Slow Start-Up On Old Dell Computer

[WolfpackRon]

I have an old Dell computer with 500gh processor and ~10gb hard drive w/ 5gb free that takes 1 to 4 hours to start up. The blue Dell screen appears quickly, but it takes forever to boot. It appears to work properly after this. I defragged, scanned for errors and viruses, but it is still slow. Scanning the hard drive with Norton did not take very long (8 sec.). This does not sound correct. Any suggestions. WolfpackRon.

[james8547]

Yeah dell bites. I learned my lesson.

Anyways, try to d/l AVG. It's a free anti virus prog. Run it and see what happens.

I had similar problems with my dell. Usually the culprit is a virus or registry is messed up big time. If you want/can, try to reformat the drive. It worked for me but I lost all my info on th drive.

Check also msconfig startup and see if there are anything suspicious.

How old is the system anyway?

[WolfpackRon]

Computer is my son's who graduated from college in May. The computer is approx. 4 1/2 years old. I suspect the virus idea may be correct. Using Norton to scan for viruses said "complete" in only 8 sec. and 28 files.

[Alienware_Dude]

http://www.security.kolla.de - Spybot Search and Destroy
http://www.grisoft.com - AVG Anti-Virus