Start > Programs menu slow to display

[Jim G]

I click Start, Programs and the outline of the menu opens quickly, but the
shortcuts do not appear in the menu for up to 15 seconds. The menu has a
gray background before the shortcuts are populated. This occurs the first
time I access the Programs menu. The second time the shortcuts display very
quickly. On future accesses, sometimes the shortcuts appear quickly and
sometimes it takes awhile. I'm on a domain and have roaming profiles. My
profile is 28MB+.

Under my roaming profile, I do not have this problem on other desktop
workstations, or my laptop. I just formatted the workstation I am having
this problem with. Formatting and reinstalling did not fix the problem. All
workstations and the laptop have WinXP SP2, and all the latest updates,
patches, etc. I have at least a 2GB processor, and 512MB RAM. Since I
formatted this workstation, it has fewer applications.

The Programs menu worked perfectly until I (guess) I installed an app,
driver, or patch. How do I diagnose what application, process, service, or
driver is causing the slow Programs menu on this one workstation? I've
already formatted and reinstalled, so it's too late to restore a previous
configuration.

Thanks, Jim G

 

[Guest]

I have seen delays in opening the start menu if you have a bad shortcut, or
if you have a bad network drive mapping. It will hang while it trys to find
what the shortcut is pointing to.
Check for those.

Jeff S

 

[Jim G]

Thanks Jeff,

There is a shortcut in the workstation Programs menu to NetStumbler which is
only installed on the laptop. The app is not installed on the workstation,
since it does not have a wireless adapter. I guess I can just delete this
type of shortcut from the workstation. There may be other nonsense
shortcuts. I'll look for those. Thanks again.

 

[Jim G]

Thanks Wes,

Before I flattened the workstation, I set the MenuShowDelay to 20 (totally
arbitrarily). It didn't help. I think Jeff S. may be correct. Some of the
shortcuts point to "//laptop/application..." (or elsewhere) that is either
not on all the time (laptop), or I may have moved. I'll also check any drive
mappings, although I don't think I have any other than to the SBS2003
server.