my PC is slower

[Talal Itani]

A few days ago, I added a and old slow disk drive to my XP PC, for backups.
Since then I noticed that my PC is slower, and I can hear that old drive
crunching. Is it my imagination? Is XP now using this drive for things?
Thanks.

Talal Itani

 

[JS]

That old drive could be dropping you down to a lower DMA mode or worse PIO
mode.
See: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/817472/en-us

Part of this article covers a method for checking the current mode:
Start/Administrative Tools/Computer Management/System Tools/Device Manager
Check the IDE primary channel properties. It should be Ultra DMA 5 or 6 and
NOT PIO mode.

JS

 

[Talal Itani]

That old drive could be dropping you down to a lower DMA mode or worse PIO
mode.
See: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/817472/en-us

Part of this article covers a method for checking the current mode:
Start/Administrative Tools/Computer Management/System Tools/Device Manager
Check the IDE primary channel properties. It should be Ultra DMA 5 or 6
and NOT PIO mode.

JS

I just checked. It is DMA5.

 

[JS]

Is the XP Indexing service running, if it is this also could be a problem?

JS

 

[Bill Ridgeway]

A few days ago, I added a and old slow disk drive to my XP PC, for
backups. Since then I noticed that my PC is slower, and I can hear that
old drive crunching. Is it my imagination? Is XP now using this drive
for things? Thanks.

Talal Itani

The old standby of cleaning the disk of redundant files (Cleanup!
www.stevengould.org/software/cleanup/ is better than the Windows offering)
and a defrag will bring it up to the best possible (albeit slow) speed.

Regards.

Bill Ridgeway
Computer Solutions