IBM Preload

Can anyone give me some help with my IBM R51...running XP Pro.

After 10 months i'm still able to pop to the corner shop while it boots...yup takes that long...love the machine just hate the boot and shut down time.

I've used Black Vipers service configuration guide to cut over a min off the time and it still takes over 4mins to boot....it's all the unneccessary IBM preloaded apps that i dont use or need...i've tried 'trial and error' there's a lot of IBM stuff ive removed and put back because some things then dont work as they should... i just dont understand what i'm removing and if i need it to keep the machine stable.

I also want to free up the space they use.

What i'd like to do is clean the whole drive and do a fresh install of XP...i'd then just install any IBM stuff i know i want to use...Access Connections etc.

PROBLEM.....no discs...everything is preinstalled on a hidden partition.

Anyone use an IBM and been able to work around this to get a decent boot time.

I've rung IBM but no help there...according to them if i want to just install XP without the preload i must purchase the XP software seperately...apparently it was the price of the preload included in the purchase price of the machine and not XP as a stand alone


Any thoughts appreciated

 

With no programs running, Press CTRL-ALT-DELETE to bring up the task manager and see how many processes you have running. A fresh install of XP with nothing else installed has about 22 processes running after startup. An average computer with a few months worth of programs installed would probably run around 30-35 or so. How many do you have running? It sounds like you need to cut down on them.

Go to RUN, type in msconfig and press enter. The System Configuration Utility should pop up. Go to the "Startup" folder and have a good look at how many programs you have starting up with your computer. How many are there? You should uncheck all but the essentials, such as antivirus and possibly items which support your hardware, such as video card. If you're unsure, uncheck a few at a time, apply & reboot...see if there are any issues. Continue until you're running as few as possible, that should help your boot time.

Be aware, if you're running a resource hog such as Norton Professional Antivirus or Systemworks, it'll bog your computer down & drag out your booting time regardless of how many other programs you cut out.

I also recommend two programs to help clean up your computer. "ccleaner" to clean out all the unneccesary clutter on the hard drive, and a good registry cleaner like Registry Mechanic or similar to optimize your registry.

 

Thanks Wave....i've already used the ccleaner...i have AVG and run Ad-Aware daily...i also do a regular online scan so i know i have no spyware etc on the machine...very clean.

The one problem i have is defrag just wont run...all greyed out...trying to find out how to repair it at the moment.

I checked the start up and have 27 running...i know the AVG....Zone Alarm and any other security apps that need to run but what confuses me are things like 'pdservice' 'telephony' etc...don't know what they are...wouldn't know what the video card is either...still new to all this i'm afraid.

I've googled most of them and i'm still none the wiser...QCWILICON i think is something to do with the wireless connection...searching 'cssauth' just gives me pages of what to me is Greek...is there an idiots guide to these and other apps so i can understand what they are for so i can work out if i need them or not....can't find a way to print them out for reference while i'm searching either...

Services tab shows 64 running with about 20 'stopped'....

Any list of essential services i mustn't uncheck while i'm trying to figure things out would be helpful if there's one somewhere

 

Do you mean the startup tab in msconfig? If so, wow! No wonder it's slow to boot up.

If you can't figure out what they are by the name, or by the path and name of the exe file under the "command" column, googling is your best bet. For instance:

qcwlicon.exe is a process from IBM which allows a user to see the wireless connection status, as well as, be able to turn it on or off. This is a non-essential process. Disabling or enabling this is down to user preference

So, you can uncheck that and shouldn't have any problems.

CSSAUTH you should find here-> C:\Program Files\IBM ThinkVantage\Client Security Solution\cssauth.exe

It's a bundled IBM app...you can go here to read all about it:

http://www.pc.ibm.com/us/think/thinkvantagetech/security.html

If you think you use/need it, fine, otherwise uncheck it.

PDSERVICE - Again, IBM bundled stuff--> C:\Program Files\IBM ThinkVantage\SafeGuard PrivateDisk\pdservice.exe

http://www.pc.ibm.com/ww/alliances/utimaco/safeguardpriv.html

If you don't use it, uncheck it.

Like I said before, uncheck everything you can identify & doesn't seem absolutely neccesary...google what you don't know (that's what I did for your IBM apps) and pick them off one-by-one until you have something more reasonable, like 8 or 10 programs starting up.

 

Cheers Wave...i'm going to back up then start googling...most probably take me a while with trial and error...IBM could make life a lot easier by supplying everything on disc as with my old HP