X60/Windows XP Pro randomly crashing --- wifi-related?

[mbhagan]

Hello,

A few times over the past week or so, my X60 has randomly crashed - i.e., completely froze, to the point where I have to press and hold the power button until the system resets. What's strange (or at least seems so) is that when windows XP Pro restarts, it boots up regularly, and does not mention anything about the crash. It seems to only happen when I'm utilizing the wireless connection, and especially when I'm using FireFox.... (when using firefox, it does ask if I would like to restore my session after I reboot). I tend to keep several tabs open, and have several other programs running, such as Trillian, the ThinkCenter system software, Windows Live OneCare, Symantec Security Client, Windows defender, Diskkeeper and Windows search.

Has anyone else had a similar problem, or know if any of the programs listed are known to conflict with any of the thinkcenter software that could be overloading the system? This may be a bit of a stretch, but in thinking about this, I'm wondering if it has something to do with diskkeeper or windows live or windows search scanning the computer in the background - does anyone know if this is even a plausible idea?

Any help is greatly appreciated!!

some info on my system... Intel Centrino Duo T2400 @ 1.83GHz, 512 MB Ram... about two months old

[christopher_wolf]

Hmmmm, have you tried using another browser to see if that works without crashes to narrow it down some?

[mbhagan]

yeah, i've been using internet explorer... but it's just so bad... haha. the crashing seems to have stopped... i wonder if it has something to with a ram overload? i'm going to upgrade to 1gig in the few days...

does anyone know if there is a way to diagnose a crash like this? (i.e., is there software that would be able to chart it and provide any information...)

thanks for the response...!

[Musti]

Interesting...you have sufficient memory for a healthy Win XP operation (though there's no such thing as "too much memory") not to mention a kick-a processor

I don't know of the software you're asking, though something tells me there's at least five of them somewhere. Like System properties --> Advanced --> Startup & Recovery --> Settings -> System failure options...

As for the browser, give Opera a spin. You might like it. I was a die-hard Firefox user (as well as Camino, another Mozilla product, for Mac OS X), but I am loving Opera. Fast, low memory footprint, etc (you'll love those etc's)

[GomJabbar]

You might look in Event Viewer for clues. Start > Control Panel > Administative Tools > Event Viewer.

I also am a fan of Opera.

[mbhagan]

thanks for the suggestions!

I'm using Opera every now and again... still like FireFox though... but I do wonder if it was part of the reason for the random crashing.

I doubled my RAM to 1Gig, and, well, it has made a HUGE difference. The full computer crashing seems to have stopped... but FireFox has crashed a couple of times. however, it has also brought up a crash box from mozilla (hence my belief that it is part of the earlier problem...).

Anyway, hopefully this was problem...

And to anyone considering an increase in RAM - I HIGHLY recommend it, especially if you use several programs at once. My initial feeling was that 512 with this processor would be great... but 1gig really does make a huge difference and the computer feels much more stable...!

Thanks again for your responses!