Mouse freezes, keyboard won't work, cannot open Task Manager
I'm grateful this doesn't happen often, but every once in a while, my mouse (pointer) freezes, and nothing can get it moving again. When this happens, the keyboard won't work either, and I cannot get into Task Manager to do anything -- I have to do a cold shutdown and restart the PC.
I'm using Win7 Pro-64, but this also happened with Win10. This is an almost brand-new mouse I began using a few weeks ago, but until now it has worked perfectly. This issue has occurred before with other mice, as well as on a different OS as I stated.
My son used this mouse on his PC for a week before giving it to me, and it worked fine on his PC. And to reiterate, both this mouse and others have worked fine on my PC .... this 'freezing' only happens very infrequently.
Odds are it has nothing to do with the mouse. And as you can imagine - trying to troubleshoot something that happens "very infrequently" is very hard to troubleshoot.
I would just make a lot of notes everytime it does happen to see if you can spot a common thing.
If you're happy and you know it......it's your meds.
Thanks, Steve. Unfortunately, my "very infrequently" statement is rapidly becoming invalid. This has happened almost daily the past several days. The only thing I can do is a cold shutdown and restart.
When this happens, check the hard drive activity light. If it is on continuously, that is an indication that that the computer is accessing or attempting to access the hard drive.
Things to check:
Check Event Viewer to see if there are any critical (red) events.
Check the hard drive S.M.A.R.T. status for any indications of failure or impending failure.
Run the manufacturer's hard drive diagnostic software to check for errors.
Run memtest86 to check for memory errors.
Make sure that you have a current backup of your critical files, as well as a current drive image backup of your boot drive.
Thank you for your comments. I took a look in the Event Viewer, and did see a number of "red events." I am attaching them for you to peruse at your convenience.
I don't see anything there that looks like it would be causing your issue. The Kernel-Power 41 errors are from you powering off the computer without shutting down, and the "bowser" errors should not be causing lockups either.
Thanks, jdc. Is there a possibility that this specific issue (freezing) has to do with a failing motherboard? This PC home build I am using is several years old. I'm preparing to upgrade the mobo and CPU soon, so perhaps I might see this problem resolved.
Thank you, jdc. Sorry, I had an unexpected trip out of town.
I have
- Looked at Event Viewer, there are no "red" events except where I did cold shutdowns after the PC froze
- checked HDD S.M.A.R.T. status, everything checked out OK
- Ran WD's disk diagnostic utility, the boot drive and both data drives checked out fine. (All 3 drives are WD; I used their HDD tool).
- The installation of memtest86 does not finish. It says I need another 150 MB disk space; my flash drive is 32GB, how much space does it need?? I tried finding this out, but the total required space is not mentioned.
- I tried installing "Ultimate Boot" but regarding the instruction step "Click the CD icon button, browse to your ubcd5##.iso file, and click Open," the file cannot be found (in Downloads).
I'm now going to try another HDD status tool, per your most recent post. I'll report later after I try things out.
By the way . . . not sure if it's related, but there's another issue. Sometimes, I'll leave my PC for a while, hitting CTL-ALT-DEL and selecting "Lock This Computer." I then return to log back on; the power button on my monitor (LG 27EA33) will be flashing slowly as it always does, but the usual moving/clicking of the mouse does not awaken the PC or start things as it should, neither does hitting keys on the keyboard. Both methods usually work. Just like with the mouse-freeze issue, I have to resort to a cold shutdown and restart of the PC. This happens whether I leave the PC for 5 minutes or 5 hours.
Last edited by star-gazer777; May 9th, 2018 at 08:41 PM.
For the computer lock issue, check the power settings. Make sure the hard drive is NOT set to turn off after a period of time. I would also make sure that the network hardware (wired or wireless) is also not set to turn off, and the USB devices (if you are using a USB keyboard and/or mouse) are not set to turn off.
The MemTEst86 should be run from the UBCD. You should follow Midknyte's instructions on how to make a bootable disc from the UBCD .iso file.