Acer aspire 5051 freezing

Acer 5051 laptop

I purchased the above laptop, in February, for a charity run by my church. Despite persevering, it’s driving the user up the wall!

Here’s a link to a similar specified laptop-http://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/Acer_Aspire_5052AWXMi_LX.AV40X.022/version-1.asp. Admittedly, the 5051 only comes with 512MB RAM, but we ordered it with the memory upgraded to 1GB.

For at least the past month, it takes ages to boot up and more importantly, it now randomly freezes and you can only do a hard reboot.

The hard drive is nowhere full and the only software added, to my knowledge, is Microsoft office 2003.

Now normally in these circumstances I’d recommend a Windows reinstall (Windows xp) but am reluctant after only 2 months.

The user is completely non technical. Admittedly, I’m a software engineer and in normal circumstances I’d like to use it myself. However, this type of issue, usually requires extended use before the problem occurs, and in my position, that is not viable as I use specific gadgets owing to a disability.

Now on top of the above, the laptop has during the past week had printer spooler errors and upon rebooting, the mouse pad no longer works (but a USB mouse is working). However, note, with regard to the spooler error and mouse pad, I’ve not seen the laptop since this has happened.

Any advice?

Thanks

David Holden