Questions about external drives for XP

[Joan]

I am a "young" senior citizen and an avid enthusiast of digital photography
and editing. Due to the large size of Photoshop files and that I cannot
afford a new PC with a faster processor I am looking for ways to make my PC
more productive. It's been slowing down quite a bit lately. I have IntelP4
and have upgraded to 2GB of memory, so don't think memory is an issue. I
have a 80GB HD with 48GB of free space. I move important picture and project
folders to DVDs for safety but also to keep more free space on the hard
drive.I also keep my system maintained very well (clean, defrag, A-virus,
firewall, etc..,) it'd help me to know the following:

- What changes can I make to empower my PC to "get back to speed"?
- Have been thinking of getting an external HD, is that a way to help? And
when an external HD is connected to PC and turned on, is it taking
"energy"?? from the PC's performance?
- Is it OK to move My Picture folder to an externa HD and use it from there?

Thanks for any suggestions and/or ideas you can provide. Joan

 

[Darhl Thomason]

- What changes can I make to empower my PC to "get back to speed"?

Do you defrag your hard drive? I would recommend scheduling a Defrag to run
once a week at minimum.

- Have been thinking of getting an external HD, is that a way to help?

Not really in this case

And when an external HD is connected to PC and turned on, is it taking
"energy"?? from the PC's performance?

Not really, it may slightly, but depending on how the eHDD is connected may
make a difference when accessing files on it. If your computer or the eHDD
is USB1.1 then that's pretty slow. If your eHDD is USB2.0 or FireWire or
eSATA then those are all pretty high speed connections and would not slow
things down.

- Is it OK to move My Picture folder to an externa HD and use it from
there?

Sure, that won't be an issue, but I don't think it will help you in this
case.

Thanks for any suggestions and/or ideas you can provide. Joan

Let us know how it goes.

Darhl

 

[Ghostrider]

I am a "young" senior citizen and an avid enthusiast of digital photography
and editing. Due to the large size of Photoshop files and that I cannot
afford a new PC with a faster processor I am looking for ways to make my PC
more productive. It's been slowing down quite a bit lately. I have IntelP4
and have upgraded to 2GB of memory, so don't think memory is an issue. I
have a 80GB HD with 48GB of free space. I move important picture and project
folders to DVDs for safety but also to keep more free space on the hard
drive.I also keep my system maintained very well (clean, defrag, A-virus,
firewall, etc..,) it'd help me to know the following:

- What changes can I make to empower my PC to "get back to speed"?
- Have been thinking of getting an external HD, is that a way to help? And
when an external HD is connected to PC and turned on, is it taking
"energy"?? from the PC's performance?
- Is it OK to move My Picture folder to an externa HD and use it from there?

Thanks for any suggestions and/or ideas you can provide. Joan

The most important piece of information is missing. Just which Intel P4
CPU is installed and what is its speed? The next bit of needed information
is the hard drive, viz., IDE vs. SATA, make/model, etc. These would be two
areas which can be changed to increase speed.

Attaching an external drive does not really contribute to speed issues
other than to offload files cluttering up the hard drive. Again, what
type of external drive connection - USB2 vs Firewire vs Firewire 2, etc.?

(And, BTW, I would never store any hard-won work in MyPicture. I prefer
using discrete folders for each download from the digital camera, working
folders and dedicated folders for finished work. Much easier to maintain
backups, archival storage, protection, and so on. A heartbreaker is the
loss of the original digital picture and from which the production shot
is generated.)

 

[Bert Kinney]

Hi Joan,

Having 48 GB's of free disk space, the disk should not be the issue.

