XP is getting to excruciatingly slow !!

[HeyBub]

there are many reasons why a computer
can become slow.

one way to double check performance is
to boot into the safe modes.

if the system is zippy quick in the safe
modes,

then you have eliminated 50 percent of
the possible problems that are causing
poor system performance.

Inasmuch as ONE of the culprits could be an attempt to network-connect to an
impossible device, don't neglect "Safe mode with no networking" in the
diagnostic protocol.

 

[M]

I don't think so. The second thing that has to load is NTFS and it, in turn,
then loads everything it needs for subsequent access. Everything.

I've timed it numerous times on many machines and it boots faster.

M

 

[Daave]

I've timed it numerous times on many machines and it boots faster.

Out of curiosity, how much faster did these machines boot?

 

[chrisv]

Even on cold boot it takes more than 5 minutes for XP to get
everything back in shape, ready to be used.

I have tried everything, from defragmenting the HD to "cleaning" the
registry to even defragmenting the registry, and it's STILL so slow.

Software wise, I don't use too many. Just the typical office thingy,
that's all.

What else should I do to speed up my XP machine --- a 4-core CPU with
4GB of RAM ?

So far, two have advised you to Format and start over with a fresh install.
Let me be the third one. All the other crap will just spin your wheels.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

So far, two have advised you to Format and start over with a fresh install.
Let me be the third one. All the other crap will just spin your wheels.

My view is that that's terrible advice. It *might* be the best thing
to do, but certainly not without having any idea of what's causing the
problem.

 

[M]

Out of curiosity, how much faster did these machines boot?

That depended on how badly fragmented it was which could mean up to a
minute less boot time.

M

 

[relic]

My view is that that's terrible advice. It *might* be the best thing
to do, but certainly not without having any idea of what's causing the
problem.

It's XP. That's what XP does... get slower and slower.

 

[Daave]

That depended on how badly fragmented it was which could mean up to a
minute less boot time.

That's pretty significant!

 

[Daave]

It's XP. That's what XP does... get slower and slower.

Maybe in your case...

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

It's XP. That's what XP does... get slower and slower.

You may believe whatever you want to believe. It's not my experience
at all, and I completely disagree with that statement. XP gets slower
and slower only on the computers of people who do everything with it
wrong.

 

[Pennywise]

You may believe whatever you want to believe. It's not my experience
at all, and I completely disagree with that statement. XP gets slower
and slower only on the computers of people who do everything with it
wrong.

I had XP Pro and Home dual booting for over 4.5 years, and kept them
humming along (Home was just a back door to Pro). Speed wasn't a
problem, some odd ball stuff was, like the boot.ini file would change
itself from.
WINDOWS="XP Pro E_Drive" /fastdetect /NoExecute=Optin to
WINDOWS="XP Pro E_Drive" /fastdetect=Optout
Never could figure/trace that one down (not malware, or a rootkit)
there's just so many times you can use ERUNT or repair installs.

I finally formatted the two partitions, the restore disks didn't work
for home (too old?), so I dual booted slipstreamed XPSP3's - things
aren't working right any more - and one of the two is slower than it
should be.

I plan on reformatting that Partition, then install XP, SP1, SP2, and
maybe SP3.

Just saying even after 4.5 years of operation (with SP3), I was
operating faster and with fewer problems, than after a clean install.
(and all drivers have been installed).

Note: I reinstalled as my Best Buy network card quit working, and I
thought it was windows Pro. I had the internal one disabled with
autoruns - thus my warning about autoruns in my post above.

 

[M]

That's pretty significant!

The machine in question was so badly fragmented that you couldn't see
any blue in the defrag app, just red and it had over 15,000 fragmented
files. Even the defrag recommended defragging it. It took about 25
passes with the XP scrolling bar before it went to the Welcome screen.
After defragmenting, it went down to six passes.

Most machines only see 5 to 10 second improvements.

M

 

[S∩∪hw0ζƒ]

I finally formatted the two partitions, the restore disks didn't work
for home (too old?), so I dual booted slipstreamed XPSP3's - things
aren't working right any more - and one of the two is slower than it
should be.

I plan on reformatting that Partition, then install XP, SP1, SP2, and
maybe SP3.

Just saying even after 4.5 years of operation (with SP3), I was
operating faster and with fewer problems, than after a clean install.
(and all drivers have been installed).

Note: I reinstalled as my Best Buy network card quit working, and I
thought it was windows Pro. I had the internal one disabled with
autoruns - thus my warning about autoruns in my post above.

Check out BlackVipers website and turn off all the unnecessary services.
The list is pretty comprehensive.

HTH

 

[Shiva]

It's XP. That's what XP does... get slower and slower.

You better use linux. Never had these problems with Debian.

 

[Pennywise]

Check out BlackVipers website and turn off all the unnecessary services.
The list is pretty comprehensive.

I have see BLackvipers site, there's another I use and used to link to
http://www.jasonn.com/turning_off_unnecessary_services_on_windows_xp
It's changed, not as informative, and a log-in site now as well.

