Alright here's the full story.

HP Presario SR2023WM
Windows XP Media Center Edition
Service Pack 2
AMD Athlon processor
1 Gig of RAM
160 Gig Seagate Barracuda
ASUS mobo
Onboard NVIDIA GeForce 6150 LE


The computer is just over a year old, never had any problems before this.

About a month ago I noticed it started chugging on certain tasks. Typically browsing. I thought maybe it was dirty, so I took the case off and cleaned it. It was pretty dusty, but nothing major.

That didn't fix it. So I thought it might be a virus. Scanned, found nothing. No malware, spyware or any other kind of ware for that matter.

Thought maybe it was a deeper-routed problem so I burned off all the info I wanted to keep (photos, some music) and ran the recovery disc, complete with formatting the HDD. That didn't fix it.

Someone mentioned that they had an issue with their HDD not showing the full storage capacity until they formatted TWICE, so I tried recovery disc a second time. Still nothing. Still freezes.

Here's the kicker ... it doesn't freeze in Safe Mode! It runs smooth in Safe Mode, in fact, I'm typing this up on it right now. I can run programs all day on this (at least, the ones that'll install and run in Safe Mode), with NO freezing at all.

Since it's running on VGA, I figured "Oh, that means it's the graphics chip set", so I uninstalled the NVIDIA chips and rebooted. Ran it in VGA mode in a normal boot, STILL freezes.

Any ideas? I'm all ears at this point. I've tried booting with and without the HDD, and removed that from the list of possible causes, and I have no inclination that it may be the power supply as I've had no other power-related issues.

Help!?!?!?!?

Since it works in the Safe Mode, that implies that you have a bad driver.

i would try updating all driver to the most current, if your still getting the problem after that then

may i suggest testing your memory? you can download a memory tester here

Memtest86.com - Memory Diagnostic

I tried memtest86 under someone else's advice, too ... couldn't get it to run in Safe Mode, and can't run normal mode long enough to burn the iso to a CD.

And is it possible to have a driver just "go bad" after a year of normal use? Not to mention, these should be stock drivers from the recovery discs, yeah?

i would suggest making the memtest98 bootCD and running off of that rather then running in windows, if you need help on how to make the bootCD then please let me know and i will walk you through it.


Your drivers may not "go bad" but i would suggest keeping all your drivers up to date. Also you may want to try reinstalling your major drivers, sound, video ect.

I'm all ears, drdroopy. If there's a way to use this iso that I can do, I'll do it.


Also, as of now I don't see an option to update the drivers to anything because there aren't any updated drivers on the HP site (they're so helpful). Searching automatically doesn't turn up anything either.

as far as your video card drivers go you can get them from Welcome to NVIDIA - World Leader in Visual Computing Technologies, theres a support tab on top click that then click download driver, select the correct drivers (yours would be 6 series) download and install.