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Vista.. Freezes! But works in Safe Mode fine

16K views 9 replies 4 participants last post by  TerryNet 
#1 ·
Hello

I am new here, posting with an extremely inconvienient issue. I am running Windows Vista on an HP Pavillion dv6626 laptop. My issue is that Vista is constantly freezing upon startup, without any error message or indication whatsoever. It started once every week or so, then to everyday within 30 minutes of startup. Now, its within 5 minutes sometimes the desktop doesnt even load before the freeze. After the system freezes, I have to hold down the power button to shut off the machine.

There's a couple details that lead me to belive the issue is software related and not a hardware issue. First, when the system freezes, I can still move the cursor via the touchpad, 95% of the time. I just cannot select a window, toggle between screens, or get any keyboard functionality or any other response at all. Second, I can boot up in safe mode and have all the functionality as safe mode will allow with no issues. I can also startup in Diagnostic mode with no issue at all, but again, tasks are limited.

I have deleted countless files and uninstalled probably 60% of my programs including the most recently installed ones. I've updated windows, and cleaned temporary files, and I just received extensive assistance to solve a malware issue which I beleive to be fixed. (This issue began before I had a virus issue)

So.. I'm out of ideas. I'm posting this now in Safe Mode With Networking, and hoping for some help. Thanks in advance!
 
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#2 ·
My opinion/advice is to cut your loses--format the disk and reinstall Windows. :( With that out of the way ...

Assume that it's one or more tasks or services that do not run in Safe Mode with Networking.

For tasks work with the Startup tab in msconfig. Disable them all and restart. If the problem occurs you can re-enable them and work with services. If the problem disappears you can re-enable 1, or several or 1/2 and eventually find the culprit.

For services (Control Panel - Administrative Tools - Services) first note the few that are running in Safe Mode--these are apparently OK.

Then in normal mode stop 1, several, or all but one of the other running services and begin your search.
 
#3 ·
Yea, your fastest way would be to try repair vista or reformat.I know that Hp's don't come with restore disc or a OS disc so i hope you made them. With no blue screen error the computer itself is fine, which is good news. So yes I concur its probably a software related issue, also you may want to try a registry repair. and make sure all the drivers are installed.
 
#4 ·
Well, you gotta do what u gotta do. Thank you guys for the advice..

I have no restore discs so I'm really not sure how to approach this. I will attempt to back up my most important files via safe mode first, then proceed to this solution.
 
#5 ·
You have a Recovery partition, which can be used as long as you can boot into Windows. Best to make a set of Recovery DVDs or CDs in case someday you cannot boot or the Recovery partition is damaged. And, of course, it's always an excellent idea to have your data backed up even when there is no immediate problem.
 
#7 ·
What do you mean by configuration?

I'm running Windows Vista on an HP Pavillion dv6500 Notebook PC
With an Intel(R) Core(RM)2 Duo CPU T5250 @ 1.50GHz 1.50GHz
RAM 1014 MB 32-bit Operating System

and the freezing has happened occasionally for about a month, now its so frequent, I cannot boot in normal mode. Can I activate HP Recovery via safe mode?
 
#8 ·
I am not 100% sure I will look into it I thought the freezeing may have been caused by little ram but it looks like you have enough there but I do recomend at least 2GB for vista I would contact HP to ask them about HP Recovery I have never owned an HP so Im not 100% but dont format because hp may be able to help you fix the problem
 
#9 ·
Alright, so I have a development...

I booted in safe mode, went to msconfig startup services and I disabled all except the bare necessities. I then booted in normal mode with no issue at all. Of course my abilities were extremely limited including no networking, but from here I started re-enabling services, 5 at a time... Booting and rebooting and rebooting over and over again with no issues until I reached "Windows Search." Probably one of the services that I least expected, but Windows Search is definitely the culprit. I tested it (1) by enabling all services except WS and booted up just fine.. and (2) again enabling only the bare necessity services, and WS.. which caused an immediate freeze. I am now posting in "Selective Startup" mode with every service except WS enabled.

So Windows Search uses the executible file SearchIndexer.exe in the Windows/System32 folder. Whhhaaaaatttt do I do about this? Can I delete it? Update the driver? Permenantly disable it?
 
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