computer slow

i had my computer on for little over a month everything was fine and then i rebooted and now everything is slow and it seems everything i do like open things move things explorer.exe is using more than 50% of cpu, its like a snail, ive checked for viuses and spyware and got rid of what it found but to no avail, im running pentium 4 3.0ghz with 1gig ram and windows xp, anyone know whats going on ?

 

1) Did you have the PC on and running the entire month without turning it off?

2) Did you install any new software or hardware?

If you have not made any changes at all (newly installed or uninstalled programs, device drivers, hardware components, registry and/or BIOS tweaking, no means of malware infection), then the only thing I can think of is a hardware problem such as HardDrive. Possibly RAM, mobo or PSU too but HD would be my first suspect.

 

I know a case where a pc was never turned off for months and the owner was boasting in one of the forums that he never uses an antivirus and he is lasting for more than a year.
Could booting be the elan vita of the viruses?

 

yea it was on constant and no i didn't install any hardware software yes and i've only a few things open at the minute and explorer is using 40-50% of me cpu i've had this problem before in the past and i reinstalled windows and it was fine but i want to see what the problem is the only reason i rebooted was because my internet wouldn't connect

 

Sorry for the late reply, I have been quite busy lately.
Anyhow, it is kind of hard to understand what is going on with this much info, can you give more info on your system and installed apps?
I don't think it is healthy for a Windows system to run constantly without any reboot for that long. It could be a process or an application running in the background that could be the cause but do not forget the possibilities with system overheating or HardDisk failure. How old are the components? Hard Drive could be forming bad sectors (physical damage to the smallest useable area) due to its age or working conditions? Also understand this, after running for even a few days, the HardDisk would be hot not necessarily hot enough to damage it but hot enough to expand the internal components to an extreme point where even the slightest bump or cooling it down for a few minutes then restarting could cause damage....I don't know the exact cause, like I said it would be an educated guess at the best.
Run HijackThis and attach a log file here if you suspect that it is software related, just make sure to close all browser windows prior to running it.
.....that is all I can think of.
Good Luck.

 

Try the advice here.


http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=25834

 

hey, my pc isn't that old only built it in november this has happend to me a few times in the past and a format brings things back to normal, theres nothing wrong with me hard drives they are as healthy as a horse, i've recently formatted as i got fed up with it being slow and couldn't find any answers and now everything is fine and as fast as ever i didn't have any spyware or viruses cause i checked and i have a firewall too, and for that month or more when i had it on constant i didn't install much if i remember right my pc is on constant anyways just i didn't need to reboot then so i didn't but it's happened a few times and no doubt it will happen again but i would like to know why, no one else had this problem ?

 

Kinda hard to say but if it was Hardware related you should have experienced the same after a fresh-install so more than likely something happened in that month and it could have been a boot sector virus or another type of system/file corruption that didn't kick in until you rebooted the system. Also know this, having a firewall, an anti-virus scanner, etc. doesn't mean your system is 100% secure and protected...bad guys are -unfortunately- one step ahead...

Try rebooting again after a month later and see what happens?