Beginning to get annoyed with Windows 7...

[Benchwayze]

Does anyone know why Windows explorer keeps malfunctioning, freezing my PC. It's also happening on my laptop now,. It is seriously messing with my head!
Any advice on what to do, would be appreciated.
I've seen online remedies, but they are so involved, I would re-install Windows more easily. (If I had a disc with which to do that!)

TIA

John

 

[gregmcateer]

I've not used W7, but seems from other's I've spoken to that it was a duffer, a bit like Vista. Best advice seems to be change it to XP or W8.

Best of luck, whatever you choose

 

[Benchwayze]

I've not used W7, but seems from other's I've spoken to that it was a duffer, a bit like Vista. Best advice seems to be change it to XP or W8.

Best of luck, whatever you choose

XP would be great. Will it install on a Quad core, and will it handle more than 2 gig of RAM?

Cheers.
John

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I believe Greg's got them the wrong way around - loads of people have uninstalled Win8 or 8.1 that the computer came with and gone back to Win7.

 

[RogerP]

I believe Greg's got them the wrong way around - loads of people have uninstalled Win8 or 8.1 that the computer came with and gone back to Win7.

Indeed, W8 was the new Vista not W7 which very many people are happy to stay with.

 

[bugbear]

And XP is full of holes, and out of support.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/wind ... pport-help

Why, yes, I do use Linux, why do you ask?

BugBear

 

[mseries]

I've not used W7, but seems from other's I've spoken to that it was a duffer, a bit like Vista. Best advice seems to be change it to XP or W8.

Best of luck, whatever you choose

I use W7 Pro every week day at work, it's fine. I have never heard that advice before. IMO, Win7 Pro is better than XP Pro. No idea about the home editions

 

[mseries]

I've not used W7, but seems from other's I've spoken to that it was a duffer, a bit like Vista. Best advice seems to be change it to XP or W8.

Best of luck, whatever you choose

XP would be great. Will it install on a Quad core, and will it handle more than 2 gig of RAM?

Cheers.
John

If you have a 32 bit machine no OS will handle more than 3.?? GB of RAM. XP64 will handle more but you'll need a 64 bit machine.

 

[mseries]

YOu machines are probably very busy doing something else, not frozen at all, just too busy to respond to the user interface. LIkely to be doing disk maintenance, re-indexing or something. Maybe you can help it by defragmenting your disk.

Maybe, likely, you have some unwelcome process running in the background, either malware or not.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I had problems with a newspaper to which I subscribe - I had a moan and they asked what I was using. I replied Win8.1 and IE10. They replied that I would be better off using something that suited their system better - like WinXP and IE6. This was a major newspaper a few months ago. :?

 

[Michael7]

John, I have Win7 Pro on 3 PCs and its a rock solid OS. Sounds like you may have a few gremlins in your network.

Michael

 

[Benchwayze]

I have Win 7 Pro Ultimate.

I can't defragment, as this is done automatically. So I believe. I have uptodate A/virus and Malware programs. I regularly clean all trash files with CC Cleaner.I don't know what more i can do. I tried Linux, but it has a few disadvantages, like I can't access any of my old files, without learning to use a new Word Processor and so on!

 

[nicguthrie]

I've been an IT engineer and tech support guy for almost 20 years, and I'd be very surprised to find XP *now* running better than win 7.

Sure vista was a pig, and folks stayed with XP while that was out, but the only reason to keep XP now, is if you have software or a device that's not supported by win 7.

Going back to XP removes a lot of the more modern security changes, and will open vulnerability to a lot of rubbish that win 7 just ain't prone to.

If your system is quad core and over 2gb ram as stated, it's odd for win 7 to be glitching, I've had it running smoothly, if a bit slowly on far less spec.

Are you using a free anti virus or McAfee? I've seen both cause Explorer crashes. Also some cataloging apps or perhaps unusual hardware with a very bad driver. It's hard to give and definite answers from so little info, but going back to xp is a bad idea. I've used 7 since it was out, 8 is imo not worth the upgrade unless you have a touch screen.

If you want to pm me with further details I can see if I can give you some ideas, but I'd suggest a malware scan (malwarebytes anti-malware is a great free program), and changing your antivirus to Kaspersky or Norton or one of the other "pro" ones.

The usual cause of Explorer malfunction is malware or software that corrupts it's processes.

