Hi guys My computer has begun to freeze when surfing the web .It seems to occur at least every few minutes. I must open task manager and close internet explorer to start over. no particular web site, even happens while checking my e-mail. I am running windows 8.1 How can I find what ever is causing the problem? I have tried the remove everything and reinstall windows option in system restore more than once, but it still persists. Thanks Stucky

 

Check the resource usage on the Processes or Performance tabs when you have Task Manager open - you should be able to see the bottleneck there (RAM, CPU, hard drive).

Have you tried any other browsers?

 

had that issue wiyh fire fox... continue freeze ups.. something with script errors I think..

Went back to chrome and never looked back.

 

IMO upgrade to 10... .

 

It's elementary, but do you delete cookies and clear your cache?? How much RAM are you using?

 

I agree that you have something running in the background that is using a lot of memory (RAM). Look in the processes like Stickshift mentioned in post #2. See if you can figure out what shouldn't be normally running in this situation.

 

I would also see if you have any browser extensions or toolbars loaded. Some poorly programmed ones (and more virus-like ones) can suck up resources that shouldn't be used.

Also, malware can have the same issue. I highly recommend malwarebytes malware scanner (malwarebytes.com). Their free version is great at finding malware hiding on your system.

 

Download, install, update & run anti malware, from malwarebytes.org

If that doesn't help which I think it will, download & run Hijack This. Run it & post the output here. I will tell you what to delete.

If you want to take Lawrosa's advice & upgrade to Win 10, make sure that you reinstall Win 8.1 first. If you don't, whatever is running will follow you to Win 10.

 

I have been following this thread but I have been busy for a while so I haven't had a chance to comment until now. So far I do agree with all of the advice however everyone so far has forgotten one thing, it could be your anti-virus that is causing the freeze ups. A few years ago when I first installed Windows 7 I then installed AVG's free edition of their anti-virus. Not long afterward everything froze I couldn't use my mouse and could barely use my keyboard. Well somehow I managed to remove AVG and then everything went back to normal.

Most of the time AVG isn't bad and causes no problems but in this case it did. AVG though is not the only culprit out there McCafee and Norton are two bad guys disguised as good guys in my opinion and I had nothing but problems with both of them. On Windows 10 I just use Microsoft's Defender program and Superantispyware another great program with a free program available here SUPERAntiSpyware | Remove Malware | Remove Spyware - AntiMalware, AntiSpyware, AntiAdware! .

 

Thanks hedgeclippers. SuperAntiSpyware eliminated 549 adware. So far I haven't had any problems with freeze ups for a two days.