IT Quits Responding - Looking for Troubleshooting Tips!

Posted by KarenS ® , 04/07/2019, 01:48:17 Reply   Forum

Greetings, IT Angels!

Brace yourselves because this is going to be a novella! I'm having a problem that is getting progressively worse, and I'm pulling my already-too-thin hair out, trying to get to the bottom of it. I need help!

For close to 10 years, I've used IT with no problems whatsoever. But maybe two-ish years ago, I started incurring instances where it would just quit responding. That was 3 computer systems ago when it first started. At first, it was very, very rare - maybe 2 or 3 times a year at most. Closing out of IT and then re-opening did the trick, and I could move on. So that was on the Dell Inspiron laptop (using Word and/or WordPerfect). The Dell eventually became painfully slow (probably from unwanted software bloat), and unfortunately, I can't

Then came the Acer Predator laptop, a super-fast laptop with a fast processor and 48GB of RAM. It never got above 30% memory usage. On that system, which I used for two years, it would happen maybe once a month or once every two months. With that system, I did not notice any particular behavior pattern prior to IT not responding. That doesn't mean there wasn't one - it's just that I didn't notice it.

Just to clarify, what I mean by "not responding" is that I will type a short (e.g., bec for because), and nothing would show up in the advisory, nor would anything expand.

Interestingly, with the first two systems, that is the ONLY problematic behavior I noticed. But now I have a brand new, super-duper PC, again with 48GB of RAM (which usually hovers between 10%-20% usage), two fast SSD drives, and an AMD Ryzen 7 2700X 8-Core Processor, 3.70 GHz. My programs are on the C: drive, and all of my data files are on the D: drive, with the exception of the IT glossaries, which I allowed to stay on the C drive, since that's where it wants to install itself.

I had this current PC custom-built in January, and although it's super-fast in every other respect, the problem with IT started happening within a a week or so after it was built, even before I got all my software loaded.

Another FYI: My typical working scenario is to have Word or WordPerfect open, maybe 2 or 3 documents open at a time, 4 AHK script files (that aren't very large), my transcription app, IT, Carbonite backup, Dropbox (with syncing activated), Malware Bytes, and Windows Defender, plus Opera or Chrome, with several browser windows open.

Rebooting and scaling down what's running doesn't seem to improve the situation.

So on this PC, things have gotten a little more complicated. Not only does IT quit responding - and MUCH more often than before, as in SEVERAL TIMES A DAY (!), but now it's also doing this thing where I will type a short that should invoke an entry in the Singles glossary, and while I do see entries in the advisory, the Singles entries do not appear. And even stranger, you would think if it was going to ignore the singles glossary, it would at least bring up a "logical" short in the Words advisory that relates to the single short I typed. But nope.

For example, one of my Singles entries is "u" - which should expand to "Uh-huh (nods affirmatively)." (the period as part of the short as well). I have several "u" Singles entries, and that is the first one.

But when it glitches, instead of seeing any "u" Singles entries, I see the word "tautology" - which does not begin with a "u." I have plenty of words in my glossaries that begin with the letter "u," so that makes no sense at all!

That above-described glitch did not happen with either of the previous two laptops. When that glitch happens, it will still respond with my regular 2+ letter glossary entries, but of course, without the Singles entries, I'm still forced to close out of IT and reopen it to get it going again. But the mystery gets even better . . .

With my previous two laptops, the ONLY issue I had with non-responsiveness was with IT. But now, more than half the time (not always, but more often than not), once IT quits responding, so it goes with the 4 AHK scripts! So I have to close out of them as well and reopen all of them.

And with this PC, I have noticed a pattern that I have not noticed before. That doesn't mean it never happened, but I'm inclined to believe I would have likely noticed it if it the pattern existed on the laptops (no guarantees though). Anyway, I notice that almost every time, the problem occurs *after* I've switched my focus from the Word or WordPerfect document over to a browser window. Then, when I go back to Word or WordPerfect, that's when it quits.

Sometimes I have IT active with my browsers, and sometimes I don't. Unfortunately, I've not noticed if it behaves differently in either scenario, but my fuzzy memory wants to say that that doesn't matter. I'm going to try and pay attention for future purposes though.

It doesn't seem to matter whether the PC has been running for a lon time (say, days) between reboots or if I've just rebooted a short time before. This problem now happens several times a day, EVERY day. What the heck!

One other thing that may be of interest: I have tons and tons of what I refer to as "functional" shorts or scripts, meaning it's not an expansion of text but a series of keyboard strokes to perform a function, either directly in Word or directly in IT. I typically build a lot of "waits" into these scripts to account for variations in system speed. It's not unusual, when I switch from one PC to another, or when I share it with someone who has a totally different PC or laptop, to have to adjust the wait times.

But interestingly, with this new PC, which is even faster than my Acer Predator laptop, the only adjustment I had to make was to one AHK script that includes functions for adding typos to the typos glossary. I'm not sure if that matters for troubleshooting purposes, but I thought I'd mention it, just in case.

Since it's now happening with both the IT functionality *and* the AHK scripts, I'm wondering if there's something amiss in my system that needs to be tweaked. In all other respects, it seems to be running normal, and I've run umpteen benchmark tests, check disk, and other routines to ensure that it's functioning properly.

So I'm pleading with you for ANY possible tips you can offer for any settings I might be able to change in IT to cure this problems. Am I the only one on the planet this is happening to, or have you heard of it happening before? Any thoughts or ideas?

Thanks for your patience in reading my super-long tale of woe. And thanks in advance for any advice you may have to get me back to normal with my beloved IT!

~Karen :)




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