do I have virus or hardwear problem?

Washer,

Tell us more about your system? Is it a laptop?

Mike.

I have a dell laptop. It runs windows xp.

Washer,

Just a llliiittle more...

What model laptop is it? How much memory? And just about anything else that you might think of that can help us resolve your problem?

Mike.

It's an Inspiron 5100, 512 memory, 40 gb hard drive(with about 18 gb left).  This started back in  November. I think it started after I started using ebay a lot.  It was so bad at one point that a friend came over and had to start it in safe mode just to get it running. We decided to restore it back to two months earlier.  It only shuts off when I try to run any kind of spyware program, or antivirus program.   I don't know what else to tell you. Thanks, Washer

Washer,

If it just decides to shut itself down without warning (going from 60 to 0 instantly), then it could the overheating issue that those system have. When your running a program that scans your system (like spybot) - non stop, it can cause your processor speed and cpu heat to dramatically rise.

Have you tried blowing compressed air into the cooling vents and see if that clears the problem up? Also try doing a GOOGLE search on "5100 overheating" and see if anything there resembles what your experiencing.

Mike.

 

Thank you!  I checked it out on google and found that there are a lot of people having this problem.  Now to get Dell to fix it.  Luckilly, being my first computer, I bought the at home, 3 year warranty.  Apparently there is a heat sink that accumulates dust through a design errror causing the computer  to overheat. People with a one year warranty are getting burned because it is taking that long for the problem to occur, and Dell apparently is not admitting any fault. Lets hope that they change their policy. They will probably lose 100's of 1000's customers in the future if they don't. Thanks again.

washer10,

Did you try blowing out the rear vents with compressed air?

While it can certainly be a hardware issue...Spybot does hang on some systems and one cause is a CPU with Hyperthreading (maybe not on your 5100). Here's some advice from a friend:

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http://forums.net-integration.net/index.php?showtopic=24389

Item number 3: Hangs during fix or scan.

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Thanks Chris, I had read that advice on the internet also, so I did it.  I also bought a notebook chill mat made by Targus. The mat has two fans that help dissipate the heat that the laptop fan blows out.  I ran the antivirus program, and got all the way through it.  Just a sidenote, that I don't think is connected but has me confused and happy.  I ran my spybot program.  It has been taking over 12 minutes to run through the whole list.  It took 180 seconds and found over 160 threats.  Can anyone explain how it is working so fast now?

Washer,

The CPU works by opening and closing computer circuits (internal to itself). The faster those electrical circuits are opening (the faster the CPU is running - the clock cycle) and closing (the computer is processing data), the more heat is building up.