 seconds.

Really annoying but I'm concerned it could be serious and just wanted it to be sorted before it goes kaput altogether!

Any ideas?

 

Have you tried a hot water bottle?

To be honest, you have only given the symptoms, so I can only suggest the following generic answer.

make sure your anti virus is up to date, and also just as important get a cleaner, I use "tune up utilities" it cleans out all the broken links and stuff. Its amazing what my pc is like after I run it. Other cleaners are available

 

How old is the laptop? What can you tell us about the specification?

What web browser you using? Internet Explorer? Firefox? Chrome? something else?

Does it happen on all websites, or just a specific few?

What operating system is it? eg Windows XP/Vista/7, or a linux install like Ubuntu, or is it a Mac?

 

It's about 3 years old (max), using Internet Explorer, it happens on all websites and I'm using windows 7. Not sure what you mean about spec sorry As you may have guessed, I'm useless with computers!
Hope this helps...

 

Freezing laptops are quite often fixed by just a good dust clean around the cooling intakes with a brush and the suction hose of a vacuum cleaner.

Internet cache and accumulated junk on your browser can be cleaned with Ccleaner

http://www.piriform.com/CCLEANER

 

I find IE 8 and 9 (you'll be on one of those on Windows 7) horrendously slow at times, intermittently. I could probably resolve it, but to be honest I find life much simpler if I just use Google's Chrome instead.

 

Reboot your modem. Use a speed checker just to make sure your provider is doing his job. Defrag your hard drive. Empty your cache this can really slow things down while browsing. Then as above.

 

Another thing to consider is the number of programmes running in the background.
People with Windows 7 often have Google Chrome and Google Earth sitting open and with Virus detectors running every time another on-line connection is made it can cause slowness.
A small blue circle can be seen running in the corner whilst the computer is waiting to complete a previous action. This can be significant, particularly if the Virus Detector is not up to date and trojens, malware etc. have accessed the unit.
As suggested already, keep the detector fully up to date (ideally daily)

 

If computer critically overheats it doesn't burn these days but simply switches off in the most brutal way - cuts out.
If computer simply overheats and that computer is a laptop you expect the cooler fan to make a lot of noise and some computer do slow down to keep the heat production down. If the latter happens you expect things to work slow but WORK.

A faulty hard disk or a healthy hard disk with a logical error on it can make Windows (I assume a PC) to do extra verifications as it reads and writes to the disk. Everything will be VERY slow. Solution - Run CheckDisk (chkdsk c: /r ) with elevated Admin privilege. This cannot happen whilst you are using Windows and a reboot will be required. I doubt a faulty hard disk as that usually give a blue screen of death - not a freeze up.

If you are using MS Internet Explorer try clearing the cache. BTW, the CCleaner will do this job for you, so take the earlier advice on that.

Check your computer for infections. Update your antivirus software and run a FULL system scan. Download MalwareBytes anti-malware software and without agreeing to buy it run a full system scan. This software is not crippled even when you do not pay for it.

Start your computer in a Safe Mode with Networking and attempt to use the internet. Go to safe sites like BBC. If the problem stops you may need to reset your Internet Explorer to default settings and disable any add-ons that may have accumulated over the past years.

If you are using MS Outlook, quit it to check if the freeze still happens with that thing off. MS Outlook has this nasty ability to choke all network connections when it is waiting for and email to arrive. Even when it is a tiny email that is stuck in the pipeline and nothing else is transmitted.

There are many, many more things that can be done to diagnose the source of your problem. In human terms your symptoms akin to asking your GP on the phone about not feeling too good and expecting a precise solution. Not going to happen...

 

Blimey Dmitriy, thats a bold opening post

Welcome to Gardeners Corner

 

I'm going to give ccleaner a try, tried googleing it and several websites come up, so whats the actual website please anyone?

 

http://www.piriform.com/CCLEANER

 

Well I've took all the advice - changed from I.E. to google chrome and intalled CCleaner and touch wood all seems ok so far, so a BIG for all the advice!

The only thing is when I use CCleaner it wipes out all my info like usernames & passwords etc...