long sytem freeze

L

lesiofamily

Hi,
I have P4 3.2 GHz with win xp pro installed
2 GB RAM
I have 2 HD IDE - partitioned to 4 C,D,E,F and 1 SATA
my C is total 58 and free space 22 Gb
I have NIS 2008 - updates done , scan results - no threats

recently my PC freezes at times for 15-30 seconds
but bigger issue is that it freezes during start up - it takes him instead
of 1-2 minutes up to 20-30 minutes to start
I defragmented all my HD
I do not have any warnings from system re: CPU temp. etc
although during freezes I noticed in windows task manager/performance -
that my CPU usage peaks periodically to 100% without any application run
while I am writing this post my PC is working fine

what can be the reason for the problem , any suggestions how to fix it?
thanks,


lb
 
R

R. McCarty

Abrupt/Noticeable loss of performance can sometimes be due to your
Windows volume having inconsistencies. From a Command Prompt do
the following:
Chkdsk C: [Enter]

Note the summary - or a message that Windows found errors on the
volume. If so you need to perform a Fix or Repair session of Chkdsk.
This can only be done prior to Windows fully loading. The system will
ask you if you'd like to perform the Chkdsk at the next boot. The
command to queue up a 5-phase run of Chkdsk is
Chkdsk C: /F [Enter]
*Note: Chkdsk can and does remove data in the course of repairing
issues - DO NOT run Chkdsk with /F or /R unless your XP
is fully backed up and verified.
 
U

Unknown

Go back to task manager when this occurs and check what applications are
running under application tab. Are you using a virus scanning program?
 
L

lesiofamily

I scheduled previously chkdsk C at start up with fix errors automatically -
I did not have time to wait for results but later my win was up and
operating ; there was no report so I assumed that that there was nothing to
be fixed - is ti correct?
should I ran again from command prompt? I did it from my
comp/C/properties/tools/error-checking
--
lb


R. McCarty said:
Abrupt/Noticeable loss of performance can sometimes be due to your
Windows volume having inconsistencies. From a Command Prompt do
the following:
Chkdsk C: [Enter]

Note the summary - or a message that Windows found errors on the
volume. If so you need to perform a Fix or Repair session of Chkdsk.
This can only be done prior to Windows fully loading. The system will
ask you if you'd like to perform the Chkdsk at the next boot. The
command to queue up a 5-phase run of Chkdsk is
Chkdsk C: /F [Enter]
*Note: Chkdsk can and does remove data in the course of repairing
issues - DO NOT run Chkdsk with /F or /R unless your XP
is fully backed up and verified.

lesiofamily said:
Hi,
I have P4 3.2 GHz with win xp pro installed
2 GB RAM
I have 2 HD IDE - partitioned to 4 C,D,E,F and 1 SATA
my C is total 58 and free space 22 Gb
I have NIS 2008 - updates done , scan results - no threats

recently my PC freezes at times for 15-30 seconds
but bigger issue is that it freezes during start up - it takes him
instead of 1-2 minutes up to 20-30 minutes to start
I defragmented all my HD
I do not have any warnings from system re: CPU temp. etc
although during freezes I noticed in windows task manager/performance -
that my CPU usage peaks periodically to 100% without any application run
while I am writing this post my PC is working fine

what can be the reason for the problem , any suggestions how to fix it?
thanks,


lb
 
R

R. McCarty

You should re-verify that the XP volume is OK.
Click Start, Run ( Type ) Command [Enter]
Then from within the command prompt type
Chkdsk C: [Enter]
Examine the summary and make sure no errors are indicated
or a recommendation for a more comprehensive run of Chkdsk.
If the volume is "Clean" then your sluggish response is related
to other issues likely Malware. Malke has a good web site for
cleanup and removal.
http://elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Removing_Malware


lesiofamily said:
I scheduled previously chkdsk C at start up with fix errors automatically -
I did not have time to wait for results but later my win was up and
operating ; there was no report so I assumed that that there was nothing
to be fixed - is ti correct?
should I ran again from command prompt? I did it from my
comp/C/properties/tools/error-checking
--
lb


