XP is getting to excruciatingly slow !!

(PeteCresswell) wrote on Sat, 17 Oct 2009 19:59:21 -0400:
Speaking as one who doesn't know a lot about operating systems -
buy who has a teenager beating on their PCs every day after
school for a couple hours....

I have become comfortable with imaging my systems right after a
build. This takes about 20 minutes - but presupposes the
discipline of not ever keeping "data" on C:. I keep "data" on
a separate "D:" drive always.

There are dozens of utilities that do this. Mine is called
Terabyte and cost about 20 bucks...

You can do this for free. Lots of them actually.

--
Bill
Asus EEE PC 702G4 ~ 2GB RAM ~ 16GB-SDHC
Xandros Linux (build 2007-10-19 13:03)

(PeteCresswell) wrote on Sat, 17 Oct 2009 19:59:21 -0400:
Speaking as one who doesn't know a lot about operating systems -
buy who has a teenager beating on their PCs every day after
school for a couple hours....

I have become comfortable with imaging my systems right after a
build. This takes about 20 minutes - but presupposes the
discipline of not ever keeping "data" on C:. I keep "data" on
a separate "D:" drive always.

There are dozens of utilities that do this. Mine is called
Terabyte and cost about 20 bucks...

You can do this for free. Lots of them actually.

--
Bill
Asus EEE PC 702G4 ~ 2GB RAM ~ 16GB-SDHC
Xandros Linux (build 2007-10-19 13:03)

(PeteCresswell) wrote on Sat, 17 Oct 2009 19:59:21 -0400:
Speaking as one who doesn't know a lot about operating systems -
buy who has a teenager beating on their PCs every day after
school for a couple hours....

I have become comfortable with imaging my systems right after a
build. This takes about 20 minutes - but presupposes the
discipline of not ever keeping "data" on C:. I keep "data" on
a separate "D:" drive always.

There are dozens of utilities that do this. Mine is called
Terabyte and cost about 20 bucks...

You can do this for free. Lots of them actually.

--
Bill
Asus EEE PC 702G4 ~ 2GB RAM ~ 16GB-SDHC
Xandros Linux (build 2007-10-19 13:03)

On Sat, 17 Oct 2009 16:07:47 -0700 (PDT), Penang
wrote:

Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.


Are you talking about how long it takes to boot, rather than its speed
in doing things after booting?


I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry


Ugh! That's much more likely to exacerbate the problem than to fix it.
Here's my standard post on the subject:

Registry cleaning programs are *all* snake oil. Cleaning of the
registry isn't needed and is dangerous. Leave the registry alone and
don't use any registry cleaner. Despite what many people think, and
what vendors of registry cleaning software try to convince you of,
having unused registry entries doesn't really hurt you.

The risk of a serious problem caused by a registry cleaner erroneously
removing an entry you need is far greater than any potential benefit
it may have.

Read http://www.edbott.com/weblog/archives/000643.html


to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU with
4GB of RAM ?


First reply to my question above and tell us whether the machine is
slow, or just slow in booting.

Also, what anti-virus and anti-spyware programs do you run? Are they
up date? Have they ever found infections? When? What infections did
they find? How many infections did you have?

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP (Windows Desktop Experience) since 2003
Please Reply to the Newsgroup

On Sat, 17 Oct 2009 16:07:47 -0700 (PDT), Penang
wrote:

Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.


Are you talking about how long it takes to boot, rather than its speed
in doing things after booting?


I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry


Ugh! That's much more likely to exacerbate the problem than to fix it.
Here's my standard post on the subject:

Registry cleaning programs are *all* snake oil. Cleaning of the
registry isn't needed and is dangerous. Leave the registry alone and
don't use any registry cleaner. Despite what many people think, and
what vendors of registry cleaning software try to convince you of,
having unused registry entries doesn't really hurt you.

The risk of a serious problem caused by a registry cleaner erroneously
removing an entry you need is far greater than any potential benefit
it may have.

Read http://www.edbott.com/weblog/archives/000643.html


to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU with
4GB of RAM ?


First reply to my question above and tell us whether the machine is
slow, or just slow in booting.

Also, what anti-virus and anti-spyware programs do you run? Are they
up date? Have they ever found infections? When? What infections did
they find? How many infections did you have?

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP (Windows Desktop Experience) since 2003
Please Reply to the Newsgroup

On Sat, 17 Oct 2009 16:07:47 -0700 (PDT), Penang
wrote:

Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.


Are you talking about how long it takes to boot, rather than its speed
in doing things after booting?


I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry


Ugh! That's much more likely to exacerbate the problem than to fix it.
Here's my standard post on the subject:

Registry cleaning programs are *all* snake oil. Cleaning of the
registry isn't needed and is dangerous. Leave the registry alone and
don't use any registry cleaner. Despite what many people think, and
what vendors of registry cleaning software try to convince you of,
having unused registry entries doesn't really hurt you.

The risk of a serious problem caused by a registry cleaner erroneously
removing an entry you need is far greater than any potential benefit
it may have.

Read http://www.edbott.com/weblog/archives/000643.html


to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU with
4GB of RAM ?


