presario lock up

[tas]

this is probably too broad a question, with 100's of probable answers but here goes anyway. i have a factory rebuilt presario 5868 and it keeps locking up on me. 2 or 3 times a night. any ideas ?

 

[Shukla]

Numerous presarios were suffering lockups very recently. The compaq website has a few softpaq updates that you need to download and incorporate to fix this problem.

Also, what vid card is in your system? If it's an ATI card than you need to add the following to your system.ini file:

[display]
DevBmp=0

I don't know why this works but it does work.

 

[phlashphire]

Might just be overheating. Or it could be poor power supply. Are you running any particular programs to cause the crash?

 

[tas]

no it locks up when running various programs. sometimes online sometimes offline.

 

[phlashphire]

Doesn't sound like a software problem, but to have you tried a clean install and update all components drivers? Check if the fan is working, my guess is that your comp is overheating. Does it crash when you're not running anything? Try to narrow down the cause, your description is a bit vague.

 

[Cylon]

Try closing out all those useless Compaq programs running in your system tray. If your advanced enough with computers, download the latest drivers for your machine's components (ie modem, videochip, soundchip, etc.) and format. Then reinstall windows using the latest drivers. This way you avoid all that pre-installed Compaq bloatware from the start .
From my experience with Compaqs, it's a combination of too much useless software running at once combined with cheap hardware that causes those lockups.
Also, when was the last time you ran scandisk/defrag on your system? Windows gets flaky if you go for months at a time without running them.

 

[tas]

ran scandisk/defrag a week ago. no help. i'm afraid i'm not very proficient with computers yet. to get latest drivers for various hardware do i have to remove case & get information directly off the piece (ie. manufacturer, model#, serial#) or is there some other way i can find that information. the literature compaq sent me is no help.

 

[tas]

fans working fine. locksup on different programs.

 

[tas]

i'm trying to download the softpaq i think i need but aol keeps kicking me off before the download completes. is the graphics card the same as the video card?

 

[phlashphire]

I feel for ya... a compaq and aol...
You don't have to open up your computer to find out about your hardware info. You can find out the hardware information by going into My Computer-->Control Panel-->System-->Device Manager.
My past experiences w/ compaq hasn't all been great. I also had a presario, ultimately the best solution for me was to remove all that Compaq proprietory crap from my computer and do a plain install of Windows (not the Compaq version that comes w/ the computer). I found all the buttons on the comp to be pretty much useless and not worth the trouble that comes w/ using their software.