My computer is freezing up--I think it is dying. What do I do to save my files before it gives its last gasp?

First off what files do you need saved and what type of media are you saving them to. The crucial things will most likely be in your documents and settings C:\Documents and Settings\<Your Login>, unless you have been saving your files elsewhere.

what you should do…go into your local computer retail store, and pick up an “enclosure” to put the hard drive in….if the computer keeps freezing you may not have enough time to get it off the computer before it freezes again.

Open your computer, take the hard drive out and put it in the enclosure, and plug the “enclosure” into another computer if you have one (or a friends). and you can then keep it on that computer’s hard drive, burn it to DVD, put it on a flash drive, whatever you want to do from there. But the important thing is, you are just making sure you get that data off the hard drive before it goes out (assuming the hard drive is going bad).

Note this enclosure is allowing you to use your hard drive as an external hard drive. You plug it into the USB port on the outside of any other computer (it takes two USB ports, one for power, and one for transfer). And then you are able to access that hard drive under “my computer” and navigate through your files, and grab what is important and back those up.

There are two different types of enclosures…if your hard drive has a ribbon cable (grey cable that is very wide) you need an IDE/EIDE enclosure. If you have two smaller connections on the back of the hard drive connecting to your motherboard then you’ll need a SATA enclosure. So it’s either IDE/EIDE or SATA.

Also a side note, you may have a virus? It is hard to say without actually checking out the computer myself. But if it is a hardware problem, or even a windows problem, you should follow my instructions above. If it’s a virus, well…be prepared to lose some of those files you hold so dearly to yourself, and get a better anti-virus I use this one www.eset.com NOD32.

If you need anymore help, you can send me a message or something too.

@Dan: Thanks. Just able to get on again. For some reason, I suspect a virus, although the computer is old. I’ll check yours out.

from what I know of the problems, it could be a variety of many things…just some assumptions I have…bad memory, or lack of memory, OS problem, or malicious software.

I’d save as much as I could to an external right away. I’d also hint ask somebody who knows about computers, hint hint maybe a close relative. Who knows about computers.

(hint)