R. McCarty said:
Abrupt/Noticeable loss of performance can sometimes be due to your
Windows volume having inconsistencies. From a Command Prompt do
the following:
Chkdsk C: [Enter]

Note the summary - or a message that Windows found errors on the
volume. If so you need to perform a Fix or Repair session of Chkdsk.
This can only be done prior to Windows fully loading. The system will
ask you if you'd like to perform the Chkdsk at the next boot. The
command to queue up a 5-phase run of Chkdsk is
Chkdsk C: /F [Enter]
*Note: Chkdsk can and does remove data in the course of repairing
issues - DO NOT run Chkdsk with /F or /R unless your XP
is fully backed up and verified.

lesiofamily said:
Hi,
I have P4 3.2 GHz with win xp pro installed
2 GB RAM
I have 2 HD IDE - partitioned to 4 C,D,E,F and 1 SATA
my C is total 58 and free space 22 Gb
I have NIS 2008 - updates done , scan results - no threats

recently my PC freezes at times for 15-30 seconds
but bigger issue is that it freezes during start up - it takes him
instead of 1-2 minutes up to 20-30 minutes to start
I defragmented all my HD
I do not have any warnings from system re: CPU temp. etc
although during freezes I noticed in windows task manager/performance -
that my CPU usage peaks periodically to 100% without any application run
while I am writing this post my PC is working fine

what can be the reason for the problem , any suggestions how to fix it?
thanks,


lb
 
G

Gerry

lb

One of my suspects would be NIS 2008. It places heavy demands on
resources. All security software does when booting. Does Norton do a
scheduled full scan at the time you notice freezes.

Malware is also a possibility as no security software catchs all. You
should try something like Spybot S & D to see if there are any trojans
or the like.

Do you have Outlook Express set to Send & Receive on start up?

Have a look in the System and Application logs in Event Viewer for
Errors and Warnings and post copies here. Don't post any more than 48
hours ago.

You can access Event Viewer by selecting Start, Control Panel,
Administrative Tools, and Event Viewer. When researching the meaning
of the error, information regarding Event ID, Source and Description
are important.

HOW TO: View and Manage Event Logs in Event Viewer in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308427/en-us

A tip for posting copies of Error Reports! Run Event Viewer and double
click on the error you want to copy. In the window, which appears is a
button resembling two pages. Click the button and close Event
Viewer.Now start your message (email) and do a paste into the body of
the message. Make sure this is the first paste after exiting from
Event Viewer.


--



Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 
R

Randem

You have several reasons that this could be. Follow these steps to find such
a cause when this is happening. You can also use some of these steps to
eliminate the problem.

1 - Open Task Manager then go to the Processes tab. Click on the CPU heading
(twice) to sort in decending order. Check to see which processes are taking
up you CPU cycles.

2 - Uninstall Windows Search 4.0. It is a dog that will hog your CPU cycles
with nothing to gain...

3 - Remove Malware from your system -
http://www.randem.com/virusproblems.html

4 - Check hard disk for failures using Chkdsk /f or testdisk (windows or
linux version) You can get testdisk from the Linux System Rescue CD. Google
it.

This is just a start...


--
Randem Systems
Your Installation Specialist
The Top Inno Setup Script Generator
http://www.randem.com/innoscript.html
http://www.randem.com/installerproblems.html
http://www.randem.com/vistainstalls.html
http://www.financialtrainingservices.org
 
L

lesiofamily

Hi guys,
thank you for all the advice -
I agree with a note re NIS (using resources)- but have it for a few years
now and this version was installed almost a year ago; recently I did not
change anything, did not install any new program....
again I have 2GB of RAM.......
when my PC is up and freezes there are no applications running
malware.....?
I will start with Chkdsk and event viewer
I will keep you posted
thanks
 
L

lesiofamily

the result of chkdsk - comments?

Microsoft(R) Windows DOS
(C)Copyright Microsoft Corp 1990-2001.

C:\DOCUME~1\LESIO>chkdsk c:
The type of the file system is NTFS.

