Thank you all for your replies.

inthewildteam: my computer is an Amilo Pro V2000. Fujitsu-Siemens has such a bad reputation for technical support and customer care that I wouldn’t trust them to detect the fault. I would rather return the computer for a refund if the problems are not resolved within the next few days.

lee: I’m not running multiple anti-virus/firewalls and have tried Ad-aware/Spybot and checkdisk.

Eddy: I did try posting error logs to Microsoft but have had difficulty understanding all the technical details in its knowledgebase. I think I’ll give it another try though.

I too keep getting the svchost.exe requesting access through ZoneAlarm and allow it through otherwise I’m unable to connect to the Internet. Is it safe to allow it through? Could a virus exploit this to gain access to my computer?

Another thing that troubles me is that system info lists the RAM on my computer as being 504Mb instead of the expected 512Mb. Is this normal? (The computer has integrated graphics but I’m not sure how to check the Video RAM spec).

I’m seriously considering a system restore.