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Win 10 Locking up

danludlow
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Registered: ‎03-12-2014

Win 10 Locking up

I updated my Win7 to Win10 on Thursday, using the supplied Windows updater it didn't install well, kept freezing and seemed to be a strange mishmash of Win10 and Win 7 using my normal settings. I had to cold break out of it, reboot, then try to get done before the next freeze. Eventually I restored Windows 7 through the 30 day "back button" in Windows 10.
Friday, I tried to install Windows 10 again, this time through the usual Windows Update which already had it ready to go. It installed somewhat differently, runs better but still freezes occasionally, usually when I input to change what I'm doing, as if it can only handle one thing at once.
I have not found any tools that check the installation out. I'm guessing that my problem is possibly a driver or software interfering somehow. Id rather not start with a clean install, I have a lot of software installed. I'd also rather not go back to Windows 7, as what I've seen of 10 is that its faster with the programs I use.
Is anyone else having this trouble? Have Microsoft said anything about similar bad installs from Windows 7?
I was on Windows7 64bit Ultimate, and the Windows10 version is, I think, "Professional".
13 REPLIES 13
chenks76
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

was it a 100% legitimately genuine version of windows 7 ultimate 64bit?
rongtw
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

Thats a strange one  Huh i haven't seen that on forums
have you asked here http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10?tab=Threads
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danludlow
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

Hi chenks76, Yes, as far as I know. I had a PC made to order about 5 years ago, to a spec which included Win7 64bit Ultimate and MS Office 2010. I paid the right sort of price for both, nothing skimped. It was from a legit supplier but they went in the recession I think, sadly, very helpful but I can't find them now. PC's are a bit of a shrinking market these days it seems, but I love them.
If it had been dodgy, wouldn't that show up at Microsoft? Wouldn't they just say "No" you don't qualify, when the check you out?
My Mrs has a laptop running win8 (I find 8 horrible, I bought an upgrade for my PC but never installed it once I'd seen hers). Hers was a home version and it upgraded to Win10 like a dream.
danludlow
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

Thanks rongtw, a useful link. I've joined a discussion of people with seemingly the same issue (not many on it so far). Symptoms described were all too familiar. I wondered if it was too much to expect a smooth upgrade, you imagine that it's all carefully planned well ahead, but there's so much that has to happen at the right time, in the right way, and in a way that allows it to take over, not simply start again and replace, which might have been the way to go?
CX
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Registered: ‎16-09-2010

Re: Win 10 Locking up

Does it completely freeze, or does it come back if you wait long enough?
What graphics card is in the machine?
What mode is the hard disk/SATA controller set to? Legacy IDE emulation should pretty much always work reliably. AHCI should work, provided no stupid firmware bugs on the motherboard. RAID modes will be dependent upon the SATA controller driver provided by the manufacturer, and hence potentially far less stable. I have an old Dell Dimension E521 that by default runs with nVidia's awful SATA RAID drivers when running Vista and Windows 7.
danludlow
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

Sorry for slow reply CX, its a strange one, the screen freezes, but the mouse remains active (not the Wacom pen, I believe, but I unplugged that early on and ran without it to remove a possible). Nothing happened, I can't get the Task Manager up, and usually the only way out was to reset and reboot. Once I left it frozen overnight, absolutely no difference.
After the second install attempt, I was getting longer periods between freezing, maybe up to an hour. I was working on a Digital painting and it froze. No worries, I thought, I have been saving every 5 minutes, but both the picture and attached backup (Corel Painter saves both be default) were saved in an unreadable form. On trying to open it, I got the message that the file (picture I think it said) was much too big to load. I have never seen that message before. I do keep backups, and so I have the files from the previous day.
What I saw of Windows 10 itself impressed, noticeably faster start and shutdown, faster generally, more responsive PC, and many features I would dearly like to investigate/play with, but the unreliability overrules all of that and so I'm back on Windows 7 64bit Ultimate, and all is well with my computing World. I spent 3 very frustrating, fruitless days struggling to find solutions, reinstalling drivers etc. I'd have torn my hair out if I had any. returning to Windows 7 is like luxuriating in a hot bath having come in from the Snow.
It shouldn't be like this, should it. Looking online, and in Microsoft forums, I find that I am not unique, though perhaps  a select band. As yet nobody has a solution and Microsoft themselves seem silent. I hope that this is addressed and that I can upgrade to what must be the way to go. IF a fresh install solved it, I may well consider it, but I can't see anyone guaranteeing it can you? There may be some components in my 5 year old PC that are behind it, or something else?
ReedRichards
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

If the mouse remains active (at least for a while) then it isn't a graphics fault that has left you with a frozen image.
I associate the type of fault you describe with a faulty hard drive.  Areas of the hard drive become very difficult to read but the computer does not give up and everything else gets queued whilst the computer waits for a response.  It's like trying to swim through treacle,
If you had a hard drive that was a bit faulty before, the stress imposed by the Windows 10 Update is quite likely to have made it worse. 
danludlow
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

Thanks ReedRichards, Very Interesting. My Hard drive is an SSD about a year old, maybe 14 months, bought as previous got filled up, this has bags of space, and showing no sign of problems, or not until now.
Does that give any clue? What would you suggest as a next step?
ReedRichards
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

Assuming that the hard drive might be faulty, I would begin by making a backup of anything I would not want to lose.
Ordinarily I would then restart the computer holding down the Shift key to access boot options, find the CMD prompt and run Chkdsk /f on the Windows partition.  However as I understand it, with an SSD the Trim function might be 'pruning' out bad areas of the hard drive so Chkdsk would not find anything.  My comment about "swimming through treacle" was really about electro-mechanical hard drives, not SSDs.  Do you have any other hard drives attached or is it just the SSD?
danludlow
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

I have other hard drives attached, within the PC there are 3 one of which is another SSD ( the one that got full)  its main job is overflow memory. All files are kept on a big HDD within the machine, the SSD on C drive is program's only. All are backed up to  external drives through USB. Connections. Thanks for advice, everything should be well backed up, I'd hate to lose anything even that which doesn't matter!
ReedRichards
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

Quote from: danludlow
I have other hard drives attached, within the PC

Is it possible to temporarily disconnect the other hard drives and see if that makes any difference?
danludlow
Aspiring Pro
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

It is possible but I'm now back on Win 7 and stable. When I was trying to get Win10 working I disconnected all the USB HDD's and the Wacom tablet, but not the internal drives. I may well try again sometime to install Win 10, but not keen to try soon, as 3-4 days spent going nowhere discourages. Also I'd be happier knowing what the fault was/how to avoid (wouldn't we all!) and I was hoping that as more get the problem, a solution will be sought and or emerge. (I can but hope!!).
A "one size fits all" approach doesn't work if one is an exception, does it.
ReedRichards
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Re: Win 10 Locking up

I suggest you open up a CMD windows and run chkdsk /f on all the partitions on your internal drives.  One should do this anyway, from time to time, as routine maintenance.