Every once in a while, Windows seemingly wanders off, you're left looking at a computer that does nothing. None of the computer's lights blink. Panicked clicks don't do anything. Pressing every key on the keyboard doesn't do anything or worse yet, the computer starts to beep at every key press.

When nothing on-screen moves (except sometimes the mouse pointer), the computer is frozen up solid. Try the following approaches, in the following order, to correct the problem:

• Press Esc twice. This action usually doesn't work but give it a shot anyway.
• Press Ctrl, Alt, and Delete all at the same time. If you're lucky, the Task Manager appears with the message that you discovered an unresponsive application. The Task Manager lists the names of currently running programs, including the one that's not responding. Click the name of the program that's causing the mess and then click the End Process button. You lose any unsaved work in that program, but you should be used to that! If that still doesn't do the trick, click the Task Manager's Shut Down menu and choose Restart.
• If the preceding approaches don't work, push the computer's reset button, you should check you computer’s user manual.
• If not even the reset button works (and some computers don't even have reset buttons anymore), turn the computer off by pushing its power button. (If that merely brings up the Turn Off the Computer menu, choose Restart, and your computer should restart.)
• When nothing else works, if you press in the computer's off button long enough, it will eventually stop resisting and turn off.