Here are some tips for dealing with a Slow Computer:
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar/slowcom.htm

You can also download and run Process Explorer. Look for any processes that
may be taking up a lot of CPU recourses. When the system is at rest,
normally idle time should be around 95%.
Process Explorer
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/Utilities/ProcessExplorer.mspx


Regards,
Bert Kinney MS-MVP Shell/User
http://bertk.mvps.org
Member: http://dts-l.org

 

[Anna]

I am a "young" senior citizen and an avid enthusiast of digital photography
and editing. Due to the large size of Photoshop files and that I cannot
afford a new PC with a faster processor I am looking for ways to make my PC
more productive. It's been slowing down quite a bit lately. I have IntelP4
and have upgraded to 2GB of memory, so don't think memory is an issue. I
have a 80GB HD with 48GB of free space. I move important picture and
project folders to DVDs for safety but also to keep more free space on the
hard drive.I also keep my system maintained very well (clean, defrag,
A-virus, firewall, etc..,) it'd help me to know the following:

- What changes can I make to empower my PC to "get back to speed"?
- Have been thinking of getting an external HD, is that a way to help? And
when an external HD is connected to PC and turned on, is it taking
"energy"?? from the PC's performance?
- Is it OK to move My Picture folder to an externa HD and use it from
there?

Thanks for any suggestions and/or ideas you can provide. Joan

Joan:
It really would be best if we had a clearer picture of what you mean when
you say that you "are looking to make my PC more productive. It's been
slowing down quite a bit lately." Are you referring, for example, to a
significant difference in the time it now takes to manipulate (edit, save,
etc.) your digital photos as compared with the past? Lengthy bootup time? Or
is it just a case where you feel the computer is somewhat more sluggish than
in days gone by and seems to be getting progressively worse?

Are you familiar with XP's Disk Cleanup feature - (Start > All Programs >
Accessories > System Tools > Disk Cleanup)? Do you use that feature
more-or-less routinely? That might help.

I assume you're aware of the fact that you don't want unnecessary programs
running in the background after you boot up. Are you familiar with the
msconfig command from Start > Run > OK to check this out and uncheck the
startup of any programs that need not be running in the background?

And, as you've indicated, you're performing the appropriate "housekeeping"
chores re checking out your machine for any malware/viruses/spyware, etc.?

The basic use of an external HDD - I assume you're referring to a USB
external HDD - is for storage/backup purposes. It might be desirable for you
for storage/backup of your digital photos. At least the process of copying
that data to an external HDD would be considerably faster than
copying/burning such to DVDs. But for archival purposes, which I take it may
be your main objective, it probably would be better to store your
photos/digital images on that latter media as you are now doing. Many users
use both kinds of backup/storage devices for additional safety, especially
where their main concern is with protecting precious, irreplaceable photos,
videos, etc.

In any event, the use of a external storage/backup device, USB or otherwise
would ordinarily not have any significant advantages in your situation where
your primary concern is with the perceived "slows" of your PC. There
wouldn't seem, for example, any performance advantage to moving your My
Pictures folder over to a USB external device.

In the final analysis - as you apparently infer - assuming one is working
with a reasonably "clean" machine as I suppose you are, the truly
significant performance improvement will result from a higher-powered
processor, associated RAM, together with some other components. For all
practical purposes, a new system. And, of course, you've indicated that is
not possible at this time.

Anyway, if you want to pursue this issue further and perhaps receive other
responses that might be helpful to you, it would be wise to include in any
subsequent post the make/model of your motherboard together with the precise
designation of your Intel P4 processor and the type of RAM you're using. I
take it this is a desktop PC, yes?
Anna

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

I am a "young" senior citizen and an avid enthusiast of digital photography
and editing. Due to the large size of Photoshop files and that I cannot
afford a new PC with a faster processor I am looking for ways to make my PC
more productive. It's been slowing down quite a bit lately. I have IntelP4
and have upgraded to 2GB of memory, so don't think memory is an issue. I
have a 80GB HD with 48GB of free space. I move important picture and project
folders to DVDs for safety but also to keep more free space on the hard
drive.I also keep my system maintained very well (clean, defrag, A-virus,
firewall, etc..,) it'd help me to know the following:

- What changes can I make to empower my PC to "get back to speed"?

