diagnosing a problem

[Papa Smurf]

my dumb overpowered laptop i should have never bought has been deteriorating rather quickly... Just browsing the internet today(building a desktop computer with LOTS of fans) it blue screened 3 times, froze twice, and crashed once. it's been getting blue screens playing diablo 2 after 1-2 hours, and can't play starcraft for more than 10-15 minutes. world of warcraft lasts 2-5 hours b4 BSOD. I have it propped up on a ridiculous setup of small empty boxes( the ones that checkbooks come in) and a powerful little fan sitting on my keyboard tray blowing underneath it, specifically at the spot that gets hottest. I'm not convinced it's because of overheating anymore. It's gotten buggy before and was staved off by repairing windows, but i tried that recently and it bluescreens before it finishes. What else could it be? I opened it up and there is no dust btw. It crashes before finishing virus scans or ad-aware scans as well. it can't seem to finish performing any long scanning operation. I'm not sure if that means the hard drive or the ram could be bad? or just because of corrupted files in the windows directory? I'm pretty sure it's not a virus or ad-aware aborting my attempts because it crashes at different points in the scans and my computer is pretty clean.

I call it a dumb overpowered laptop i should never have bought because it has 2 geforce go 7800 gtx in SLI. I have realized that that was probably excessive lol. no laptop needs SLI >< it's not worth it!

It's a 4 year old computer btw and did not used to have these issues or require this elaborate heat dissipation shrine setup until about a year ago

I just had a thought... could it need re-application of thermal paste?

also,
from the troubleshooting thread-

CONSTANT CRASHES IN WINDOWS
Problem: BSODS etc
1. Check VIA 4in1 drivers(if applic.)
2. Set cpu back to stock
3. Set ram back to stock
4. Apply SB live+via patch(if applic.)
5. Remove all hardware one at a time until problem disapears.

what are VIA 4in1 drivers and why would i want them? could that help me diagnose my issues?
i looked them up on google and didn't find much... how do i tell if my laptop has a VIA chipset? I just looked in the device manager and saw nothing about the chipset : (

 

[Jorsoft]

What is the make and model of your laptop?

New chipset drivers wouldn't hurt, if there are any available, but I'm not sure if it would solve your issues or not. When was the last time you backed up your data and did a complete windows reinstall? I think that would be a good place to start.

 

[Papa Smurf]

What is the make and model of your laptop?

New chipset drivers wouldn't hurt, if there are any available, but I'm not sure if it would solve your issues or not. When was the last time you backed up your data and did a complete windows reinstall? I think that would be a good place to start.

It's a sager m590k. I'm planning to do that once my new desktop comp and my external hard drive case arrive : ) last time i did that I had issues with it bluescreening a whole bunch of times during the process though. I just had to keep trying till it finished without crashing. I really think there is something that needs replacing but i don't know what : (

 

[ricanflow]

It most likely has dust built up from years of use.

Open it up and blow all the dust out and you should be gravy.

 

[Papa Smurf]

yeah that's what i figured too, but i opened it up and it was perfectly clean. no dust at all. i was disappointed, actually i was hoping that was all it was