Can a defective hard drive cause your computer to freeze?

Question

Lately, I have been having problems with my computer crashing. I think it is because my hard drive is messed up. My computer just freezes periodicaly. Could it be because of the hard drive?

Answer 1

Is this a temporary freeze or a permanent one (requiring a reboot)?

One thing you could do is check for error messages in Event Viewer...
Right-click on My Computer, select Manage.
Click Event View, then double-click System.
Look for errors (red x's) around the times that you have froze before (ignore the Service Control Manager and DCOM ones)
Double-click them to read the description.