Unsolved
This post is more than 5 years old
10 Posts
0
38063
XPS 430 Keeps Freezing/Not Responding Hard Boot Required
I have a new XPS 430 that I purchased in late April 2009 that keeps freezing/not responding. Normally this happens when using Internet Explorer (both 7 and 8) but it also happens when using regular programs like office or Dreamweaver CS4. The system will simply stop responding and if I try to engage the task manager using CTRL+ALT+DEL, I will get a Security Error. The only solution to move forward is to hard shut down. Since mid June it has gotten to the point where it happens multiple times per day and I am reverting back to my old computer. I am not as tech savy as I used to be (more savy on specific programs) so the more detailed the directions, the better.
Karen
Dell XPS 430
Windows Vista(TM) Home Premium-64, Service Pack 2
Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q8300 @ 2.50GHz
6 GB DDR3 RAM, 750 GB Seagate
IDT High Definition Audio CODEC
ATI Radeon HD 3650
knrkmartin
10 Posts
0
July 14th, 2009 10:00
So I have uninstalled all extra programs I had on this machine (iTunes, Dreamweaver CS4, MS Office Ultimate, Paint Shop Pro X2) and I am still getting the freezes.
I downloaded and installed all the updated drivers from the Dell site for this machine. Still freezing, although it seems to be more when the machine has been idle for a few moments than when I am doing basic surfing.
With all the other posts I am seeing on different Dell XPS machines, is this some sort of Driver issue?
knrkmartin
10 Posts
0
July 18th, 2009 09:00
The computer has become a bit more stable since removing extra programs. I did reinstall Office (need it for class next week), although I am not actively using it at the moment. The past few days of close monitoring I have noticed a definite trend. Any time I am waking the computer up from the screensaver or sleep mode, it is freezing up. If I remember to start the taskmanager first thing in the morning and watch when this happens, one of the CPU's will spike, but there is no other CPU usage activity or memory usage activity.
DELL-Chris M
Community Manager
Community Manager
•
54.9K Posts
0
July 18th, 2009 16:00
Turn off all power management. Does the freezing still occur?
knrkmartin
10 Posts
0
July 18th, 2009 17:00
I have all power management turned off thru the Windows interface - I will report back in a few hours/tomorrow morning what the results are.
knrkmartin
10 Posts
0
July 19th, 2009 22:00
I turned off all power management thru the windows interface, kept the screen saver going (Was always taught to eliminate one variable at a time). After the 10 mins of the screen saver, just running task manager and IE she froze requiring a hard reboot. I then turned off the screen saver and after about 30-40 minutes, same results. I did a hard boot and had the Resource Monitor (Reliability and Performance Monitor), task manager, and IE running. Again, after 30-40 minutes she froze. What I noticed was that the CPU Usage would spike if I tried to click on a window, but there was absolutely no disk activity. On the expanded view of the Resource Monitor, there was no details listed under the Disk and although it read 0 KB/sec it also read 100% Highest Active Time.
DELL-Chris M
Community Manager
Community Manager
•
54.9K Posts
0
July 20th, 2009 08:00
I doubt this is a hardware issue. I would backup my data and start over with the operating system.
knrkmartin
10 Posts
0
July 30th, 2009 23:00
It has taken a few days. I noticed that there have been issues with the Seagate Hard Drives. Although my hard drive was supposedly not affected, all the lockups and freezing were when the system was trying to access the hard drive after an extended time of no use. I installed a Western Digital Hard Drive and installed windows and all the Dell drivers again and have not had a single issue with freezing.
AlanVH
1 Message
0
August 17th, 2009 14:00
I purchased a Dell XPS 430 in about April as well from Best Buy and have had the same thing happen. At first i thought it was the Internet connection that was caausing it but after doing web research have seen more and more people that have the same problem. Quite a few seem to say that its the hard drive that is causing the problem. i am contacting Dell as well as Best buy today when i get home from work. There are only a couple programs that i added. Office 2007 and a couple others. Have barely used the unit and it has frozen up so much . Really frustrating. Are there any new known fixes???
knrkmartin
10 Posts
0
August 17th, 2009 15:00
I have not had a single problem since installing the WD hard drive. This is a picture of my reliability stats:
Not one Windows or Miscellaneous Failure since the new hard drive. I have Office 2007 & Adobe reader. Still need to install Dreamweaver CS4 and iTunes, but they are not critical to install yet.
DudeStarship
1 Message
0
July 30th, 2013 00:00
Freezing when streaming media full screen. Freezing when running 3D cybercommunity site secondlife.com . This is a total freeze requiring hard boot.
Checked all components via Dell diagnostics passed all. Checked Memory from boot and system diagnostics no error found.
1. Upgraded graphics card to Power Color ATI Radeon HD 7770 1 gig no change
2. Formatted hdd Reinstalled windows 7 sp 1 no change.
Purchased 2009
XPS 430 quad 2.33Mhz
RAID HDD 2 x 500 gigs
Ram 2 x 2 gigs Kingston