Yes, that too.

Follow this link, download the appropriate microsoft stand-alone system sweeper tool and generate a cd. Boot off it and see what it finds.

http://www.pressbyte.com/2843/microsoft ... m-sweeper/

OK, tried most of the things above and then Superfetch started crashing like crazy knocking me offline as well.

Disabled both Superfetch and Readyboost and the system seems to be more responsive.

The update list has climbed from 22 updates in queue to 29 now.

Spoke too soon.

I normally use Firefox. I am now posting using IE because the latest problem is I get "Plugin Container for Firefox has stopped working" error and Firefox won't stay up for more than 15 seconds.

I can say with confidence this laptop will not be in service very much longer.

I bought it nearly three years ago for $299 so can't complain.

A new one will cost the same and come with Windows 7 more RAM and a bigger hard drive.

Money is tight now as we are moving and taking a drive to New York for my class re-union. I never made one before.

So will likely get one probably towards end of next month.

There is probably nothing wrong with the hardware

i have the solution - back up your docs and important settings; find all the drivers for your notebook .. and

Format C:

Do a clean windows install

i bought my notebook at about the same time you did your - opened it up and extricated and executed the dust bunnies; and then blew away the HP Compag CRAP they put on the notebook - and it boots up more than twice as fast - and this is before the SSD, Vista 32 is as good an OS as Win 7.

STOP! I had a similar problem, I felt it was Firefox and also problem with updates. I tried several ad ware programs ie Malwarebytes, spy-bot, A squared free, etc. all showed no problems.

Then I went to CNET and looked for some other FREE programs and lucky daze Ad-Aware try it it takes quite a while to scan but it found the durty little varmit. http://download.cnet.com/Ad-Aware-Free- ... ag=mncol;1

My machine is purrrfect now!

OK, stopped using that one back in 2009 when they got too full of nag screens but downloading now to give it a try. Couldn't hurt.

Ad-aware could not install. It gave a Microsoft CRT error which I've never seen before.

Going to cold boot and try again.

What you are describing is a notebook that needs to be reformatted due to probably being hijacked by malware


Do you have a copy of Vista or Win 7? If not, use the restore disks that came with your PC
- back up what you can first (and scan what you backed up) then start over.

And this time don't disable your UAC

It came with Vista installed but didn't get a CD with it.

All the Malware programs I do have installed all say no Malware found

Anti-Malwarebytes, Spybot, Microsoft, Advanced system care