It appears most of my pc problem was the router. When I had no internet jobs running, it showed 100% utilization. This didn't impact the PC's CPU utilization, but it had an impact, for sure. I managed to clear that up and overall performance has been much better. Even IE's acting better, lol.
I have a theory on the mute. I'm using headphones, but to make them work had to define them as quad speakers which suggests maybe I have them plugged in the wrong place. Anyway, I suspect the adapter card measures its performance and perhaps launched a task to mute and/or lower the volume to eliminate a feedback problem. What I should do is find where to plug in my external speakers so I can easily use either. Who knows all the grief these minor things can cause, too.
I'm still suspecting a memory problem for the broad range of issues I've seen and intend to pick up some, if it's cheap enough, although I do have low swap file usage. I want to replace it and see if stuff improves and avoid buying a new system, if possible. I tend to buy the best configuration I can get, within reason, expecting it to last a very long time. I don't know how long they typically last, but this one's 8 years old and counting.
Oh, and those files I mentioned. I noticed Microsoft uses them for minidumps when your system hangs. When I rebooted, a window asked if I wanted to send them to MSFT. I looked at the file names and gulped. But this time, they didn't contain those questionable files.
Spyzooka's still coming up with those trojans that Webroot doesn't see. Still have to follow up on that. I'm not downloading their stuff, since webroot caught viruses in it. Wacky.
Micro, if you're reading, I think you were right about the battery. I didn't get inside yet, working these other things, but when I dragged the pc out to open it up, the date reset back to when I bought it, so I suspect it is not seated well or held down well. So I'll be looking things over inside, including finding the memory and seeing if it's seated well, although I'm not doing much as things are working now. Gotta get some work done, this stuff's outrageous!
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