First reply to my question above and tell us whether the machine is
slow, or just slow in booting.

Also, what anti-virus and anti-spyware programs do you run? Are they
up date? Have they ever found infections? When? What infections did
they find? How many infections did you have?

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP (Windows Desktop Experience) since 2003
Please Reply to the Newsgroup

Here's a semi-random suggestion:

Does anything of interest appear in Even Viewer? Sometimes a process or
service that isn't loading properly can lead to a long boot time.

"Penang" wrote in message
...
Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.

I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU with
4GB of RAM ?

Here's a semi-random suggestion:

Does anything of interest appear in Even Viewer? Sometimes a process or
service that isn't loading properly can lead to a long boot time.

"Penang" wrote in message
...
Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.

I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU with
4GB of RAM ?

Here's a semi-random suggestion:

Does anything of interest appear in Even Viewer? Sometimes a process or
service that isn't loading properly can lead to a long boot time.

"Penang" wrote in message
...
Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.

I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU with
4GB of RAM ?

You didn't answer this part:

What antivirus program or suite do you use? Do you have it
automatically update and perhaps scan your drive each time you boot
up?

Assuming you have no malware and since your performance is fine (other
than the first five minutes), it seems likely that your antivirus
program/suite is configured to automatically update and perhaps scan
your drive each time you boot up.

Is this something you can live with?

Penang wrote:
RAM = 4GB

HD 1 = 640GB
HD 2 = 1TB

HD mostly empty, though.

XP Pro.

Once the 5 minutes it takes to get past the cold boot (and get
everything ready), performance is okay.

Malware wise, I've scanned and re-scanned the computer with all types
of malware scanners. So I think all the malware (at least most of
them) have been eliminated.

On Oct 17, 4:25 pm, "Daave" wrote:
Penang wrote:
Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.

I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU
with 4GB of RAM ?

How much RAM do you currently have?

How large is your hard drive and how much free space is on it?

XP Home, Pro, or MCE? Service Pack level?

Once the five minutes pass and "everything [is] back in shape," how
is the performance?

What antivirus program or suite do you use? Do you have it
automatically update and perhaps scan your drive each time you boot
up?

FWIW, "cleaning" and "defragmenting" the registry won't boost your
performance. And you need to be careful; there have been numerous
people who have used these registry "cleaning" products only to find
they are left with a PC that doesn't boot!

Here are the typical causes of sluggishness:

1. Malicious software (malware). You need to rule this out first!
This page has excellent information:

http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/...iruses_Malware

2. Certain programs that are designed to combat malware (e.g., Norton
and McAfee). Ironically, they can slow things down because they
simply use way too many resources. Sometime they cause conflicts
with other programs. And their default mode is to scan your entire
hard drive each time you boot up. Fortunately, there are other
antimalware programs available that use far fewer resources (e.g.,
NOD32, Avast, and Avira).

3. Too many of certain types of programs always running in the
background -- with or without your knowledge. (Then again, many
programs that run in the background have trivial consequences.)

To determine every program and process you are currently running, use
the Task Manager (Ctrl+Alt+Del) and click the Processes tab. You
should be able to sort by CPU usage or Memory usage to get a good
ideas which ones are the resource/memory hogs. You should write down
the names of all the processes for future detective work (or take a
snapshot and print it out).

Use these sites to determine what these programs are and to learn
how to configure them not to always run at startup:

http://www.pacs-portal.co.uk/startup...s/tasklist.htm

Sometimes it is recommended to use msconfig to configure the
programs to not run at startup. A better, more thorough program is
Autoruns:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/s.../bb963902.aspx

But before you do this, you should use the preference settings of the
program in question. Otherwise, for some programs, they will return
to the startup list anyway!

If you do wish to use msconfig, it may be accessed this way:

Start | Run | type "msconfig" (without the quotation marks) | Enter
(or OK)

4. Not enough RAM, which causes the PC to overly rely on the
pagefile. A quick way to determine if this is happening is to open
Task Manager (Ctrl+Alt+Del) and click the Performance tab. Then note
the three values under Commit Charge (K): in the lower left-hand
corner: Total, Limit, and Peak.

The Total figure represents the amount of memory you are using at
that very moment. The Peak figure represents the highest amount of
memory you used since last bootup. If both these figures are below
the value of Physical Memory (K) Total, then you probably have
plenty of RAM.
In case you want to explore this further, you may run Page File
Monitor for Windows XP:

http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm

5. You might also want to check that your hard drive's access mode
didn't change from DMA to PIO:

http://www.technize.com/2007/08/02/i...dvd-drives-too...

and

http://users.bigpond.net.au/ninjaduc...duck/udma_fix/

You didn't answer this part:

What antivirus program or suite do you use? Do you have it
automatically update and perhaps scan your drive each time you boot
up?

Assuming you have no malware and since your performance is fine (other
than the first five minutes), it seems likely that your antivirus
program/suite is configured to automatically update and perhaps scan
your drive each time you boot up.

Is this something you can live with?

Penang wrote:
RAM = 4GB

HD 1 = 640GB
HD 2 = 1TB

HD mostly empty, though.

