My PC crashes/freezes, frequently and apparently quite randomly. The cursor freezes, the keyboard doesn't respond,even the caps and number lock keys have no effect, so, of course, the Ctrl-Alt-Del keys can't bring up Task Manager. I have to use rest button every time. Never any error message. This happens in any program, at any time ...after the computer has been running for a few minutes, half an hour or two hours. It even happens while the computer is not being used and the welcome screen is showing. My PC runs Windows XP Professional. (This seems to have started after I downloaded and installed a large number of Windows updates (as advised by Microsoft's Update site.)

Try this . eScan Antivirus Toolkit Utility http://www.it-mate.co.uk/main_content/security.asp#dialerspy http://www.mwti.net/index.asp MicroWorld has developed a Free eScan AntiVirus Toolkit Utility, that will help you diagnose if your machine is infected by a virus. This tool also cleans your registry and other system areas of the damage that a virus might have done. The best part of eScan toolkit utility, is its ability to; A. Check running processes in memory. B. Check illegal dialers running in memory and inform the user. C. Inform users of any background (legal) sniffers or tools running in memory. Ed: This program can be slow on older systems with large hard drives

Les, If you're not infected it could be 2 other things, 1) your power supply is going or 2) there's a piece of hardware or driver that XP doesn't like. Did you just install XP and then add the updates or was XP working fine for a while before you did the updates? Did you recently add any hardware or upgrade any drivers? Try removing all cards you don't need and even your CD player and see if the problem continues. If the problem stops, start adding your cards and CD one at a time til you find the culprit. Did you choose the option to be able to uninstall your updates? If so do that and see if the problem stops. If not you can run the fix previous installation routine off your XP CD which will wipe out your updates and see if that gets you back to where you were. Good luck! wired

Thanks for advice. Wired, XP Pro was running without problems. Then, after I switched to broadband 2 weeks ago, I downloaded and installed a buildup of Windows Updates. PC freezes began after that.