"Daave" wrote:

brbrown wrote:
I use a Windows XP Sp3 desktop computer with an AMD Athlon 2GHZ
processor, 149GB hard disc with 133.3GB free space and 512MB of RAM.
I regularly use CCleaner, Ad-Aware and Ashampoo Cleaner. After
startup, when all the desktop, task bar and notification area icons
have appeared, the processor runs for another 5 or 6 minutes before I
am able to use it. In msconfig Startup, I have turned off all the
none essential programmes I recognise to stop them starting but it
makes no difference.

In Task Manager, quite often, System Idle is showing CPU use as 92%
to 99% idle but the hard disc is very busy with CPU use diving
between various processes but AAW Service.exe which I believe to be
Ad-Aware disabled in msconfig, is always shown as working and
sometimes takes over from System Idle with up to 99% CPU usage. What
is going on?

Other than completely re-installing Windows, can anyone please
suggest what I can do to speed startup?

For starters, uninstall AdAware since it's hogging CPU cycles. Although
this was once a highly regarded anti-spyware program, it's just a shadow
of its former self. (MalwareBytes' Anti-Malware and SUPERAntiSpyware are
far better.)

While you're at it, uninstall the useless Ashampoo Cleaner. Registry
cleaners never deliver noticeable performance improvement, and there's
always the risk they may muck something up. Keep Ccleaner, but avoid its
registry cleaning function.

Finally, as you have discovered, msconfig is often not effective in
truly disabling programs or processes that automatically run at startup.
The proper way to do this is to go to each program's settings or
preferences and do it that way. If you don't see the way, post back and
someone should be able to help you. Msconfig is best used as a
short-term diagnostic tool. For programs that are not well-behaved,
AutoRuns would be a better program than msconfig. Although it will take
some time, I would reconfigure a normal boot in msconfig and then trim
down your startup programs and processes by going to the programs'
settings themselves. For programs like AdAware that are detrimental (or
for programs that you *never* use, simply uninstall them. :-)

Thankyou both very much for your replies. Sorry about the delay coming back
but I didn't get an email notification that you had posted. I just checked on
the offchance. I will take heed of what you have both said and post back
with the results. Thanks again.