My computer has been playing up for a while.  Freezing and having to be turned off.  I did all the clean up things and it seemed to be better - however sometimes I leave the room and come back to see that the computer has 'recovered from a serious error'.  I have several error files sitting on my desktop.  Now I am turning the computer on and nothing happens until I turn it on and off at the switch several times.  Internet explorer is freezing on turning the computer on now intermittently.  Now I am weighing up whether to get a new computer or get this repaired.  Seems awful paying out several hundred pounds perhaps when that could go towards buying a new one.  Not our month at the moment.  The central heating boiler has gone down and we are waiting for them to come back with a part - that is going to cost over £300 and I have been trying my best not to spend too much at the moment. 

Have you tried re-installing all the software? It will wipe your hard-drive (you will loose any files) but if the problems are due to the software (as opposed to broken/worn out computer parts) it can make it all as good as new. Your computer should have come with a disc or set of discs, it's all pretty easy to do and the discs should have instructions with them/on them. Definately worth doing before forking out for a repair or replacement.

~Gosh I will have to do an awful lot of backing up in that case.  Trouble is the computer is about 4 years old now and re-installing the original software will mean an awful lot of updating. 

> Trouble is the computer is about 4 years old now and re-installing the original software will mean an awful lot of updating.

Maybe a replacemnt would be better than a repair then. There are some good deals on lap-tops about, like get a free lap-top when subcribing to 'whatever' broadband etc.. That maybe worth considering as a cheaper alternative to a new desk-top computer?

I had similar problems with my laptop.  It was so bad I thought my hard drive was dying - I couldn't even run defrag or checkdisc   took it to my nephew who is into all things computer and he ran a Kubuntu disc in the DVD drive to check my HD and it was fine, the problem was Vista!   So I got rid of Vista and installed Kubuntu 9.10 and it has been brilliant ever since, better than the computer was when it was new :-D :-D  ( I was sick of MS programmes anyway ;) )

Nephew told me a lot of the trouble with people's computers is from microsoft programmes and their automatic updates ;) Now I only update when I want something or it's really necessary :)

I did back up all my important files just in case but Karmic Koala imported everything seamlessly ;)