A freeze feels like the whole PC has died. Often it has not. There are two common causes, and they need different handling.
- One program is stuck. The rest of Windows still works. You can move the mouse and open the Start menu, but one window is greyed out or says "Not responding".
- The whole PC is out of memory. Everything crawls. The mouse jumps, windows take half a minute to open, and the disk light stays on.
The first can usually be fixed without restarting. The second sometimes sorts itself out if you wait and close things.
Why running out of memory looks like a freeze
Memory (RAM) is the PC's short-term workspace. Windows can only hand out as much memory as your RAM plus its page files combined. [R2] A page file is space on the disk that Windows uses as overflow.
When programs ask for more than the RAM can hold, Windows moves data out to the disk. That is much slower than memory. [R3] If enough is moved, every program waits on the disk and the PC seems frozen.
Programs left running in the background make this worse. A browser with many tabs, a leftover helper from a program you closed, or a tool that kept running after its window shut can each hold hundreds of megabytes. You do not see them, but they use the same memory.
What to try before you hold the power button
- Wait one minute. A PC that is swapping memory to disk is slow, not dead. Give it a little time before you decide.
- Try Ctrl + Shift + Esc. This opens Task Manager. If it opens, the PC is not completely frozen.
- Look at what is using the resources. On the Processes tab, click the Memory column heading to put the biggest user first. Microsoft recommends looking at CPU, memory and disk usage to find what is slowing a PC. [R1]
- Save anything you can. Work you have not saved exists only in memory. [R2] If another window still responds, save from it first.
- End the stuck program, not the PC. Right-click it in Task Manager and choose End task. [R4]
- Close what you do not need, then give Windows a minute to recover.
What ending a program costs: ending a program can throw away anything in it that you had not saved. Use End task as a recovery step, not as a normal way to close a program.
A frozen app versus a frozen PC
| What you see | Most likely | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| One window says "Not responding"; the rest works | A frozen app | Wait a minute, then End task |
| Everything is slow; disk light stays on | Memory is full | Close programs; look in Task Manager |
| Mouse will not move; keyboard does nothing | A frozen PC | Wait, then the power button |
What Task Manager shows
Task Manager lists the programs and background processes that are running, with columns for CPU, memory and disk use. Those three figures are what Microsoft points to for finding something that is slowing a PC. [R1]
A single process using far more memory than the rest, or a disk that stays at the top of its range, is worth a closer look. A long list of ordinary-looking processes, each using a little, is normal and is not the cause by itself.
The power button
If nothing responds at all, even the mouse and Task Manager, holding the power button is the last resort. Microsoft's own steps for a Surface that stops responding end this way: hold the power button until it shuts down (about 20 seconds), then release it. [R5]
This is an abrupt shutdown. Unsaved work is lost, and a file being written at that moment may be damaged. After the restart, reopen your Office programs first. They may offer to recover what they had.
What to do after a restart
- Check whether the same program was running when it froze last time.
- Close programs you do not need, especially browsers with many tabs.
- If it keeps happening with plenty of free memory, the cause may be a driver or hardware problem rather than memory.