See below.

- Have been thinking of getting an external HD, is that a way to help?

No. An external hard disk might be very useful as a backup device, but
it will not affect your performance.

And
when an external HD is connected to PC and turned on, is it taking
"energy"?? from the PC's performance?

No.


- Is it OK to move My Picture folder to an externa HD and use it from there?

Yes, but again, don't think of this as a way to improve performance.
That might actually decrease performance slightly, since access to the
drive will be slower than to an internal one.

Thanks for any suggestions and/or ideas you can provide. Joan

You have apparently experienced a recent slowdown. If the hardware you
are using is the same (actually better, since you say you've increased
the amount of RAM), your problem is clearly *not* any deficiency in
your hardware. Don't look to solve a non-hardware problem by
installing or upgrading hardware.

These days one of the most common cause for performance issues is
spyware infestation. The first thing to do is always to be sure you
are free of malware. I recommend that you go to
http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Removing_Malware and
follow the instructions there.

 

[Uncle Grumpy]

Thanks for any suggestions and/or ideas you can provide. Joan

Pay CLOSE attention to Ken Blake's reply.

 

[Joan]

Thank you all for your efforts to help me, you are wonderful.
After reading all the comments from each one of you I've come to suspect
(although I certainly could be worng within my limited knowledge) that my PC
is either infected by a silent invasor or the processor or something may be
malfunctioning ???. My processor is IP(R)4, 2.40GHz, my PC is a Dell 8200
Dimension circa 2002. Have never in this PC's life had any problems with it.

As I mentioned earlier. I do maintenance regularly: disk clean, defrag check
for errors, and I also use run and update Win XP2 Updates, NortonAV, Windows
Defender, WinPatrol, Adaware and Zone Alarm Pro. In addition I control
unnecessary programs running in background and at startup. I have not had
any reports of virus or any other type of invasion after current scannings.

The slowness can be described as a longer time to complete tasks than
previously and happening at bootup, log off, applying Photoshop editing
steps, opening and closing files, etc... It seems after your responses that
memory and HD size and external USB connections are non issues.

Initially, I will follow through on Ken Blakes recommendations to make sure
infection is not the case. After that it will be either take it to a
technician to check it out or get a new PC. Ouch! either way. Thank you
again for your comments, I'll let you know if I find any infection. Any
additional comments will be appreciated. Joan

 

[GHalleck]

Thank you all for your efforts to help me, you are wonderful.
After reading all the comments from each one of you I've come to suspect
(although I certainly could be worng within my limited knowledge) that my PC
is either infected by a silent invasor or the processor or something may be
malfunctioning ???. My processor is IP(R)4, 2.40GHz, my PC is a Dell 8200
Dimension circa 2002. Have never in this PC's life had any problems with it.

As I mentioned earlier. I do maintenance regularly: disk clean, defrag check
for errors, and I also use run and update Win XP2 Updates, NortonAV, Windows
Defender, WinPatrol, Adaware and Zone Alarm Pro. In addition I control
unnecessary programs running in background and at startup. I have not had
any reports of virus or any other type of invasion after current scannings.

The slowness can be described as a longer time to complete tasks than
previously and happening at bootup, log off, applying Photoshop editing
steps, opening and closing files, etc... It seems after your responses that
memory and HD size and external USB connections are non issues.

Initially, I will follow through on Ken Blakes recommendations to make sure
infection is not the case. After that it will be either take it to a
technician to check it out or get a new PC. Ouch! either way. Thank you
again for your comments, I'll let you know if I find any infection. Any
additional comments will be appreciated. Joan

Joan, a Pentium-4 2.4 GHZ CPU is not a known speed demon nor is the
Dell 8200 in contrast to today's computers using multi-core, multi-
threading CPU's with real and perceived speeds in the 3.4 GHz and
faster range. Nor should all of the programs be causing any issues
even though they may be resident in memory...we are no longer in the
days of MS-DOS. I think you are getting more inpatient and justifying a
purchase of a computer newer and better than the Dell might be the cure.
If this is the case, go for it! I do my digital photowork using a 3.4 GHz
Pentium-D CPU, 2 GHz of PC-6400 RAM, and fast 300 GB SATA HD's.