WARNING! F parameter not specified.
Running CHKDSK in read-only mode.

CHKDSK is verifying files (stage 1 of 3)...
File verification completed.
CHKDSK is verifying indexes (stage 2 of 3)...
Index verification completed.
CHKDSK is verifying security descriptors (stage 3 of 3)...
Security descriptor verification completed.
CHKDSK is verifying Usn Journal...
Usn Journal verification completed.
CHKDSK discovered free space marked as allocated in the
master file table (MFT) bitmap.
CHKDSK discovered free space marked as allocated in the volume bitmap.
Windows found problems with the file system.
Run CHKDSK with the /F (fix) option to correct these.

61440560 KB total disk space.
37978904 KB in 63663 files.
21340 KB in 5357 indexes.
0 KB in bad sectors.
190388 KB in use by the system.
65536 KB occupied by the log file.
23249928 KB available on disk.

4096 bytes in each allocation unit.
15360140 total allocation units on disk.
5812482 allocation units available on disk.

C:\DOCUME~1\LESIO>
 
L

lesiofamily

I scheduled chkdsk c:/F
interesting thing about event viewer
when I try to read the log I receive the message:

unable to complete the operation on "application"
the interface is unknown

when I try to check system or security I receive the same information
should I reinstall something.....?
 
D

Daave

lesiofamily said:
Hi,
I have P4 3.2 GHz with win xp pro installed
2 GB RAM
I have 2 HD IDE - partitioned to 4 C,D,E,F and 1 SATA
my C is total 58 and free space 22 Gb
I have NIS 2008 - updates done , scan results - no threats

recently my PC freezes at times for 15-30 seconds
but bigger issue is that it freezes during start up - it takes him
instead of 1-2 minutes up to 20-30 minutes to start
I defragmented all my HD
I do not have any warnings from system re: CPU temp. etc
although during freezes I noticed in windows task
manager/performance - that my CPU usage peaks periodically to 100%
without any application run
while I am writing this post my PC is working fine

what can be the reason for the problem , any suggestions how to fix
it?
thanks,

There does not exist a single program, not even NIS 2008 (which can be
quite a resource hog!), that can guarantee you are 100% malware free. I
doubt that's your problem, but malware issues *always* need to be ruled
out. Here is a good resource:

http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Viruses_Malware

If you run Process Explorer, you should be able to tell which process is
causing your CPU usage to go through the roof:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx

To get an idea of what this utility is capable of, have look at this
page:

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/tutorial129.html
 
L

lesiofamily

I used malwarebytes program - no malware found
when I check in windows task manager/processes
my iexplore.exe has 69408K mem usage
when I checked my peak mem usage iexplore.exe has 73604K and my svchost.exe
peaks to 181812K (is it good/bad/normal?)
again I has not installed recently anything or change configuration before
the problem started
today my PC started more less OK (2 min)
If it is still sluggish I will try to uninstall win search
any suggestions/comments are still welcomed

lb
 
D

Daave

lesiofamily said:
I used malwarebytes program - no malware found

That's good.
when I check in windows task manager/processes
my iexplore.exe has 69408K mem usage
when I checked my peak mem usage iexplore.exe has 73604K and my
svchost.exe peaks to 181812K (is it good/bad/normal?)

The first figure doesn't seem that bad, but the second is probably your
problem. When your PC is sluggish, what is the CPU usage for that
particular instance of svchost?

Here is the Web page again for troubleshooting svchost:

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/tutorial129.html

You will need to download Process Explorer first:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx
 
G

Gerry

DaavehHas recommended trying Process Explorer.

It would be helpful if you could post the Command Line of the svchost
process generating the excessive CPU usage. In Process Explorer place
cursor on Process and select Properties, Image.

--



Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 
L

lesiofamily

I am learning, thank you guys.
using windows task manager CPU usage for that particular svchost.exe is 00
but I see system idle process which has 99
I've never paid too much attention , except for mem usage and my general CPU
usage which except for editing DVDs was always low
any comments on above?

lb
 
L

lesiofamily

using process explorer
I can see few svchost but they use 0% CPU
the highest is system idle process with 99-100% CPU usage
command line is blank, description blank, company name blank

I checked my other PC
system idle process takes approx 86- 97% CPU - for me it looks high but it
10% less than my first PC
any comments?
 
