Computer turns off after a few minutes. Found viruses. Is it toast?

Question

Computer was running extremely slow. Now it turns off after a few minutes. Ran a virus sweep. Found at least 5 viruses, but computer turned off on its own before sweep could finish. I've had it for about 5 years now. It's an HP Pavilion running Windows XP. Is it salvageable? Should I give in and buy a new one?

Answer 1

You should clean out your computer from all the dust that's inside.Open up the case and carefully remove the dust.UNPLUG it first.

Answer 2

go to kim komando website to fix it.  She takes you through it step by step and even has links to free downloads.

Answer 3

Your best bet to *Completely* eradicate viruses is to erase the hard drive and reinstall Windows. This can be done with the restore discs provided with your computer. *warning* This will completely erase ALL data. If there is anything you need on the computer you will want to back it up first!

If you do not have the discs that came with your computer, give HP a call and they can provide them.

*Some computers have a restore partition, which enables you to restore Windows from this part of the drive. This should be detailed in the manual of the computer. Usually this can be accessed by hitting F10 when the computer is starting up.

You may want to try going into Safe mode, which is a very stripped down mode of Windows and then trying a virus scan. Hit F8 when the computer starts up to enter this mode. If your computer is still shutting down in safe mode, it may be something more serious requiring a re-installation of windows.

*Some people pointed out that the problem may be heat related. This is possible since it is an older machine and a lot of dust and stuff could have accumulated inside of it. I recommend a can of compressed air to clean out your computer.

Answer 4

Does it just randomly shut off or does it shut down first and then shut off?

I had a Compaq desktop computer that did that every few minutes and we found out it was because it was overheating.  We had to install a new fan to have it work.  

It would run for 10 minutes and just shut off.  Then if I turned it back on right away, it would shut off in a minute.  The computer was trying to cool itself off.  

Anyways, the virus might be another problem that isn't even related to the computer shutting off.  Check to see if your fan is working inside the computer... it could be overheating.