System Freezes and Then Comes Back

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Guest

As I type away or click away, the system seems to lock up. After a minute,
it recovers. I have seen this when viewing DVD's with media player as well
but when that happens I get off and on tones for about 30 seconds and then
the DVD resumes.

I use a Belkin wireless KVM cable. Do you think the KVM is the problem?
 
KVM Cables are for internet. That has Nothing to do with this problem.
Either reinstall Media Player or check to see if the disc has a lot of
scratches.
 
Ed, would this happen even though I have not executed Media Player? I may
run Media Play once a week. The error I am talking about happens about every
15 minutes. Sometimes it only happens once every couple of hours.
 
On Sat said:
KVM Cables are for internet. That has Nothing to do with this problem.
Click to expand...

Eh? KVM = Keyboard, Video and Mouse, and are generally solutions
aimed at allowing a single set of these to be switched between
multiple running PCs. Think clustered computing, bulk setup,
headerless servers, insufficient desk space etc.

I agree; not likely to be relevant.
Either reinstall Media Player or check to see if the disc has a lot of
scratches.
Click to expand...

Are the problems limited to Media Player alone?

This can be a generic failure pattern that arises when something
delays low-level driver code within critical sections that disable
interrupts, thus freezing out keyboard, mouse, playback, etc.

Causes include:
- failing HD sick-sector retries
- HD LED stays on
- HD noise silent or periodic clicking
- CPU usage usually low, i.e. 90%+ in idle loop
- can eat your data sooner or later, so fix++ (replace HD)
- bad/mis-spec'd network cabling, causing broken packets
- HD LED usually off
- stops when you disconnect network cable
- other peripherals and drivers
- HD LED usually off
- stops when you disconnect or disable the peripheral

Wireless can act as a virtual bad cable, if signals are too weak
(think batteries) or are subject to interference.

No, but wireless may be, if it's dipping out.


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Click to expand...
Saws are too hard to use.
Be easier to use!
 
Alot to digest. I do run a wireless network but the other PC's on the
network run very well, as does this one. Signal is very good but who knows
about interference but the access point is just down the hall. I don't think
it has anything to do with the network.

The hard drive is only a couple of months old and worked very well with XP
Media Edition. I don't have any reason to believe that it is a hardware
problem. The drive could need defraging though. At least that is a
possibility. I am just wondering if there is a misbehaving driver out there.
I did not do a clean install. I installed over the top of XP, per Dell's
recommendation.

Funny thing is that it did not happen at all today yet and I have been in
and out of that PC all day.

You are right, KVM (Keybord, Video, Mouse) is used when you want two PC's to
share the KVM. This is a wireless Flip model which may be interferring
somewhat with the network. I don't know what frequency the KVM uses. I use
a higher frequency (Ch 11) on the network and always have. I had no KVM
problems prior to this so I don't anticipate any with the exception of a
program Belkin provides that you can use to switch, Video, Audio, or All. It
doesn't seem to want to stay resident in Vista and then won't execute until I
reinstall. I have a note into Belkin support to see if they are planning a
Vista version of the softward.

I will look into the CPU usage. My guess is that the CPU is not very active
but that would be the norm rather than the exception. I have a CPU gadget
active, so I will watch that should this occur again but I don't know how
accurate it will be since it really seems that the PC locks up temporatily -
I can't click on anything...
 
On Mon, 12 Mar 2007 15:18:05 -0700, qz2026
Alot to digest. I do run a wireless network but the other PC's on the
network run very well, as does this one. Signal is very good but who knows
about interference but the access point is just down the hall. I don't think
it has anything to do with the network.
Click to expand...

My main concern with wireless networking is that you no longer have a
hard physical scope that determines who is on your network and who is
not. It's difficult to tap into your network from the Internet
without some malicious code footprint, and it's hard to plausibly deny
hostile intent if caught physically breaking into a building so as to
tap into networking cables. WiFi LAN intrusion is slippery++

I thought networking in this case, due to your assertion that problems
apply only when online. Network packet handling at the driver level
involves the same combination of 3rd-party hardware-specific driver
code, and speed-critical low-level system access, so could cause the
same "disabled interrupts" lockout effect as a failing HD.
The hard drive is only a couple of months old and worked very well with XP
Media Edition. I don't have any reason to believe that it is a hardware
problem. The drive could need defraging though.
Click to expand...

