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My brother in law is having a strange problem.

First off, PC Specs:

AMD 2400+ CPU 512 RAM 80Gig hardrive

PC is about 5 years old now.

PROBLEM: So he's been running Windows 2000 for ages and FINALLY decided to upgrade to Windows XP SP2. So he got it and tried to install it. After formatting his drive, he had to try 4 times to get the install completed as it kept freezing during the install, it was NOT bluescreening though, just locking up.

Now that XP and both Service Packs are installed, the PC is still randomly locking up often. Now, to my mind, if it was a RAM problem, the pc would be BSOD'ing but its not, just locking up. Could this be a harddrive problem? Western Digital harddrive after 5 years of use.....

Thanks!

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    Have you tried going onto event viewer and seeing if it shows any problems happening
    – admintech
    Oct 5, 2009 at 9:23
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    For checking the RAM, you could get a Linux-LiveCD (f.e. Ubuntu) which have memeory testers (memtest86 or something).
    – Bobby
    Oct 5, 2009 at 9:43
  • My brother in law lives a few hundred kilometers away, will try talk him through it on the phone though, thanks guys
    – StevenMcD
    Oct 5, 2009 at 9:48
  • Did he install over Win2k or do a fresh installation?
    – MartW
    Oct 5, 2009 at 12:13
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    @CodyByMonlight: Fresh Install "After formatting his drive, he had to try 4 times to get the install completed..."
    – Bobby
    Oct 5, 2009 at 12:44

1 Answer 1

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Sounds like bad hardware somewhere. Could be the HD, but could also be RAM, mobo, etc...

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  • although this was resolved by us a few days later, it was a RAM issue as I suspected. Since this is the only answer on the question, I will mark it as correct
    – StevenMcD
    Aug 2, 2010 at 11:40

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