William writes:

<<My HP8380 acted up, yet again.  But this time, having read about it here on
PCSOFT, Dr. Watson was on the scene!  When I tried to close a file in MS
Works, that had been saved on a 3.5 that had already been removed, the
program crashed....Under "System" tab, and in section "Resources", it said:
"18% system resources free>>

That's way too little free resources.  The system has probably run out of
memory.

Run msconfig and see what's loading at startup.  HP's often come with way
too much loading at startup, most of which is unnecessary and only robs the
system of resources.

Either:
Add more RAM
Don't have too many other things running
Remove all non-vital stuff from startup.

Most people don't need anti-virus programs running all the time if they are
sole home users and not on the Net (and are reasonably sensible).  Most a-v
programs suck up valuable resources.

If your HP has a built-in "crash-prevention" program running in the
background, try disabling it.

And remember, neither msconfig nor Ctrl/Alt/Del necessarily show everything
that's running in the background.

To check free resources at any time, open any Explorer window, click on
Help/About Windows and the figure is displayed. At startup, you should
strive to have at least 80% free (93% without any startup programs) and
during normal operation this figure shouldn't be allowed to go below about
30%. You should be running most of the time above 50%, depending on how
much RAM you have installed.

I've seen some big-brandname computers come delivered new with only about
60% free resources at startup, they load so much junk.

One of my elderly friends, new to computers, was most impressed when his
new computer came with about 15 programs loading at startup!  I didn't have
the heart to disillusion him, just told him to call me when he struck his
first crash. His call came a fortnight later!

But I digress.

Don Penlington
Free computer tutorials at: http://www.geocities.com/donaldpen/
Also Fractal Galleries,  free icons,  poetry,  and beautiful Queensland beaches.

      "Hold No Punches.." Rode brings you great shareware/freeware
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