good hardware X slow performances

[Guest]

Hi, could anyone help me at least understand what's going on with my machine?
Thanks for reading this!

I've recently bought a PC, XP home edition, 2.9 Pentium processor, 512mb
memory and 160gb HD (divided in 2 hds for programs & data). How can it be so
slow sometimes? It gets so slow and it reminds me of my first PC, which had
6gb HD and 128mb memory, not to mention 1.2 duron processor.

Something must be wrong, and I dont't know what! I'm no technician, but I'm
familiar with windows system when solving problems. I get along. Can someone
explain to me why does its performance gets so slow sometimes? There's other
times when the pc simply crashes after getting slow. I wonder if it's a
problem or should I change something inside. Like the memory, which is 512
and I really think it should've been 1024...

Thanks a lot for your help!

 

[Alias]

Hi, could anyone help me at least understand what's going on with my machine?
Thanks for reading this!

I've recently bought a PC, XP home edition, 2.9 Pentium processor, 512mb
memory and 160gb HD (divided in 2 hds for programs & data). How can it be so
slow sometimes? It gets so slow and it reminds me of my first PC, which had
6gb HD and 128mb memory, not to mention 1.2 duron processor.

Something must be wrong, and I dont't know what! I'm no technician, but I'm
familiar with windows system when solving problems. I get along. Can someone
explain to me why does its performance gets so slow sometimes? There's other
times when the pc simply crashes after getting slow. I wonder if it's a
problem or should I change something inside. Like the memory, which is 512
and I really think it should've been 1024...

Thanks a lot for your help!

Memory won't help. When was the last time you did a clean up and defrag?
When was the last time you did a scan for malware and/or viruses?

Alias

 

[Guest]

I scan for malware all the time and I've got this Norton WinDoctor that helps
solving some minor problems. Defrag... well, everytime I do a analysis, it
says I don't need to defrag, especially because the PC is new. Viruses... I
doubt very much it's one, because AVG runs a complete test every week...

Is there another way to make a PC slow? maybe, like, bad hardware... but I
don't know... it's just strange that the PC is so slow with so short time of
usage.

Thanks again!

 

[Alias]

I scan for malware all the time and I've got this Norton WinDoctor that helps
solving some minor problems. Defrag... well, everytime I do a analysis, it
says I don't need to defrag, especially because the PC is new. Viruses... I
doubt very much it's one, because AVG runs a complete test every week...

Is there another way to make a PC slow? maybe, like, bad hardware... but I
don't know... it's just strange that the PC is so slow with so short time of
usage.

Thanks again!

When you analyze the drive, how many files are fragmented when you look
at the report? IMHO, MS defrag LIES when it says you don't need to
defragment 4000+ files.

Alias

 

[Guest]

I've just analysed it again using Norton SpeedDisk, I don't trust windows
scandisk also. I have a 160gb drive divded in two disks: one for programs and
other for data. When I ask it to analyse, it says an average of 35% in each
disk is fragmented. Might that be what's slowing the PC down?

Thanks Alias! You've been a real helper!

 

[Malke]

I've just analysed it again using Norton SpeedDisk, I don't trust
windows scandisk also. I have a 160gb drive divded in two disks: one
for programs and other for data. When I ask it to analyse, it says an
average of 35% in each disk is fragmented. Might that be what's
slowing the PC down?

Thanks Alias! You've been a real helper!

I'm not Alias, but I hope he won't mind my popping into this thread.
There is no reason why you shouldn't trust XP's defragmenter or its
Chkdsk (there is no Scandisk in XP). Certainly they are *far* better
than the Norton SpeedDisk which could be the entire cause of your
problems.

If you have other Norton programs installed, turn off everything except
the firewall and antivirus and see what happens.

Malke

 

[Alias]

I've just analysed it again using Norton SpeedDisk, I don't trust windows
scandisk also. I have a 160gb drive divded in two disks: one for programs and
other for data. When I ask it to analyse, it says an average of 35% in each
disk is fragmented. Might that be what's slowing the PC down?
Bingo.


Thanks Alias! You've been a real helper!

You're welcome.

Alias

 

[Papa]

IMHO the first thing you should do is get rid of all Norton software. Norton
is "nortorious" for slowing down and otherwise cluttering up PCs.

The same goes for other so-called "helpful" software add-ons. Just let
Windows do it's job unencumbered, although I do think a few non-Microsoft
tools are an exception. The free versions of AVG and Ad-Aware are 2 good and
very efficient examples.

 

[Guest]

Thanks guys! Alias, Malke and Papa!