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HELP - What is wrong with my computer?

post #1 of 33
8/16/09 at 1:53am
Thread Starter 
Anyone here know enough about computers to tell me what's wrong with mine? A couple of days ago it started freezing and unfreezing every once in a while. As I type this is is doing it again. I'll post this quickly because it takes forever to type. Basically, the physical memory being used suddenly jumps from around 500mb to 1.7-2gb (I have 2 gigs of ram), despite me not doing anything different or running any new apps. The task manager's performance tab looks like this.



That's 3 freezes there. Normally, there's just one at a time but sometimes more. If it's just one freeze there's just one of those lumps, which can be shorter or longer, like so.



It seems to happen more frequently when I'm playing a DVD.

Any ideas?
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post #2 of 33
8/16/09 at 1:54am
need to download moar ram
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post #3 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:10am
Click on the Processes tab when it happens and see if a particular application is using up a lot of the CPU. May help to narrow down what is causing it.
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post #4 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:12am
Thread Starter 
^Tried that, and the "show processes from all users" box is selected. Nothing ever jumps more than a couple mb here and there. Firefox uses the most ram and it's never THAT high, ie right now it's about 80mb. So whatever it is, it's not showing up there.
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post #5 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:21am
Quote:
Originally Posted by JD_May View Post
^Tried that, and the "show processes from all users" box is selected. Nothing ever jumps more than a couple mb here and there. Firefox uses the most ram and it's never THAT high, ie right now it's about 80mb. So whatever it is, it's not showing up there.
You want to look at CPU usage when this is happening. For example right now, my physical memory is at 75% but my CPU usage is only 4-5%. For reference my Firefox application is using about 600 MB of RAM (I have a shit ton of tabs open). I've had similar issues to what you describe in the past and it's usually been an errant program misbehaving with %CPU used spiking to near 100% making the computer jerky as you said. Upgrading the program, reinstalling it or uninstalling inevitably solved it. In one instance though this started happening more and more often and it turned out that my computer was on its last legs. Something (hardware) was failing.
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post #6 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:21am
Check the Processes you're running. You're missing something. If you don't know certain processes, Google them. If they're anywhere near dangerous, end process quickly and download/run Malwarebytes. This usually doesn't happen. Freezing? Slow typing? The symptoms of malware/virus.
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post #7 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:24am
you have a virus stop downloading german shista
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post #8 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:25am
Quote:
Originally Posted by pseudonym View Post
Check the Processes you're running.

You're missing something.

If you don't know certain processes, Google them. If they're anywhere near dangerous, end process quickly and download/run Malwarebytes.


This usually doesn't happen. Freezing? Slow typing? The symptoms of malware/virus.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Night Owl View Post
you have a virus stop downloading german shista

Both of these are possible although the symptoms would likely indicate spyware rather than virus.
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post #9 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:31am
This is what you get for posting in Current Events.
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post #10 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:35am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by pseudonym View Post
Check the Processes you're running.

You're missing something.
How I know I'm not missing anything is that my processes are sorted in terms of what's using the most ram. Nothing ever gets above firefox and that's not using that much memory. So if it's a process, it's not one that the task manager is keeping tabs on.

I also know it's not the CPU because the freezing is always exactly in time with the sudden jumps from 560mb memory in use to 1.9 gb or whatever. The CPU spikes once in a while but it doesn't really seem to affect much and it never gets up near 100% or anything.
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post #11 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:40am
You can run Process Explorer from Sysinternals. Have it on your desktop ready to run when your RAM and CPU usage begin to spike. You'll be able to find (and kill by right clicking) the offending app or process. If you determine it's an unfamiliar app or process, download Spybot Search and Destroy and the associated updates once you install. Restart your system in safe mode (Press F8 when your system starts up to see the choice) and run Spybot. This will allow the app to actually remove the spyware/malware (if that's what you have).
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post #12 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:52am
Thread Starter 
I'm now running process monitor. I'm not 100% sure what I should be looking for here, though. The only thing that sticks out to me that looks bad is that every once in a while, something called "lsass.exe", which my task manager identifies as a local security authority process (SYSTEM, does something called "RegQueryValue" and the result is "BUFFER OVERFLOW". Could that have something to do with what's happening? I'm downloading spybot and I was already downloading ad-aware.
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post #13 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:52am
http://www.memtest.org/ Download and run this. I think your memory's fucked.
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post #14 of 33
8/16/09 at 2:55am
Quote:
Originally Posted by JD_May View Post
I'm now running process monitor. I'm not 100% sure what I should be looking for here, though. The only thing that sticks out to me that looks bad is that every once in a while, something called "lsass.exe", which my task manager identifies as a local security authority process (SYSTEM, does something called "RegQueryValue" and the result is "BUFFER OVERFLOW". Could that have something to do with what's happening? I'm downloading spybot and I was already downloading ad-aware.
Sorry, it was Process EXPLORER. No, buffer overflow messages happen a lot in ProcessMon
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post #15 of 33
8/16/09 at 3:00am
Thread Starter 
Ok, I'm running process explorer now. What should I be looking for? Rambo I would use that memtest thing but it doesn't seem to be an app in the usual sense and that's above my ken.
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