First steps to cure slow computer

[mike12]

I plan on going to a friends house early next week to see if i can do something about her two year old Dell that has become very slow. I plan on doing the regular first steps like scanning and clearing any viruses and spyware. Then I plan to search what exactly is loading at startup by using MSCONFIG and then STARTUP. Since she has all the discs that came with the computer, I mentioned that sometimes it is better to re-format and do a clean install. She said I should do that as a last measure since she does all her banking etc. with that computer and does not want to reinstall everything etc. She said the computer came with XP Pro, but they usually come with XP Home unless she paid extra for Pro. Other than the three items I listed at the beginning of this thread, what other steps can I take ? Thank you, Mike

[kosova]

check her specs see if you can upgrade something, maybe add another 256mb ram. See if her insides have dust bunnies, we dont want none of them. Trust me they really help the computer. You got pretty much covered, reformat, defrag, scan (avg, spybot,hjt,zonealarm,adware)..well good luck maybe u can do some good to your lady friend

[albertw2]

Sounds like you got it all lined up just in case run a chkdisk on any hard drives to check for bad sectors as well. Once you get rid of any spyware, viruses, clean out the cache, etc . . . bigger RAM is the answer.

[mushroom]

If the system has a lot of junk, run a utility like CCleaner and clean out the trash, then run chkdsk and defragment the drive. this will help improve performance. Here are some good links which u cud check out to see if u've left out anything.
http://www.microsoft.com/AtWork/getstarted/speed.mspx/
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar/slowcom.htm

[Cricket]

Ask if she installed Norton System Works recently. If she did, uninstalling it will let the computer run like it's supposed to.

Cricket

[mike12]

Thanks everyone for the additional info. Will post back after I look at the computer in a few days. Mike

[mike12]

Well, I finally got there this evening. Here is what I did. I did that disc cleanup, and removal of all system restore items except the last one. This took about 15 minutes. Seemed like it took forever. Then I did that msconfig and looked at the startup items. There were at least 25 items. I unchecked all but two items that I could not easily identify. I noticed there were items that pertained to Norton, and McAfee. These were also unchecked. Then I had to reboot. Then I went to Housecall to do that online scan from Trend Micro. I had it scan for viruses and security items. It took 54 minutes !!! It only found 10 spyware items, which I removed , and no viruses. However, during the scan I got a popup from McAfee saying it detected a virus. This confused me since i had previously unchecked it from the startup items ????
I then downloaded AVG and updated it. Then I went to the Windows Update site and downloaded a few software items. All the security items were already installed. The computer is running XP Pro with SP2. etc, and the computer is about a two year old Dell Dimension 2400. The processor I believe is a 2.2 mhz, and it has a 40 gig hard drive, and 256 meg of ram. Did not have time to do any more at this time. I also planned on running AdAware, Spybot, and EasyCleaner, but had to leave for the evening. I really did not see any difference in the computer so far, but I could be wrong. I was considering bringing the computer to my house, but I was wondering. I have a cable modem with a Linksyes router. In the "past" when I would bring a computer to my house to work on, I would insert a special disc that I got with the router, into my computer. Then I would hookup another cable to the ethernet card in the computer that I was working on, and then turn it on. This disc would then configure the other computer and then I could easily get on the internet with the other computer. These OTHER computers always had dial up, and I never had any problems when the computer was taken back home, dialing up to the internet etc. Now, this OTHER computer also has a cable modem. If I do the same process with this computer that I did with the others, will there be a problem when I take this computer back. Will any of the settings be messed up ?
Back to the speed issue---can this slowness be caused by a hardware item ?
I know another 256 meg of ram would help, but she tells me the computer was a lot faster when new.
I suggested that as a last resort, I could reformat the computer and reinstall the OS,but i would feel like a jerk if there was no difference in speed, and she had to reinstall all her financial items--banking etc. on the computer. As I mentioned above, there were a few more things I planned on doing, but just ran out of time, like AdAware, Spybot etc. All suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Mike

[kosova]

256MB with XP? thats the minimum that xp requires, I would do what i did to my computer, go with windows 2000 sp4 (its more secure-er) and it will free some ram. The computer slowed down eh? Did you open the case, i bet she has never cleaned it out, there is nothing wrong then removing those dust bunnies from there. I'd say she better start defragging her hdd more, and keeping it more secure. As for the msconfig, i'd completely remove them all, also i bet u didnt go to the startup folder to delete any programs that will run when the comp boots.

