[HLUG] Clogged cache?

[Graham Cole]

Hi everyone
I'm trying to understand my ailing desktop which can't cope with a
normal workload these days. It slows down when the browser is used for a
while and eventually it gets so slow that I have to press the reset
button and start again. Printing a photo also slows things to a stop.
I suspect a fault with the RAM because once recently I got an error
message: E:Cache open()failed, please report. I think it was cured with
dpkg --configure -a
Is this situation familiar to anyone?
I'm using Ubuntu 7.10

Graham