XP Pro suddenly very slow

[Larry]

Hi there!

Please can somebody tell me what's happened to my
computer? Yesterday, suddenly in the middle of writing a
Word-document, my computer went dead slow. I have XP Pro,
512 MB, 120 GB Maxtor HD, Geforce MX 440, Hauppauge
WinTV.

Outlook takes about 60 seconds to open, Power VCR almost
2 minutes. To surf Internet is really a pain, Explorer
takes about minute and a half to open my locally stored
home page, and when I click a link, Explorer freezes for
about 40-60 seconds. To record video using WinTV card and
Power VCR program is OK, but when playing the clip it
jumps over major part of the frames so that it is
impossible to watch.

Any good ideas? Or do I have to format and instaal, once
again?

Greetings from Finland, LARRY

[Jupiter Jones [MVP]]

Larry;
Try System Restore for a date/time before slowdown:
Start/All Programs/Accessories/System Tools/System Restore

Otherwise:
Run an updated virus scan.
Or Scan for Viruses online:
http://security.symantec.com/ssc/home.asp?j=1&langid=ie&venid=sym&plfid=23&pkj=IRLFIZTYMWPAZTJWUFJ
Run Disk Cleanup checking all boxes except "Compress old files"
Run Defrag.
If you have file sharing software such as Kazaa, disable it.
Check this link:
http://www.aumha.org/a/noads.php
Run Ad-Aware (free version) or Spybot to check for spyware:
http://www.lavasoft.de/ (Update if you already have it)
Or
http://spybot.eon.net.au/ (Update if you already have it)

--
Jupiter Jones [MVP]
An easier way to read newsgroup messages:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/using/newsgroups/setup.asp
Please respond to newsgroup only for everyone's benefit.


"Larry" > wrote in message
...
> Hi there!
>
> Please can somebody tell me what's happened to my
> computer? Yesterday, suddenly in the middle of writing a
> Word-document, my computer went dead slow. I have XP Pro,
> 512 MB, 120 GB Maxtor HD, Geforce MX 440, Hauppauge
> WinTV.
>
> Outlook takes about 60 seconds to open, Power VCR almost
> 2 minutes. To surf Internet is really a pain, Explorer
> takes about minute and a half to open my locally stored
> home page, and when I click a link, Explorer freezes for
> about 40-60 seconds. To record video using WinTV card and
> Power VCR program is OK, but when playing the clip it
> jumps over major part of the frames so that it is
> impossible to watch.
>
> Any good ideas? Or do I have to format and instaal, once
> again?
>
> Greetings from Finland, LARRY

[Donald Link]

Had something similiar to this on a NT machine at work and after trying all
day to figure it out we found a bad memory chip. Could be your problem but
probably not. If you have 2 sticks you could try swithching them out. Hard
disk space does not seem a problem with your drive unless a virus got loose
and I assume you do have a virus checker. Just thoughts.



"Larry" > wrote in message
...
> Hi there!
>
> Please can somebody tell me what's happened to my
> computer? Yesterday, suddenly in the middle of writing a
> Word-document, my computer went dead slow. I have XP Pro,
> 512 MB, 120 GB Maxtor HD, Geforce MX 440, Hauppauge
> WinTV.
>
> Outlook takes about 60 seconds to open, Power VCR almost
> 2 minutes. To surf Internet is really a pain, Explorer
> takes about minute and a half to open my locally stored
> home page, and when I click a link, Explorer freezes for
> about 40-60 seconds. To record video using WinTV card and
> Power VCR program is OK, but when playing the clip it
> jumps over major part of the frames so that it is
> impossible to watch.
>
> Any good ideas? Or do I have to format and instaal, once
> again?
>
> Greetings from Finland, LARRY