Microsoft Windows not responding?

[DudE132]

So for the past few months, it seems that every single week this happens. At random, all applications will freeze and then this popup appears. I can still move my mouse around but I can't interact with anything other than the popup. If I click "end process" my desktop becomes blank with everything disappearing. I can still move my mouse but can't do anything else since everything disappears. So I must restart my PC.

It seems to happen at random.
-I left my computer on all day while I was away, came back to it, and this happened.
-It sometimes happens after downloading a lot of stuff in Chrome.
-It sometimes happens if I make a new folder in windows explorer
-It seems to happen more often if my PC has been on for too long. But it's not always the case.
-One time, right after booting up my PC, I tried to open Chrome, Chrome froze and then this happened.

I play games often but this has never happened during gameplay. This doesn't happen constantly, but it happens often enough to where it's a problem. I've done scans with Avast, Malwarebytes, and Superantispyware. I've done a disk defrag. I've tested my Harddrive with Seatools by doing a "Short Drive Self Test" and a "Long Generic" test and passed both. Does anyone have any idea what might be causing this? This issue has been plaguing me for far too long.

 

[mwryder55]

Have you changed the power settings for the hard drive to never turn it off? This setting is in the Advanced Power settings section.

 

[DudE132]

No I've never changed that setting. It's set to turn off after 20 minutes.

 

[mwryder55]

I have had a problem with network drivers quit working properly when the computer was idle for over 20 minutes. Turning off the hard drive sleep seems to have fixed the problem. Since you mentioned that the computer works fine when playing games, when the drive is busy I thought you might try this to see if it would fix the problem.

 

[DudE132]

It just happened again. I was installing a game on Steam and browsing Chrome then all of a sudden both programs stop responding. Then the same result as always. Cursor changes into the loading icon and I can't open any new programs. I can close programs and open folders but can't do anything else. Can't open start menu or task manager and have to manually reboot my PC. This is happening way too damn often.

Could this be a sign of my HDD failing? I've noticed over the past few months that my HDD seems quite a bit slower when booting. I've also noticed that my first time opening a program after a reboot, loading will be pretty slow with several short freezes before things start working with the program. It never used to take this long.

I've also noticed that when installing a game or downloading something off of Chrome, my PC becomes extremely sluggish until the download/install finishes. In the past I'd be able to multitask fine when downloading/installing but not anymore. Sometimes I can barely use my PC when it's installing or downloading since it becomes so slow and unresponsive.

But as I said I tested my HDD with Seatools and it passed both the "Short Drive Self Test" and the "Long Generic Test".

 

[mwryder55]

It is possible that a corrupted program is causing part of the problem. The easiest way to test this is to switch to another browser, such as Firefox or Opera, and see what happens. This might allow you to narrow down the problem. If the problem does not appear while using a different browser you could try uninstalling Chrome, rebooting, and installing it again to see if the problem comes back.
Another thing to try is to make sure that the drivers are all up to date. Maybe using the vendor's drivers instead of the Microsoft ones might help. I have been fighting a battle with the drivers that are part of the Windows 10 updates and HP printers. These drivers broke a lot of things that are used constantly on the printers.

 

[Paul NZ]

Use a better browser. Chrome is one of the buggiest programs around