BlackViper says to turn a service to manual, if it's needed it will
start, not for me. It's either enabled (auto) or disabled, manual is a
disable switch on my system before the clean install and after - Try
this on the spooler service.

Oh ya, I'm very fimilar with which services don't need to be running.

One of the very first things I do after an install of XP is to disable
the Themes service, I get an automatic CPU increase (it's claimed 1/3
of the CPU cycles are used by the themes service (no reference)); DNS
client service cause I have a large HOSTS file, and quite a few other
services.

I have the Automatic updates service disabled, and I'm getting
automatic update install request, (latest install), I've never had the
WGA service installed on any OS, it's sure trying to get in now. Avast
warns me when the update file is uploaded to my temp directory (I
don't have activeX installed) and I delete it. (Comodo firewall won't
stop microsoft incoming (built in trusted site?).

I'm going back to zone alarm 5.5.094.
--

During the equinox, the sunlight casts long shadows across Saturn's rings,
highlighting previously known phenomena and revealing a few never-before
seen images.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/10/saturn_at_equinox.html

 

[Bob I]

I would suggest checking to see if harddrive access is still running in
DMA mode. (Device manager, IDE controller, R-click on Primary Channel,
select Properties, then Advanced setting) Is it running DMA or POI?

 

[Pennywise]

You'll notice some lost funtionality and then yu get to play "guess whats
necessary".

I don't just turn them off, I know what they do, or will google them
first.

DNS
Hosts can slow down loading of pages in FF. I'd rather go with NoScript.

That's why you disable the DNS service.

"Editors Note: in most cases a large HOSTS file (over 135 kb) tends to
slow down the machine.
This only occurs in W2000/XP/Vista. Windows 98 and ME are not
affected." (then goes on to explain how to disable the DNS service)
http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm

I dont use that one
Prolly a way to blacklst what you want tho...

Avast or Comodo? I just deleted both and installed Nod32 and Zonealarm

Avast kept asking if it was ok to delete files, this even when
emptying the recycle bin. I'd turn it off but it would be the
antivirus program I disabled. just too confusing. and my Boot.ini file
changed and avast didn't say a word.


--

During the equinox, the sunlight casts long shadows across Saturn's rings,
highlighting previously known phenomena and revealing a few never-before
seen images.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/10/saturn_at_equinox.html

 

[BillW50]

In (e-mail address removed) typed on Sat, 17 Oct 2009 21:21:46 -0700:

Ya, just by copying them where you want them, I have nothing in My
Documents, Pictures, Music and so on, I save everything mostly to my
F:\ Drive

Heck, Tweak UI will change the directories "My Documents, Pictures,
Music and so on" to anywhere you want your stuff saved.
www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/Downloads/powertoys/Xppowertoys.mspx

-If your not running XP, each Windows OS has it's own powertoys, and
version of Tweak UI-

No what I am referring to for free are like Acronis True Image and
Paragon. Both are top of the line backup software available at any
price.

Acronis True Image Seagate Edition (DiscWizard)
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/support/downloads/discwizard

Acronis True Image WD Edition
http://support.wdc.com/product/downloaddetail.asp?swid=119&type=download&wdc_lang=en

Paragon DriveBackup Express 9 (free)
http://www.paragon-software.com/home/db-express/

And you really don't need to separate the docs from the system
partition. As most backup programs can backup folders as well as
partitions. So you can if you want too, make a backup of the system and
the data inn two separate backups from the same partition if you want.

 

[Pennywise]

And you really don't need to separate the docs from the system
partition. As most backup programs can backup folders as well as
partitions. So you can if you want too, make a backup of the system and
the data inn two separate backups from the same partition if you want.

I have always stored everything off the OS partitions, I can lose an
OS, reinstall, and lose very little. It's a Dos thing that carried
over to an OS that scatters your data everywhere.

In fact I would rather run a stand alone program (process explorer,
VLC) one's that only needs the dir it's located in to run.

I have those on a separate partition, reinstalling the OS is much
easier as I just link to those from the Misgprgs directory.

I've never made a back up of my OS's, just a waste of CD's. I do
backup my Data which is on other partitions. Then catalog the CD's
with Whereisit.

I have Agent (my newsreader) on a separate partition, the directory
has been with me thru at least 7 different computers, and every OS
(not ME) since Win95 (I started with Agent .98). I've never lost so
much as a message, I still have a collection of info collected from
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.misc. group.

I just move the Agent directory, to the next computer or link it to
the newly installed OS, and edit the .ini file. On a dual boot system
I can start a post on one OS, reboot and finish it from the other.

I also don't use Tweak UI, that was posted for folks who do save to
the "my stuff dirs". I do use it for other tweaks.

BTW, I recently reinstalled two versions of XP pro, on purpose - they
had been running for a bit over 4.5 years, I can pull out of a serious
error (dual booting helps a lot) - it's not like I format due to a
fatal error, or on a whim.

At this moment if I were to lose the HD, I would only lose my recent
torrent files.

And you really don't need to separate the docs from the system
partition.

I do.