D

Daave

lesiofamily said:
using process explorer
I can see few svchost but they use 0% CPU
the highest is system idle process with 99-100% CPU usage
command line is blank, description blank, company name blank

I checked my other PC
system idle process takes approx 86- 97% CPU - for me it looks high
but it 10% less than my first PC
any comments?

Are we talking about a sporadic problem? That is, perhaps you were not
experiencing the "long system freeze" during the above timeframe? Does
your problem present itself during bootup usually?

If it is sporadic, Process Explorer will give you useful information,
but you need to be looking at it *during* the grinding of the gears (not
afterward). And since in another post you indicated that one of your
instances of svchost was through the roof memory-wise, the Bleeping
Computer tutorial should be helpful.

There have been reports of svchost.exe run amok after a particular
security update was applied. How up-to-date are you with your Windows
Updates? What Service Pack level are you at? Can you recall when you
started experiencing this particular problem as well as anything
significant that occurred at around that time?

Finally, I don't recall whether or not you confidently ruled out
malware. Sometimes an instance of svchost.exe running *is* malicious.
Svchost.exe is a valid file *if* it is in the correct location, which
should be:

C:\WINDOWS\system32

If you have another svchost.exe in another loaction, it's surely
malware.

Search your entire C: drive for svchost.exe. In "More advanced options,"
be sure to check "Search system folders" and "Search subfolders." Again,
if you see another instance of svchost.exe where it doesn't belong, you
have a malware infection!

Last idea: You stated you had NIS 2008. Norton is well-known for
producing the kind of behavior you are describing. Configure a clean
boot (which means, among other things, you will be temporarily disabling
NIS 2008) and see if your problem goes away. For more info:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310353

If your problem does go away, you should be able to use the process of
elimination to determine the cause. It wouldn't surprise me if it's
Norton.
 
G

Gerry

Malware is not something I have studied in any depth but recently there
have many reports of conventional standard software not detecting
malware. Reading this article recent highlights the lengths malware can
go to conceal it's presence:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-gb/sysinternals/bb897445.aspx

This is one bit which left an impression.

Kernel-mode Rootkits
Kernel-mode rootkits can be even more powerful since, not only can they
intercept the native API in kernel-mode, but they can also directly
manipulate kernel-mode data structures. A common technique for hiding
the presence of a malware process is to remove the process from the
kernel's list of active processes. Since process management APIs rely on
the contents of the list, the malware process will not display in
process management tools like Task Manager or Process Explorer.

I have not tried RootkitRevealer but it is supposed to provide a list.
This list may reveal something upon which you could get further advice.
I make this suggest on the basis that Daave, you and I seem to be
knocking our heads against a brick wall.


--



Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 
L

lesiofamily

Daave , thanks for your comments
The problem was constant for a few days - now it looks like it is sporadic
( although I keep my PC running to avoid 30 min start ups :))
recently no freezes during normal operation
when it did happen - during this 20-30 sek freeze I was not able to do
anything
will process explorer show the culprit few seconds later - but when I can
use my PC again everything is back to normal, or is it?
I ran malwarebytes program - no malware found
I have win pro ver. 2002 with sp3 installed all other updates are done
regularly
I will definitely check svchost and let you know
I will also do a clean boot with out Norton and see how it goes

re NIS 2008 - I agree - that's why usually I do not install all the newest
programs I could install (because of CPU + RAM usage)
except for my security program which is NIS
thank you :)
 
G

Gerry

NIS 2008 Minimum System Requirements
http://snipurl.com/9g1yp [solutions_symantec_com]

It should not be an issue for you.

AVG Internet Security 8.0
http://snipurl.com/9g268 [www_avg_com]

The RAM requirements SEEM to be the same. The disk space requirements
are dramatically different.

--



Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 

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