Dell E6400 system freezing

I have a Dell E6400 and have had it for about a year and a month. recently it has started acting up. The computer is fine until I log into my account in Windows XP. Then Dell ControlPoint Connection Manager freezes while attempting to load. If I try to open any internet browser that freezes too. Windows Media freezes when I try to open it. And if I try to scan my computer using AVG the whole system freezes. Can someone give me some hints on what may be the problem? I was thinking too much memory usage or something. I opened task manager and I had 75 processes running. Would a clean install of XP solve this problem or is there another root cause? I'd appreciate any feedback.

 

time to upgrade your OS ;-)

XP kinda needs maintenance every 4mos (the kinda format thingy)

 

Running a 2001 Operating System on an end-2008 system, where most of the technology of your system is barely supported is most unwise.

Time to upgrade to Win7 64-bit. At least you can now use your 64-bit CPU AND your full RAM.

 

I have the Vista Business CD, I think it is, that came with it. Do you recommend upgrading to that?

P.S.
The system has now progressed to the whole computer locking up after 10-20 minutes of use

 

Yes upgrade, why not. It's better than Vista. Not saying that Vista is bad.

 

I would want to be more confident that the problem lies with Windows and not the hardware. I was using the same XP installation for 11 months before I did a new installation onto my SSD.

I would first look at system temperatures using HWmonitor or similar.

Then boot of a Linux Live CD (eg Ubuntu) and run for an hour to see if there are issues.

Jo