My Laptop Crashes An Awful Lot.
 

*points to title*

I'd just be using it and it would suddenly freeze. I can't move the mouse or even Ctrl-Alt-Del, so I have to force shut down my computer to restart it. Sometimes it goes days without freezing, sometimes it will freeze again right after I restart it. It gets very annoying, and I don't think what I'm doing to get rid of the freeze is good for the computer. :/
It is a Windows OS Asus. My dad bought it online last year, so I guess it's fairly new. I use Firefox and Google Chrome. I save a lot of documents and drawings on it, and I rarely download large files such as games. I do notice, however, that because this is formerly a shared computer, my mother may have downloaded something that took up space on our System disk. Because it is nearly full. Also, I may have visited some site that messed up my computer, but I don't remember any particularly fishy sites.

Anyways, I wonder if anyone knows possible causes of this and if it can be fixed, how to fix it (other than buying a new laptop).

cleaning out the fan might help, it could be overheating

Your fan is overheating. I have the -exact- same problem, all the time.
Its usually when you are doing more activity than usual, because it only happens to me whenever I go onto Skype.
All you need is a new fan~ Maybe try clearing your computer of some stuff you do not really need, also.

An alternative is that there is some kind of malware or spyware on your computer.

Big question, is it hotter than normal?

Hm, it usually does not get really hot unless I have, say, three windows open, including Chrome/Firefox. If I open too many tabs on a browser, the palm rests and the computer in general start heating up really fast.

yeah, you need to clean your fan so it does not kill your lappy or worse, catch on fire

When it crashes, are you running several things at once (like what you are describing it taking to heat up) Or does it vary?

My computer overheated and I just got the case fan replaced. I never had the freezing issue but it would noticeably slow and blue screen. I noticed that it was particularly unhappy when I ran two different browsers at the same time. Specifically, Firefox and IE9.

@ Alpha: Usually that's the case, but not always. Sometimes I'd just be reading some article and it would still crash.

@ Quiet Man Cometh: I rarely use two browsers at once. I would get the case fan replaced but I have yet to find out how or where to get a new one. Since I'm usually not the one fixing computer problems in my household.

Ah. Yeah. I took mine to Future Shop because my laptop was still under warranty there, so it didn't cost me anything.

Two questions for you.

What RAM does it have?
and
What kind of hard drive does it have?

Sometimes, just buying a better RAM can fix the issue of lag and freezing. The ones I had to purchase for my older computer was $50 but the newer ones are more like $20. I saw this on a Tech website I frequent, regarding a model just like yours.

And if the hard drive is only like 350gb, that isn't very much at all. If you suspect a virus though, you can try AGV or Malwarebytes. Both are free and I have heard nothing but good things from other people. I use it myself, haven't had any issues with either.

Sounds typical overheating, I suggest buying a cooling pad and cleaning it. >.<

try clearing the cache that might help alittle maybe you have too many downloaded things?

Unfortunately, contrary to common wisdom, defrag doesn't do anything but waste time. Defrag is a performance optimization tool, not a system maintenance tool, and the optimization is very nearly irrelevant considering you'll lose more time to the defrag operation than you'll gain in runtime performance over the lifespan of your computer.

Uninstalling programs is a sound idea, but freezes and system-level crashes are usually driver-level. Honestly the best thing you can do right now is to back up your data and reinstall Windows from scratch, then reinstall the programs you actually care about. (NOTE: Don't back up programs! Reinstall them from the original media or download them fresh! Restoring programs from backup is dangerous (what if they're infected?) and unstable (programs expect their installers to be run the right way).) If this doesn't fix your crashes, it's really not fixable.

Sadly, your experience is "well, that's just Windows for you" in my book. I've never known Windows NOT to do that.