Toyota Repair: 2008 Toyota Prius red warning light

Question
Hi, my 2008 Prius ( just bought it 370,000 ex cab) the orange malnufunction light is on ( not flashing on all the time). Whn I start car the ready light doesn't come on and car won't go back not gear so I just turn off and start again straight away and the ready light comes on and goes into gear( I don't mind doing this) the orange malfunction light remains on. Car goes great but red triangle warning master light came on while driving on highway ( driving 45 min at 109 km) when suddenly the orange traction wheel lights came on car felt like was gripping to the road for about 3 mins and then came on the master warning light .
The car then lost power after 3 minutes of driving.
Each time this has happened(. 4 times now seems fine just doing local drives but after 20 min driving this happens. The car doesn't restart and warning light stays on.
Each time I've waited about 30 minutes and have been able to restart the car. The red warning light stayed on a couple of times but I was able to drive home the other occasions the red warning light stayed off.
I should of known better than to buy an ex cab ;!
At omens I can't afford mechanic any ideas.
The battery shows all good but I noticed last time this happened the battery showed totally empty
Pleas help

Answer
The Prius uses very complex computer systems that are linked to one another, it's pretty much impossible to make a guess as to what may be causing this without having some diagnostic code information from the computers, this can be done by simply connecting a compatible diagnostic console to the car's diagnostic port to get this information, this is a starting point for any Prius malfunctions.  About the only thing you can do yourself is to make sure the 12 volt auxiliary battery in the trunk is in good shape, it must be at 12 volts or 11.8v minimum or it can create all sorts of strange problems.