You have reason to believe something's a problem because things are
Not Working, and in a fairly scope-pervasive way. So yes, I'd
consider all hardware capable of causing that problem pattern as
suspect, and HD is definitely in there. HDs do fail (or are even born
dying), and not only near end-of-life either.

Don't defrag a suspect HD or file system, for the same reason you'd
not force a sick person on a route march to "fitten them up".
I did not do a clean install. I installed over the top of XP, per Dell's
recommendation.
Click to expand...

OK; may have inherited something. I don't care much for trans-version
over-old installs - they've never worked as well as advertised.
You are right, KVM (Keybord, Video, Mouse) is used when you want two PC's to
share the KVM. This is a wireless Flip model which may be interferring
somewhat with the network. I don't know what frequency the KVM uses.
Click to expand...

Usually that short-range stuff is Bluetooth or something similar that
should stay out the way of WiFi.
I use a higher frequency (Ch 11) on the network and always have.
Click to expand...

OK. Any joy at different frequencies?
I will look into the CPU usage. My guess is that the CPU is not very active
but that would be the norm rather than the exception.
Click to expand...

Often an active CPU will delay the Task Manager pop-up until it's less
active (Heisenberg effect, heh heh)
I have a CPU gadget active, so I will watch that should this occur again
but I don't know how accurate it will be since it really seems that the PC
locks up temporatily - I can't click on anything...
Click to expand...

Yup. May be hware other than CPU.


--------------- ---- --- -- - - - -
Click to expand...
Saws are too hard to use.
Be easier to use!
 
You might have something. The only thing that is different between the pre
and post Vista is the USB Wireless Adapter. My old "B" adapter was not
supported in Vista so I used a Belkin "G" USB adapter that I had used for
another PC. It seems to work fine. Belkin idicated on their web site that
the driver was Vista compatible but who knows? Are their any logs that I can
view or turn on in Vista to try and trap this occurance?
 
On Sun, 18 Mar 2007 16:16:03 -0700, qz2026
You might have something. The only thing that is different between the pre
and post Vista is the USB Wireless Adapter. My old "B" adapter was not
supported in Vista so I used a Belkin "G" USB adapter that I had used for
another PC. It seems to work fine. Belkin idicated on their web site that
the driver was Vista compatible but who knows? Are their any logs that I can
view or turn on in Vista to try and trap this occurance?
Click to expand...

Ah, this is interesting... though more in a "performance" rather than
"stability" perspective. I'm thinking of a previous thread in which
someone complained about worse WiFi performance in Vista, which I
suspected could be due to a known issue involving mediation between
"b" and "g" traffic that I read and have largely forgotten.

As a communication technology, WiFi implies multiple players - there's
what your Vista PC does, but there are also off-board devices and what
they do that can affect your Vista PC.

These devices may have adjusted themselves to work in a certain way
that was appropriate for "b: but becomes troublesome with "g".


If this were my problem, I'd start by reading up on the "b" and "g"
standards and issues that arise between them. When I did this
previously, I did so via Wikipedia.

Then I'd look for problems as follows...
- "b" vs. "g" issues
- interferrence in the Wifi ferequency bands
- encryption issues, i.e. "open" vs. WEP vs. WPA vs. WPA2
- issues in whatever's piled up on top of that; TCP/IP etc.

We currently think that WiFi attacks are rare, but when these are
made, often there's an attempt to stimulate more WiFi traffic by
forcing errors or interferrence. The more WiFi packets flying around,
the faster an attacker's processing can analyse these and crack in.


I'd also state-chart a few typical conditions to determine the scope
of the problem, starting with Safe Mode, Safe Cmd, MSConfig with all
non-MSware suppressed, all peripherals unplugged, all networking
disabled, etc. Caveat: Once you suppress items in MSConfig,
networking may become dangerous, as you may have suppressed defenses.


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Click to expand...
Saws are too hard to use.
Be easier to use!
 
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