PC Hanging and freezing

[Guest]

My PC boots normally but sometimes in beginning display goes off, and sometime freezes at welcome screen logging in stage, and a few times it is usable for b/w 20 minutes & 1 and half hour approx:? what may be the exact problem?
as for the assistance i did made a observation of 64M NVidia Graphics Card, its fan looks a bit slow, but i don't remember, whats its normal speed of rotation.
hanging and freezing means that even ctrl+alt+del does not work num light hangs and just one way out rebooting...
Kindly help me by giving a proper solution as for previous 3 days i am searching the solution
i shall be really thankful even if your solution does not work!!!

 

[buzznut]

Well, I think it could be a couple of things. I recommend you give as exact as possible specs for your system components.

I think the slowdown you mention could be a failing fan, so the video card may be overheating which is leading to system instability, hangs, and shutdowns.

The other possibility is a failing power supply so the video card (and other components) are not getting enough power.

It sounds like a fairly old machine, so it could be a lot of things, but these seem most likely.
I would check the BIOS and see if you have a listing for the voltages the PSU is supplying. Check to see if they are within 10% of what they should be (+12V, +5V, etc.)

Also if you have a friend with another video card (AGP?) you could possibly swap to see if that clears up any problems. I'm going to guess that the video card is failing, and a new card may remedy the situation.

Its possible your motherboard may have onboard video, if that is the case then I would just use that for now until you find a new video card. Check locally on craigslist or ebay for a replacement. Don't spend too much on an older video card, this system sounds like you may wish to consider getting something a bit newer.