[Can't Complete scan - XP freezing - Help!]

Hello - seeking help

I'm runing Win XP Pro, SP3 on a an older Dell Dimension L1000R.

Xp was beginning to freeze up randomly, so I knew I had some kind of problem and hadn't been as diligent as necessary ensuring I had anti-malware and other preevntatuive software installed and running.

I've now installed and been trying to run Malwarebytes but cannot complete a scan as the PC simply freezes, forcing a hard restart and I can't hget it to complete.

So far 7 instances of malware present have been identified, but I simply can't get to the end of the scan to even attempt cleaning.

Any ideas on how I cann move forward to get this malware off my system and get back to work will be appreciated.

On viewing an earlier post, I've downloaded DDS but have yet to run.

Thank you for your help (I really don't want to have to reinstall)