Software/Hardware/Old PC Question

Discussion in 'Software' started by wwalker555, Oct 12, 2015.

  1. wwalker555

    wwalker555 Corporal

    Sorry guys I may be posting this to the wrong forum. But my problem could be anyone of the above mentioned items (or something else). So switch this thread to the correct forum if needed. This desktop is rarely used (Financial, Taxes, some Word and Excel use) so it has been able to service those requirements very well for years.

    It is a Dell Inspiron 531 (bought in June 2009) with an AMD 64 X2 Dual Core 2.6 GHz processor and 2GB memory. Uses Vista Home Premium with the following:
    Kaspersky, MBAM Premium, SpywareBlaster and CCleaner. Maintenance for all products and Windows is current.

    About 6 months ago it started slowing down dramatically sometimes taking as much as 10+ minutes completely to boot up. Then for a period of 15 to 20 minutes it runs at a very high CPU rate (75-90%) and the memory use is super high (80-90%).

    After that initial 15-20 period, the CPU usage drops to 2-5% (sometimes pegging up to around 20%, for vey short periods of time -- about a second). And the memory usage drops but runs consistently at around 50%. This is with no applications like Quicken, Word, Excel, etc. operating.

    Around the time these problems started I upgraded MBAM from Free to Premium and soon after that I added Kaspersky switching from Avast.

    Personally, I don't think this is a malware problem but of course I could be wrong -- all scans always end with no threats found.

    Do any of you guys have any ideas on what I should do? Maybe it is dying a bit of old age but would like to get another 6 months of service out of it if possible. It is not my main PC but is a requirement when I do my home office work.

    Thanks for any help.
     
  2. the mekanic

    the mekanic Major Mekanical Geek

    How does it behave when booted to Safe Mode?
     
  3. wwalker555

    wwalker555 Corporal

    How do I start in Safe Mode?
     
  4. the mekanic

    the mekanic Major Mekanical Geek

    By pressing F8 immediately after the BIOS splash screen at startup. If you would like to have internet connectivity, select "Safe Mode with Networking".
     
  5. wwalker555

    wwalker555 Corporal

    Started in "Safe Mode with Networking". Started super fast (about a minute) including connecting to the internet which by itself took many minutes. I was able to start a couple of programs (Quicken, IE and logged on to a website) all super fast. CPU usage was at 0% and the memory being used was less than 500k when I started the Task Manager.

    So I will have to assume my problem is with one or more of the other processes or services that start during the normal boot. My question is how do I determine the offending item(s)?
     
  6. _nullptr

    _nullptr Major Geeky Geek Geek

    What version of Kaspersky are you running?
    I gather that MBAM is v2.20.1024.

    Have you added exclusions for MBAM to Kaspersky and vice versa?
    Try temporarily disabling MBAM's real-time protection and reboot.
    Is there any difference?
     
  7. wwalker555

    wwalker555 Corporal

    MBAM version 2.1.8.1057
    Kaspersky Internet Security version 16.0.0.614(b)

    Your suggestion appears to have corrected the problem. When I initially booted the PC to setup the exclusions, it took 26 minutes to start up. After adding the exclusions as you suggested, it took 3 minutes to start up.

    The CPU usage is still around 50% (maybe it will die down after a bit as before) and the Memory usage is also around 50%

    But everything is working tons faster and I will chalk up the high CPU and Memory usage to just not having a large amount on the PC.

    Thanks for the help!!!!!
     
  8. wwalker555

    wwalker555 Corporal

    I do have one additional question. I have the same Kaspersky and MBAM on two other pc's and have not run into this problem (needing exclusions for each other). Could it be the OS they are running on?

    Problem PC: Vista, the other two PC's: Windows 7 and Windows 10.

    It is not super important I get an answer on this question. I am mostly just curious.
     

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