Help with my laptop's speed.

Ok, recently I've been having quite big issues with my laptop's speed. It's just so slow now, and I'm not sure why. It used to be quit decent, but now it can't really handle doing much. Anyone got any ideas what it could be causing it? Or any ideas how to speed it up? Or do I just need to format my laptop?

If anyone here can help, I'd greatly appreciate it, and I will give anymore information if you need it...

Thanks muchly in advance.

 

The first thing I would do is a full check for viruses and malware.
http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=35407
If you find things that you can't clear up then post it in malware but do the stuff in the link first.

 

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/announcement.php?f=22

 

Defrag (try a 3rd party one as they are much quicker).

Try CCLeaner, removes .temp, .bak and many other unnecassary clutter from the sys, free, very fast and can make significant differneces:

http://majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=4191

 

It's not any spy/ad ware, as I'm always checking my laptop for that stuff.

I'll try that cleaner thing though, and post if it's made any difference. Cheers

 

The make is a Compaq. CPU 2.8GHz and 192mb of RAM. It's running Windows XP SP2 Home edition (version 2002 if that makes sod all difference).

 

I find the combination of ccleaner and Registry Mechanic can make a huge difference on any machine that's been running a year or more between formats. That, and using msconfig or a program such as autoruns to keep the start-up programs to a minimum. If you show much more than 30 processes running in the task manager immediately after start-up, you need to minimize the number of start-up programs.

Upgrading your RAM to 512MB would make more difference than anything else we could mention, though.

 

I seeee. It probably is something to do with the amount of programmes that start up, as it takes ages to boot up.

And I'd love to upgrade my RAM, but I was told I can't in a laptop?

 

Well, it's not that you can't upgrade the RAM in a laptop, but some are more tricky than others. Some have the RAM slots readily available, others may not. You can read up on it here:

http://www.computermemoryupgrade.net/installing-laptop-memory.html

What makes things even worse for you is your 192MB is probably being shared with your video, only giving you 128MB or maybe 160MB of actual RAM to use. With a 2.8GHz processor, I'm sure your laptop is new enough to support at least 512MB of RAM.

Laptop RAM can also be pricey, but it's worth checking into...it'll make a night & day difference for you. Try the ccleaner/registry cleaner/msconfig stuff, and go from there.

 

MsConfig says something about there being no disabled items in startup and I can't do anything with it.

 

Try StartupCPL. Just download it. Extract it and move the resulting file to the C:\Windows\System32 directory.

http://www.majorgeeks.com/Startup_Control_Panel_Standalone_Version_d4359.html

Then go to Control Panel and you can control what programs go active at startup.

 

Wow that is a great program to have, I had 33 running processes, my laptop was a bit sluggish upon start up, now it is not anymore! I don't mean to butt in but under perfomance, it reads my CPU usage fluctuates between 3-5%, is that normal??
I hope the OP finds this program as useful!

 

Ok, so I used that program and unticked a few boxes then put the file into System32 folder, then when I restarted my laptop, it took longer than usual, the CPU usage was at 100% until I closed a process which was something to do with Java, but I can't find a way to un-install it. Also, that programme has disappeared... it's not in my control pannel or system 32 folder either.

Ooh, do you think I could do something with Hijack This?

And my current CPU usage with a few processes stopped is on average 16%

 

Is it java runtime?. 16% seems too high, are you performing several tasks at once??
Try start>search> look for java.

 

You said your very regular with adware/spyware scanning but I am going to suggest again that you do the things here

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=35407

Windows would not have removed that program, only something trying to protect itself would, like a virus or spyware.

 

I agree w snerdly I am hovering btwn 1-3% while on the net and writing this post!?! and 40 processes active but w 1gig of HT Ram. I would defrag, cclean and follow thread to the letter!

What Java do you have? Sun Java can be a lot better! You will find that in the mailware free section I think.