 

[Bert Kinney]

Hi Joan,

Ken is correct, you will want to at least rule out infection.

Download ATF Cleaner 1.0.0.15 - ATF Cleaner is a personal Temp file removal
tool - Softpedia. Remove everything but cookies, unless you don't need them.
http://www.softpedia.com/get/Security/Secure-cleaning/ATF-Cleaner.shtml

Download, update and run Ad-Aware 2007 Free - Lavasoft
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/products/ad_aware_free.php

Download, update and run, Spybot search and destroy:
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html

Download and run, CWShredder™ - Trend Micro USA
http://us.trendmicro.com/us/products/personal/CWShredder/index.html

Run Kaspersky Online Scanner .
http://www.kaspersky.com/virusscanner

Read the Requirements and limitations and click Accept.
Allow the ActiveX download if necessary
Once the database has downloaded, click Next.
Click Scan Settings and change the "Scan using the following antivirus
database" from standard to extended and then click OK.
Click on "My Computer" wait until the scan is finished. It will take a long
time.
When the scan has completed, click Save Report As Text file.
Enter a name for the file in the Filename: text box and then Click Save - by
default the file will be saved to your Desktop, but you can change this if
you wish.

Go to the following forum and read the Announcement at the top of the page.
Follow the instruction to download the HiJackThis (HJT) application, run it
and post to log.

Let the folks there know all steps you have taken before submitting the HJT log.


Regards,
Bert Kinney MS-MVP Shell/User
http://bertk.mvps.org
Member: http://dts-l.org

 

[Darhl Thomason]

Joan, a Pentium-4 2.4 GHZ CPU is not a known speed demon nor is the
Dell 8200 in contrast to today's computers using multi-core, multi-
threading CPU's with real and perceived speeds in the 3.4 GHz and
faster range. Nor should all of the programs be causing any issues
even though they may be resident in memory...we are no longer in the
days of MS-DOS. I think you are getting more inpatient and justifying a
purchase of a computer newer and better than the Dell might be the cure.
If this is the case, go for it! I do my digital photowork using a 3.4 GHz
Pentium-D CPU, 2 GHz of PC-6400 RAM, and fast 300 GB SATA HD's.

Joan,

I think that the machine you have is plenty for what you wish to do. I
really don't think you need to purchase a new machine.

Since you say you are doing regular maintenance (AV/spyware scans, defrags,
etc.) have you looked at your page file? You said you recently upgraded
your RAM to 2GB, but did you also update your page file? I typically
recommend a page file to be at least 1.5x available RAM, plus 11 MB. I
can't remember where the 11MB comes from, but I know if you have Windows
control it, that's what it adds as well. So, with your 2GB RAM, I would
really recommend your page file to be 3083MB. I also do not recommend you
let Windows control the page file, if you do, that file will become
fragmented and defrag.exe will not fix it. Best thing to do is tell Windows
no page file, run a defrag (3 or 4 times back to back to ensure you're as
defragged as you can get) then tell Windows you want your page file Initial
size to be 3083MB and the Maximum size to be 3083MB. This will create a
single contiguous page file that will not change size and thus will not
become defragmented.

To find the page file settings, right click My Computer, go to Properties,
the Advanced Tab, under the Performance section click the Settings button,
go to the Advanced tab, at the bottom there is a section for Virtual Memory.
Click Change then set your Initial size and your Maximum size. Then click
the Set button. You may need to restart your computer after doing this.

Let me know how it goes.

Darhl