Thanks for the quick responses, I am most impressed.As there are 4 responses I will respond to each.
jimtherev. As your suggestion seemed the quickest I tried it and I am now "freeze free".
I downloaded Firefox and all was well, I then removed it to see if it was pure chance and the "freeze" problem was back. I have reloaded Firefox and all is well, the screen icons work as they should. Thanks.
SoCal App. The original problem was that on start up the motherboard info screen came up followed by the Windows XP screen and then a screen of writing which basically said you have a problem try starting in safe mode, lst known good configuration etc.There was no mouse pointer but using the up and down keys I tried all the recommendations to no avail. My instructions to the "fixer" was to salvage as much as possible from the hard disc and he did that very well and returned the computer in a working condition. He found that there were 9 viruses in the system but could not say what had actually caused the problem. I found the "freeze" problem when using it at home and he had to admit that he was at a loss to suggest a solution. No access to pprune.
Your suggestions re C: and D: drive are being actioned. Thanks.
green granite.Thanks for the link, I did look through and I have filed the link for future reference.
BOAC. I am now running AVG, but was not doing so before, once bitten etc!. Yes I have always run weekly Malwarebytes, Adaware and now Superantispyware. Thanks.
I have now ordered a laptop and will be using that for internet work and this older machine for word processing and as a backup.
Once again thanks to you all, pprune at its best.