Sorry I can't be more help.

Nic.

 

[mseries]

Maybe it's defragging when it 'freezes', it it possible to do it manually, I see it on my menu and expect it'll be possible to stop it doing it automatically. To be honest I do zero maintenance on my work PC, not even defrags.

You AVs maybe scanning or updating themselves when the machines 'freeze', see if you can set those processes to manual. If you are careful about what you do, you don;t really need AV. If you are not connected to a network you don't need them, so for a test, maybe unplug your ethernet/disable your WLAN card and stop your AV, see if you get the problem.

Get rid of all Malware ;-), I think you mean;t anti-malware

See what you have auto started ( hint look at the Task Manager, then look at Services to see what is auto starting at boot time, chances are you'll not need everything, somethings will be unknown to you and be essential so don't go stopping things willy nilly.) I suspect you will have things running that are not really needed.

 

[mseries]

NB regarding Linux, it isn't a direct replacement for Windows. The OS is different, not just the UI, (there are many UIs anyway). The security model is better, the file system is better (no need to defrag, the disk doesn't get fragmented). IMO, relearning the work processor isn't that hard especially if you used MS Word prior to Word2007, Libre Offce is pretty much like older versions of Word/Excel anyway. Your docs will be convertable. In my view, because of issues like you are facing and constant need to apply patches, it's worth the climb up the learning curve.

 

[nicguthrie]

I don't mean to step on you in any way mseries, but since win 7, perhaps the first service pack, all defragging is done on the fly in the OS, so that it doesn't tend to build up into a major job anymore, most defrag tools except the ones that prioritise files by placement on your drive are pretty much redundant these days.

Oh, and be careful telling those less experienced that "you don;t really need AV." I realise that you meant *while* not connected to the network, but many would assume you meant it was now unnecessary, which would be rather dangerous these days, unless you are nefariously looking to recruit his PC to your botnet!

Good tip about the autostarting, but as you noted, also a little dangerous for the inexperienced to go sniffing about in... My wife's uncle managed to royally stuff up his PC by stopping essentials from running, and then blocking windows components with his firewall, when he tried going into the depths of things unaided

Nic.

 

[mseries]

No problem nicguthrie. Good news about Win7 Defrag. it's about time ! So maybe this isn't the OPs problem.

Regarding not using AV, I'd never recommend running without it on a windows machine, especially for ordinary users (i.e. not IT pros like us), but I do know users who work happily without it and have never been infected.

 

[Benchwayze]

Okay folks. Thank you.

I have Malwarebytes anti-malware. I use it regularly, yet it ALWAYS seems to find something. (Can't understand how these things get in, through A/V software.) I am using AVG free. I did have a subscription last year, but things happened at home, and I let it slip. I had a subscription to Zone Alarm, but that slows down the PC unbelievably. I have patience, but I don't expect my PC to take 10 minutes to put itself in a use-ready state. Which is what was happening.

The Windows explorer glitch turns my screen opaque, when I try to move files about the between discs, or from the desktop to folders. and a window comes up giving me three options.
Close program and seek a solution on-line.
Close the program
Wait for program to respond.
The last option can take up to half an hour.
I just defragged, but there doesn't seem to be any difference with speed. I de mounted all external USB hardware. No difference.

So I be stumped!

Just going to scan with Anti-Malware and AVG.

Cheers.

John

 

[ajmacleod]

Whilst I've been a very happy Linux user for 17 years I doubt that Windows 7 itself is the cause of your particular problem. My first suspicion would be a dodgy hard disk drive - they have a huge failure rate these days and if anything is going to make a drive problem reveal itself, it's shifting data about.

A start would be to use something like Piriform Defraggler, NOT to defrag your drive but to check the drive's health statistics - look in particular for bad sectors or pending bad sectors.

Defragmenting a failing drive is the very worst thing you could do... hopefully your problem is something else but I'd start there and eliminate that before bothering with software issues.

 

[woodfarmer]

I have been running linux on three systems for over 6 years now with very few problems. last usable windows was xp and that isn't up to working with a lot of more modern application or websites. Linux is inherently better that windows, much like the difference beteen an overhead valve four stroke to a small two stroke. No matter what you do to the two stroke it is never going to run reliably with any sort of fuel efficiency. In my view windows is all features based on a faulty core. a Chrome plated Trabant.