Not "THE" freeze, but a freeze (Solution found)

Symptoms:

Leaving the computer idle for a while causes random freezes. This has been reported on IE, listening to iTunes, leaving computer on overnight. It's been reported on Vista and 7, desktops and laptops, ATI and Nvidia.

This freeze has been happening to me on my i7 M11x R2. Problem specifically appears like the task bar has frozen. Ctrl-Alt-Delete works, then entering task manager fails.

Problem:
Power saver settings are inconsistent. In my case, I had the computer set to never sleep while idle, but the hard drive was set to turn off after 20 minutes. I was able to consistently force a crash by leaving my computer afk on then returning. I suspect Windows Defender is trying to access the hard drive but it is turned off.

This is a well discussed Windows bug, with a possible fix early 2011.

Solution:
See discussion here:
http://social.answers.microsoft.com...e/thread/4df56e5e-607d-4349-833a-cd22e873b4c0

Control Panel > Hardware and Sound > Power options > Change Plan Settings > Change Advanced Power Settings > Hard Disk > Turn off hard disk = Never (0)

The way I see it, Sleep will turn off the hard disk anyway, so this setting is superfluous. It's well hidden so most people will never look at it. Hope this helps people.

 

Good info, thanks!