A MS update got hung up, I powered my PC down, and now...

A MS update got hung up, I powered my PC down, and now the PC is behaving erratically; for example...

The PC would not start; Startup Repair interceded; ran multiple times with restarts between each run and without finding or fixing the any problems.

When I tried to run Windows in Safe Mode, installed about half the drivers, stopped, buzzed or dinged for 30 seconds, then sat silently for 2 minutes before continuing to load the drivers.

The first time I tried to go into Safe Mode, I ended in the BIOS settings "room" but could not do or see anything because the whole time I was in there, the highlight bar blinked and buzzed while jumping back and forth between the two options offered.

A good number of other things are behaving differently than in the past, but none as significant as the first three listed.

Can someone please help me find the root cause and eliminate it? (If it makes more sense to focus on fixing the problem and not analyzing how things used to be, I am perfectly OK with that.

I sincerely look forward to someone helping me.

All the best,

Joe




...

Hmmm...

Every since I purchased my computer seven or eight years ago, I could always hear my hard drive running in the background. Two or three weeks ago, I noticed it was much, much quieter.

Additionally, about ten days, I needed to copy 30 GB of data from DVDs to my hard drive and it seemed so slow, I tried my 16-year old external DVD reader and it was noticeably faster.

Also, when I have searched for files in c: (My wife tends to not pay attention to where she saves files.) recently, the search process seems to take very long.

Might the above three items indicate that my CD/DVD drive or my hard drive is failing and could this be causing the OS problems I am observing?

If so, are there any log files, etc. that contain information that would confirm your suspicion?

Thanks!

Joe

PS I want to say that when installing some software a week or two ago, the installation process kept hanging, but I had no problems when I used the old CD/DVD reader.

1. Some webpages, which could include the webpage that is visible and/or those that are behind the visible webpage), never completely "arrive" (In other words, Chrome's swirling circle in the webpage tab does not stop swirling and disappear,
   
2. Some webpages, which could include the webpage that is visible and/or those that are behind the visible webpage, refresh without any input from me (I have never seen this behavior until recently),
   
3. All webpages become unresponsive at once, some of them report "Not Responding" in their corresponding tabs, some of them put Google's SNAP webpage up, and all of them return to responding with the SNAP pages returning to their correct webpage.