Lenovo Laptop Crashing

Aodhan5000

Hi all,

So my father is operating a Lenovo laptop that crashes sporadically. The frequency varies but he says it happens when there's a lot going on eg. lots of chrome tabs, excel spreadsheets, etc. I'm guessing he's running into a RAM limitation as he's equiped with 8gb of memory (along with a 4300u I think) but it seems very unusual that it would crash simply because of a RAM limitation. Has never happened with me on my own computers so any advice on how to fix the problem (aside from upgrading the RAM) would be much apppreciated.

Thanks

L1011

Machines won't crash due to a RAM limitation

They will, however, crash if the RAM is faulty at a high location that only gets hit when under load.

There's a memory diagnostic in recent versions of Windows, I'd suggest running that - or else look at memtest86+ from a USB key.

kippy

When you say 'crash' what exactly do you mean? What shows up on screen, what behaviour is exhibited?

Is there any chance the machine is overheating? Could be a cause depending on the behaviour.

Aodhan5000

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119791952#Comment_119791952

I'll look into it, thanks

Aodhan5000

Had a chat with him there about it and he said it tends to become unbearably slow or just freeze up completely forcing him to restart. I think the best solution going forward will probably be to just up the RAM as he's always going to be pushing 8GB to the limit with his spreadsheets and chrome

Xterminator

before spending any money, you want to run hardware diagnostics. Also i would absolutely not spend money on a laptop that i judge has reached end of life. so the key point here has to be, is the laptop is worth upgrading?

To launch the diagnostics, press F10 during the boot sequence to launch Lenovo diagnostics. Additionally, press F12 during the boot sequence to access the Boot Menu. Then press Tab to select Application Menu and arrow down to Lenovo Diagnostics and select it by pressing Enter

if you pass the hardware tests, then adding ram and changing the hard drive to an SSD (assuming you have a mechanical drive) would be the steps to provide best bang for buck. you will need to help him change the hard drive and clone or reinstall OS & software - its more time consuming than popping in a stick of ram!

Aodhan5000

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119792100#Comment_119792100

He's running an SSD alright so that simplifies things greatly. Thanks