my computer continually produces fatal errors - usually "page fault"
errors but also  "unknown error ..." and the occasional blue screen to
top it off. These occur during program installation, while starting
programs, while programs are running and even when closing programs.

its not the operating system - I have formatted numerous times and
used 98 and ME although formatting seems to partially fix the problem
for a while. Its not the hard drive either, (I got a new one, still
same problems)

Which hardware component would be causing all the problems?

---

Request for Question Clarification by bikerman-ga on 30 Sep 2003 17:14 PDT

Hi, Scotew;

Another possible cause of these problems is a bad memory chip. 
Fortunately, you can check this by using the free memory testing
program, Memtest86:

http://www.memtest86.com/

I would suggest downloading Memtest86, putting it on a floppy, booting
off the floppy and letting the memory tests run--it can take hours, so
you might want to start it at night.

If that turns out to be your problem, let me know and I'll post this
as an answer.  If you need help figuring out how to use Memtest86, let
me know.  I've run it on a couple of my machines.

Regards,
bikerman

---

Clarification of Question by scotew-ga on 01 Oct 2003 04:39 PDT

Ive completed the memory test and all the RAM is working fine, cross
that one off the list, thanks anyway.

One possibility is that your CPU or some other crucial item is
overheating. I'd suggest checking all the fans to make sure they work,
and make sure the insides of your computer aren't covered with dust.

This problem is probably caused by you CPU. Not only overheating can
provoke such errors.
First of all make sure that your BIOS is defined to work in the same
frequency as your processor.
Second, make sure that your processor is not overclocked. It depends
from your BIOS version, but sometimes (for example bad batteries), can
cause abnormal changes at your BIOS values.
I had this problem before 2 or 3 months, and I bought also a new HDD,
but the problem was in BIOS frequency settings :)