Hi,

64 MB RAM, W98, Toshiba Sat. Pro 480CDT laptop here.

I have tried for about a day, including here, to figure out how to take my CPU temp, in attempts to identify some troubleshooting options for the following. I always used to get some application locks/freezes that I could end with ctrl-alt-del, so I kind of just overlooked it. But, maybe coincidentally, since upgrading to Office 2000 (disk 1 only), and then a higher version of AOL, instead I now get some "hard locks" that even ctrl-alt-del won't touch. In particular, have noticed this when starting to save a Word doc or while using the Internet including surfing & AOL e-mail. Seems to happen a couple times in succession, even after rebooting, then not again for days. FYI, about a month ago I installed minimum components for a new DSL connection, but this problem did not start until two weeks later, closer to the above upgrades.

Anyway, I read here that hard locks are often either a RAM issue; a CPU overheat issue; or deterioration of W98/OS. I used mtest86 (left on standard) for many passes to verify that my RAM is ok (is that adequate?). Next I wanted to check the CPU fan/temp. But am getting the idea this is not a basic, routinely-included system function. If important, I'd expect it to be, so maybe I'm offtrack in my troubleshooting ideas? I know my RAM is small, but based on all of the above I am assuming it is not the problem here?

Also, on top of the question of how to -- and if I need to -- check my CPU temp, **I have been paying attention over the last day and have not seen my fan come on even once, although my laptop computer is on and usually online all the time.** Could this possibly be normal? I have no external cooling source blowing on it or anything. If I ever do figure out the how and why of taking temp, is it true that a much higher temp reading will be normal for a laptop?

Sorry if this is too many questions. In sum I guess I'd say, am I on track w/ my CPU focus; AND what about the dormant fan. I assume you smart people will see through all the words to what I actually need to look at to figure all this out! Thanks, I hope!
= )

try this link for a program that works well in checking cpu temperature
http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php
I have a laptop for work it is a dell 2.2 and the fan hardly ever runs on that, it never really ran much on my old laptop either. The speedfan program does work on my laptop for cpu temperature as well as my home pc

Your ram sounds fine due to the mtest results.

Nothing here leads me to suspect the cpu.

The more random the freezes the more likely they are hardware. If they happen consistently they tend to be software.

If you get lock ups when saving something to the hard drive that brings up a couple possibilities. Desktop hard drives spin all the time but on laptops it varies. Some (most?) power down when not in use to save power, which means when you go to save, there is a sudden surge of power use, and its possible that at such times the cpu or motherboard or memory is briefly not getting enough power. The other thing is that if your hard drive powerup / powerdown software (whether its windows power management or if its built into the bios) could be buggy. I tried using windows pm to power down my hard drive a while back on my desktop and it sometimes froze the machine when it tried to power it up from a standby state.

Office 2000 and aol both make a fairly large number of changes to your software environment and that part of your description makes me think one or the other are the most likely culprits.

Thanks to both of you! I'll look at all the ideas. Couple things right now if you don't mind: First, another FYI: Per a tech's suggestions, I had disabled many startup apps from msconfig. Left only systray, scanreg, av and firewall. So most of the time lately my power profile (and taskmon) have not been loaded. I reloaded them today but the hard lock still happened a couple more times.

I think it's true that the prob just may be the AOL upgrade or Office upgrade. Any "preference" which would be better to try taking down? Or if I buy more memory would that help, and maybe also with the below? This is a 12/97 basic laptop with a slightly clueless owner so I just don't want to push anything.

Here's an interesting thing. To me, anyway. What do you think of the reliability of the PCpitstop system testing site? I've pasted it's "results" below. I know it's a commercial site but I wouldn't be surprised if this was all true. On the other hand, it claims to test and analyze an AWFUL lot in the three minutes it took! (Detailed suggestions are given for each problem item, and I haven't looked at how many of them will ask me to buy something yet.):

[Begin paste]
While still useful for basic e-mail, and web browsing, this system lacks processing power. If you are not satisfied with its performance after performing our tune-ups, buying a new computer would usually be more cost-effective than investing in upgrades for this one.

Customized Tune-up Tips:

Here is our customized advice based on the test analysis. Tips are listed in order of importance; red and yellow indicate issues you should fix immediately and blue is general advice. Click on a tip to find out what it means and what to do.

• Unusually low performance (Drive C)
• Check IE Restricted Sites zone
• Consider a new system
• Unusually low memory performance
• Defragment files (Drive C)
• Check processor performance
• Unusually low video performance
• Adjust IE browser cache size
[End of paste]

The first three were red, rest yellow. I defragmented a few days ago. And to save resources I have not installed and have otherwise let some video things stagnate. Don't get the restricted zone thing; set on high and not many sites added to it, but have Spybot w/ a gzillion avoid-sites.

In general, my main uses? I mainly just word process and web surf a lot.