Webcam Stopped Working

Hey I'm new here and I don't know much about computers and all. My Pavilion dv3 is only about a year old and my webcam was working perfectly fine until recently, it stopped working. It doesn't work on msn, skype, blogtv etc as those programs mentioned will crash. So I tried opening HP MediaSmart Webcam and it says it has stopped responding. Sometimes when the webcam DOES work, it will only work for a couple of seconds before the entire computer crashes. I don't know what the problem is and I tried to reinstall HP Mediasmart. The installation won't even start.
I did a full virus scan and there's nothing wrong with it. I'm at loss and I don't know what to do. Help?

Go to Start, type in Device Manager. Open it. Under Imaging Devices, the camera should be there. Right click on it, then choose Uninstall. Wait. Restart the computer. Problem solved!