[mike12]

Hi kosova, thanks for the reply. Not sure about that STARTUP folder. I thought I was stopping unnecessory programs from loading when I unchecked all those items in msconfig, startup ?? I just checked my computer by going to START, PROGRAMS, STARTUP, and it was blank ??? Obviously that was not it.

[kosova]

Originally Posted by mike12 Hi kosova, thanks for the reply. Not sure about that STARTUP folder. I thought I was stopping unnecessory programs from loading when I unchecked all those items in msconfig, startup ?? I just checked my computer by going to START, PROGRAMS, STARTUP, and it was blank ??? Obviously that was not it.

yea, that's happened to me before. So how slow was this computer exactly, like if u opened an IE/fire fox window how long did it take just to open? Besides some virus/trojan/spyware i cant think of anything else really thats causing this slowdown.

and your welcome, thats what im here for mike to help u lol

[mike12]

When I opened IE, it took about 10 seconds to load the MSN homepage. I know she has a very good cable company RCN, so the page should load much faster than that. But forgetting about getting on to the internet, remember that it took about 15 minutes to do a disk cleanup. My computer does it in about 2 minutes or less. My computer "is" faster, 3.0 mhz processor versus a 2.2, but I also have a 80 gig hard drive and she has a 40 gig. Remember it also took 54 minutes to do that scan at Trend Micro. I know it had to download the small program at the beginning etc, but it was the actual scan that took so long. I did plan on installing Perfect Disc. 7.0 and doing a defrag with it, but ran out of time.

[kosova]

the cleanup thing, idk how u get it so fast, i just tried mine 5 mins so far nothing, i just clicked cancel. Hmm did she have a lot of desktop items because they really use system resources, i think they use a cache for the window that loads everytime u change between windows (buts thats my theory). if she does, delete em, the less the better, ideal screen is just RECYCLE bin. BTW the hdd space like 80GB vs 40GB has nothing to do with speed at all lol. What your thinking is RAM.
why didnt i think of this, the registry, hers is probably corrupt. Im not sure what a good registry cleaner is or what to recommend, but maybe someone in pcmech can recommend something good that they've used. Remember back up the registry first, then do the repair. If everything goes well her comp should dramatically increase

[sgtspector]

I think what he meant about the speed was that his drive is bigger and should take longer to cleanup. Also mike remember to check the startup folder under "all users" for startup programs. There could be others that arent in your folder but will start anyway when you boot up because they are in there.

[Cricket]

Have you talked to your friend about adding more RAM? 256MB is a little light for a WinXP computer and the system is probably going to the swap file a lot right now especially if the computer is running a lot of background apps.

Another thing that may be causing the computer to run so slow is the hard drive may be developing bad sectors. You might want to run the manufacturer's diagnostic utility on it.

Cricket

[glc]

How many antivirus programs are on that thing? Uninstall all but ONE.

Definitely run manufacturer's diags on the hard drive.

[mike12]

glc-I know sometimes it is very difficult to remove AV's from a system, especially Norton. I thought that since I had UNCHECKED them from STARTUP in MSCONFIG, they would not be a problem. However I did just tell her to try to remove them from her computer, and to have the discs ready just in case she is instructed to insert either Norton or McAfee while trying.
I will also have her run some diagonostics on the hard drive.
Maybe I should start another thread for this, if so just move it. She tells me that when she goes into Documents and Settings she sees the following folders: administrator, all users, guest, shirley, and josh. She has divorced josh, and would like to rename the folder. When she tries to do so, she is given a message that it is a windows file and cannot be deleted or renamed.
I tried doing the same on my computer, and did not get those messages.
Any suggestions on that ? I have been trying to convince her to let me just format the hard drive and then start over, but she is reluctant so far.

[TPM]

Best noticable fix is definitely to install more ram. It may have been quicker when new but over time I'm sure more programs were added. My brother in law took a new dell out of the box and it was soo slow because it only had 256 worth of ram. memory is money well spent!

[Panama Red]

If Josh's logon is passworded, she may need the password first in order to logon in his name and remove the password. Then log out of Josh, log on to any name with Admin priviledges and try to delete his profile.

One of the things that slows down disk cleanup is the "compress files" scan that occurs initially. Since compressing files is not recommended anyway, you can remove that step from the process by using this registry tweak.

http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;812248