Gateway laptop problem has been

start your computer in safe mode.

Click start, run, type 'msconfig' in the box without the commas and click 'OK'

a system configuration utility window pops open. Click on the tab at the top in the middle that says 'boot.ini' and put a mark by safeboot. Drop down and click apply, move left and click close. Restart the computer, you will come up in safemode. If you dont get the same problem, is probably norton, norton wont start in safemode unless its the corporate edition.

to get back to regular mode, click start again, click on run, type msconfig and click ok. The system configuration utility window pops back open. Click the boot.ini tab and unmark safeboot. Drop down and click apply, move left and click close. Restart the computer. It will come back up in regular mode.

a work around if it is norton would be to remove norton and try AVG antivirus, is free

it problem persists, then it wasnt norton. Norton needs quite a bit of memory to run. If you dont have at least 512 mb in your system (more if your video card uses part of it), then you going to have problems.