On 19/09/2018 16:00, John Jones wrote:
When I left on holiday 2 weeks ago my laptop (samsung bought 2011
running windows 7 home premium 64 bit) worked perfectly.
When I booted today it got as far as the desktop screen and then silence
fell.
I rebooted and everything seemed ok again. Until returning after lunch
it woke up, thought about life, went unresponsive, and then gave me the
black screen of death.
I am obviously somewhat perturbed, although by posting this clearly it
is ok at present.
I guess this is a FAQ, but how can I track down any issues, and is it
time to buy a new computer?

Sounds like dodgy hard disk or memory, most probably the former.
Although much of this relates to desktops, you could try working through
the laptop relevant sections of this to see what you can find out about
the problem ...

http://www.macfh.co.uk/JavaJive/PCHa...areFaults.html