PC Verrrrrry Sloooooow

Hi everyone,

I have a Dell Dimension 8300, P4, 512, 60 G HD and am running WinXP Home. I use NAV, Zone Alarm Pro/Pest Patrol and RegScrub. I have Rogers Hispeed Internet (currently partnering with Yahoo....which may explain a lot.....).

Things seem to moving verrrrry slooooowly lately. Bootup and shutdown are okay, but everything else is....not. The computer seems to have to think about everything I tell it to do, from opening a program, e.g. IE or Outlook, to browsing, to just clicking on "Start".

I had been using a couple of different filesharing programs, which caused some problems and have since deleted them. My boyfriend is also in the habit of clicking indiscriminately while browsing and we've had a couple of programs install themselves without me really knowing what they were, i.e. screensavers, a bulk folder in my Outlook that I didn't ask for, etc. Sorry to be vague here.

I've tried to uninstall/otherwise eliminate what I can using the above programs, but it doesn't seem to have made a difference. I was thinking that maybe I should send you a "Hijack this" to see if that would help you to help me......

Thanks in advance, as always,
Janet

 

Check you system resources to see how much you are using... Do you have the widows update set to auto download? I know if you have the icon running in the taskbar waiting for you to install them will cause slowness.

Try going to task manager and seeing what programs are running. If you see one that looks suspicious do a web search and see what kind of file it is.

Check to make sure you have some free disk space, clean out the temp folders to get rid of a bunch of unwanted stuff.
Then do a defrag you may be in dire need of a defrag. Diskkeeper lite is a good one to run for this.... available at major geeks...

Try removing any unwanted applicatons from running in the task bar such as real player, roxio drag to disc, winamp etc. they just eat ram for no reason.

 

I'd definatly run a virus and spyware test on your computer. First scan for viruses, and be sure to have your antivirus updated. After that run something like AdAware (I use that but there are a lot of others) and scan for spyware. I'm pretty sure you'll notice a change after that.

Do that first of all and if that shouldn't help I'd recommend formatting and reinstalling the operating system. Try getting expert help if you don't know how.

There can be a L-O-T of other problems causing this and it's very difficult to say what but my experience tells me virus and spyware probably is your biggest problem.

Good luck!

 

These days its usually spyware or a virus that causes slowdowns. Make sure you have a GOOD AV that is *updated*, and also check at one of these websites

http://housecall.trendmicro.com/
http://www.pandasoftware.com/activescan/com/activescan_principal.htm

Adaware is also a good thing to download, if you don't have it already.

If you used a filesharing program and do not practice "safe" browsing (thinking before you click "YES! install this totally useless program!" etc.) chances are you have several pieces of spyware/viruses.

If all else fails, go to the Spyware Specific forum and send in a HijackThis log. I'm sure someone there will be happy to check it for you