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Resolved Question

XP Home keeps crashing when downloading??

Jul 21, 2012 4:36PM PDT

Hi guys,

I have had this PC running Windows XP SP3 for some time now, and the download speeds are getting worse and worse.

I first thought that it was the fault of Internet Explorer, so I changed over to Mozilla Firefox. It was much better for a month or two, then started freezing up during downloads. Multiple downloads were most affected, so I reverted to doing them one at a time.

Still no joy. The only thing that seemed to work was a system re-boot, then wait for the obligatory ten minutes "yawn-up" time, and then I could log back in, and re-commence my download.

About a year ago, I had a serious "Hello Houston - there's been a problem", and a local mobile technician took my PC and kept it for a week or so, while he re-installed Windows XP and did some other tweaking.

Paid the bill <OUCH> and found that straight away, there were download speed problems again....

Dumped Mozilla, and installed Google Chrome instead. As previously, it seemed better initially, but several months later, and I'm back to square one.

Sometimes I have to re-boot four and five times a day, just to get through my downloads, which consist mostly of music, videos, and pix.

This is annoying, as I lose expensive bandwidth each time I have to re-download, plus the fact that I have to monitor every session, rather than just selecting 'download all', as I could in Firefox, and heading off to do some other things.

My download speed starts off at a supersonic 1GB plus, and within two minutes, has reduced to a trickle of about 200mb/s.

I have a 54 megabyte wireless router with four ports, only one of which I use - connected via yellow ethernet cable.

My PC operates fine when I am not downloading....

Sorry to ramble on, but this is giving me the horrors!

Is anyone able to shed any light on this problem?

Many thanks.

Wolley.

Discussion is locked

segap_wolley has chosen the best answer to their question. View answer

Best Answer

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OK, let's tackle this another way.
Jul 26, 2012 11:25AM PDT

How long since the heat sink compound was replaced?

Are the heatsinks spotless?

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OK, let's tackle this another way
Jul 26, 2012 5:38PM PDT

Heatsinks and their compounds?

I have never even taken the cover off my PC - that's why I passed it on to the 'experts' for repair...

The best that I could manage would possibly be to open the case and give it a good de-dusting, I guess.

Please don't bother any more. I have wasted enough of your time.

I will put up with this piece of sh*t until I can afford to replace it.

Thank you again. ^-^


John.

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Will do.
Jul 27, 2012 1:49AM PDT

The never cleaned it is a very good clue. Hope it's that and good luck!

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Answer
I can explain the supersonic part.
Jul 22, 2012 2:02AM PDT

That's when content is cached. So any local stuff moves blazing fast.

There's not much detail about the rest here so I can't guess why so much downloading is going on and if any of those crappy download accelerators are in use.
Bob

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Thank You
Jul 22, 2012 1:44PM PDT

Hi Bob,

Thanks for your input.

I have no download accelerators, crappy or otherwise, installed.

The problem obviously lies within Windows XP and / or its internet settings, as the problem still occurs whichever browser I use.

Other problems could stem from the fact that my PC has been re-built twice, including having a new power supply and mother board fitted, and as I mentioned, XP has been re-installed.

I would like to be able to supply some details as to the identity and types of the components installed, but I am not sure whether the ones listed in the specs are still current. (??????)

Additionally, for the last few weeks, I have had a pop-up warning advising me that "Adobe Flash Player Update Service 11.3 r300 has encountered a problem and needs to close...BLA BLAH BLAH... Send / Don't send an error report?" .....This happens five or six times a day..... (???)

I have removed and re-installed Adobe Flash Player, but with no effect.

I do not know if this is relevant to my XP problem or not.


That's all for now.


Many thanks,

Wolley.

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Not much to work with but FLASH?
Jul 23, 2012 2:36AM PDT

Did you try the old workaround? Google the following.

DISABLE FLASH HARDWARE ACCELERATION

As to the settings, I found I didn't need to touch any of them. I would be guessing if you did.
Bob

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XP Home keeps crashing when downloading??
Jul 23, 2012 12:32PM PDT

Hi again Bob.

I did as you suggested, and disabled the Flash hardware acceleration, and so far, I have not had that annoying warning box come up again.

Many thanks for that.

Now all I need to do is to resolve the crashing when downloading issue!


Kind regards,

Wolley.

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I'd need more clues.
Jul 24, 2012 12:50AM PDT

Your posts did give me enough to suggest that setting. And we know that setting tells us that drivers are not ready for Flash to go "hardware mode." So you could research what is available for newer drivers (but don't leap at them so fast!)

With all that downloading I can bet there is some trojan or something else that got into the system. Even a CODEC PACK harbors these things.

Try Grif's note next.
http://forums.cnet.com/7726-6132_102-5098912.html?tag=posts;msg5099421

Good hunting,
Bob

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XP Home keeps crashing when downloading??
Jul 26, 2012 10:16AM PDT

Hi again Bob,

I followed your suggestions, and downloaded and installed the the rkill.exe program, and the Malwarebytes program. I already had the Super Anti Spyware installed and up to date.

Malwarebytes detected one suspect file, which was subsequently quarantined and deleted.

Now, this morning, the 'crashing' is still there, and even the damned "Adobe Flash Player Update Service 11.3 r300 has encountered a problem and needs to close...BLA BLAH BLAH... Send / Don't send an error report?" has returned.....

Oh well, I will not disturb you any further.


Thank you for your assistance.

Wolley.