XP Pro.

Once the 5 minutes it takes to get past the cold boot (and get
everything ready), performance is okay.

Malware wise, I've scanned and re-scanned the computer with all types
of malware scanners. So I think all the malware (at least most of
them) have been eliminated.

On Oct 17, 4:25 pm, "Daave" wrote:
Penang wrote:
Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.

I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU
with 4GB of RAM ?

How much RAM do you currently have?

How large is your hard drive and how much free space is on it?

XP Home, Pro, or MCE? Service Pack level?

Once the five minutes pass and "everything [is] back in shape," how
is the performance?

What antivirus program or suite do you use? Do you have it
automatically update and perhaps scan your drive each time you boot
up?

FWIW, "cleaning" and "defragmenting" the registry won't boost your
performance. And you need to be careful; there have been numerous
people who have used these registry "cleaning" products only to find
they are left with a PC that doesn't boot!

Here are the typical causes of sluggishness:

1. Malicious software (malware). You need to rule this out first!
This page has excellent information:

http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/...iruses_Malware

2. Certain programs that are designed to combat malware (e.g., Norton
and McAfee). Ironically, they can slow things down because they
simply use way too many resources. Sometime they cause conflicts
with other programs. And their default mode is to scan your entire
hard drive each time you boot up. Fortunately, there are other
antimalware programs available that use far fewer resources (e.g.,
NOD32, Avast, and Avira).

3. Too many of certain types of programs always running in the
background -- with or without your knowledge. (Then again, many
programs that run in the background have trivial consequences.)

To determine every program and process you are currently running, use
the Task Manager (Ctrl+Alt+Del) and click the Processes tab. You
should be able to sort by CPU usage or Memory usage to get a good
ideas which ones are the resource/memory hogs. You should write down
the names of all the processes for future detective work (or take a
snapshot and print it out).

Use these sites to determine what these programs are and to learn
how to configure them not to always run at startup:

http://www.pacs-portal.co.uk/startup...s/tasklist.htm

Sometimes it is recommended to use msconfig to configure the
programs to not run at startup. A better, more thorough program is
Autoruns:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/s.../bb963902.aspx

But before you do this, you should use the preference settings of the
program in question. Otherwise, for some programs, they will return
to the startup list anyway!

If you do wish to use msconfig, it may be accessed this way:

Start | Run | type "msconfig" (without the quotation marks) | Enter
(or OK)

4. Not enough RAM, which causes the PC to overly rely on the
pagefile. A quick way to determine if this is happening is to open
Task Manager (Ctrl+Alt+Del) and click the Performance tab. Then note
the three values under Commit Charge (K): in the lower left-hand
corner: Total, Limit, and Peak.

The Total figure represents the amount of memory you are using at
that very moment. The Peak figure represents the highest amount of
memory you used since last bootup. If both these figures are below
the value of Physical Memory (K) Total, then you probably have
plenty of RAM.
In case you want to explore this further, you may run Page File
Monitor for Windows XP:

http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm

5. You might also want to check that your hard drive's access mode
didn't change from DMA to PIO:

http://www.technize.com/2007/08/02/i...dvd-drives-too...

and

http://users.bigpond.net.au/ninjaduc...duck/udma_fix/

Penang wrote:
Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.

I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU with
4GB of RAM ?

Format and do a clean install, or spend the next 6 or 7 months trying
everyones' suggestions.

Penang wrote:
Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.

I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU with
4GB of RAM ?

Format and do a clean install, or spend the next 6 or 7 months trying
everyones' suggestions.

BillW50 wrote:

I have become comfortable with imaging my systems right after a
build. This takes about 20 minutes - but presupposes the
discipline of not ever keeping "data" on C:. I keep "data" on
a separate "D:" drive always.

There are dozens of utilities that do this. Mine is called
Terabyte and cost about 20 bucks...

You can do this for free. Lots of them actually.

Ya, just by copying them where you want them, I have nothing in My
Documents, Pictures, Music and so on, I save everything mostly to my
F:\ Drive

Heck, Tweak UI will change the directories "My Documents, Pictures,
Music and so on" to anywhere you want your stuff saved.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/D...powertoys.mspx

-If your not running XP, each Windows OS has it's own powertoys, and
version of Tweak UI-
--

Find Waldo
http://tinyurl.com/yj8ds74

BillW50 wrote:

I have become comfortable with imaging my systems right after a
build. This takes about 20 minutes - but presupposes the
discipline of not ever keeping "data" on C:. I keep "data" on
a separate "D:" drive always.

There are dozens of utilities that do this. Mine is called
Terabyte and cost about 20 bucks...

You can do this for free. Lots of them actually.

Ya, just by copying them where you want them, I have nothing in My
Documents, Pictures, Music and so on, I save everything mostly to my
F:\ Drive

Heck, Tweak UI will change the directories "My Documents, Pictures,
Music and so on" to anywhere you want your stuff saved.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/D...powertoys.mspx

-If your not running XP, each Windows OS has it's own powertoys, and
version of Tweak UI-
--

Find Waldo
http://tinyurl.com/yj8ds74