General PC Mayhem...Possessed PC

[efrum]

Hi all, I'm new to this forum, but I'm having real trouble with me PC.

HP Pavilion 8590C
Intel Pentium III
Windows 98
128 mb Ram

For some reason it has been running very slow. It locks up entirely multiple times a day while doing mundane tasks such as browsing the internet or typing a Word doc. It frequently goes 'crazy' where the mouse will rapidly scroll all over the screen right-clicking on everything in sight. This morning it freaked out on me and moved my widows bar to the right side of the monitor from the bottom and opened several programs and docs. I had no control over what it was doing and finally had to shut down and re-boot. Usually I have to hard re-boot, as I will not have any control over the system, or it will be completely locked up and unresponsive.

Sometimes it will simply run very slowly, such as while I'm typing this. I type several words and have to wait for the computer to slowly display each letter until it catches up with me, and I'm not a fast keyboarder.

Sorry if I sound so lost, but I am. I would really appreciate any help you all would be willing to offer. Thanks in advance.

-efrum
Kalispell, MT

[slickvic22]

sounds like you have tons of spyware adware and startup issues. I recommend running spybot search and destroy and ad-aware. You can get both from download.com. Then see if you can access your startup list, i use reg cleaner but not sure where to get it. And after that i would run a firewall if you have cable or dsl. Not that important on dial up. Win98 on a P3 w/ 128 RAM should not be slow at all.

[caebron]

Format your Harddrive.

[pianowizard]

Get a new mouse, or at least clean it.

[caebron]

download these:

http://www.majorgeeks.com/download506.html
and
http://www.majorgeeks.com/download2471.html

install and run them both (very easy to use!)

if that doesn't do the trick, you could also try using an alternative browser such as mozilla or netscape. Can be found on the same website as above.

last resort is still to format your harddrive and reinstall windows. No virus or spyware is gonna survive that. If you're still having trouble after you foramt, you probably have a hardware problem. If so, go to:
- Control Panel
- System
- click on the 'Hardware Tab'
- open 'Device Manager
- check if any of the devices are listed with a yellow exclamation mark

[SAJ]

http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/fil...id,4666,00.asp
RegClean v4.1a

[SAJ]

Check for updates on windows updates for , critical updates, security issues and drivers.
Also someone could have control of your computer through a remote desktop. But you have not given enough information about the system in order to track down the problem.

[charlielx]

are both CPU and back fans working??

[SAJ]

Originally posted by slickvic22
sounds like you have tons of spyware adware and startup issues. I recommend running spybot search and destroy and ad-aware. You can get both from download.com. Then see if you can access your startup list, i use reg cleaner but not sure where to get it. And after that i would run a firewall if you have cable or dsl. Not that important on dial up. Win98 on a P3 w/ 128 RAM should not be slow at all.

I would Not do any of that crap.
They just screw it up even more.
Ben there done that and now I am facing the format since the seek and destroy.
It gets rid of your click on your desktop and causes the domino affect.
I recommend formatting your hardrive every 6 months anyway.

[SAJ]

Originally posted by charlielx
are both CPU and back fans working??

Good call Charlie
Overheating could definately be the problem.
He could take all the covers off and see if that solves the lock up or it could be that he has temp warning in his CMOS settings. and shuts the node off. Possibly power setting change could stop it.
Don't have enough info to definately cure this one.