Serious bootproblem

[Macamba]

Hi,

I have a fairly new system (8 months), using an AMD64 dual core processor
with 4G internal memory. As operating system I use XP Home/SP3.

I noticed that booting the system takes a lot of time (2 -3 minutes). I
often gaze at the picture of my desktop waiting for something to happen. All
the time I see no icons on the desktop, nor is a taskbar available.

The previous week I bought myself a HP Deskjet D2560. And because I was not
paying attention during installation a lot of junk was installed on my
harddrive (which I deinstalled yesterday). Today I started up XP, and could
not make it do anything. Everything I do, like starting the taskmanager,
takes more then 5 minutes. I'm not able to do anything. I can not start a
browser to look on the Internet for solutions.

I'm rather at a loss, and considering to reinstall the system. But me thinks
that a daunting task, as all the drivers need to be gathered, all software
needs to be installed and the like. So I was hoping for some pointers to do
before I wipe the hard drive clean.

Macamba

 

[Gerry]

Macamba

Please post copes of Error Reports as they appear in Event Viewer.

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
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Macamba]

Hi Gerry,

I'm working with a Dutch version of XP. So I had to translate how to start
the event viewer. Sad to say, I do not have an 'Adminstrative Tools' part in
my Control Panel. Beats me why not *shrugs*.

The Windows directory contains some log files. Care to say what information
I should post coming from what log file?

In the mean time I will post you the contents of my ntbtlog.txt file.
Some translations:
Dutch "Geladen stuurprogramma" -
English "Loaded 'managing' program"
That is as it should do.

Dutch "Kan stuurprogramma niet laden"
English "Could not load 'managing' program:
That is bad. And the following log from this morning contains quite a few of
those entries.

C:\WINDOWS\ntbtlog.txt contains:
Service Pack 3 1 17 2009 10:04:46.359
Geladen stuurprogramma \WINDOWS\system32\ntkrnlpa.exe
Geladen stuurprogramma \WINDOWS\system32\hal.dll
Geladen stuurprogramma \WINDOWS\system32\KDCOM.DLL
Geladen stuurprogramma \WINDOWS\system32\BOOTVID.dll
Geladen stuurprogramma sptd.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \WINDOWS\System32\Drivers\WMILIB.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \WINDOWS\System32\Drivers\SCSIPORT.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma ACPI.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma pci.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma isapnp.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma pciide.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \WINDOWS\System32\DRIVERS\PCIIDEX.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma intelide.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma MountMgr.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma ftdisk.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma PartMgr.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma VolSnap.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma atapi.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma disk.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \WINDOWS\system32\DRIVERS\CLASSPNP.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma fltmgr.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma sr.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma PxHelp20.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma KSecDD.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma Ntfs.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma NDIS.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma srescan.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma Mup.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma gagp30kx.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\processr.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\ati2mtag.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\usbohci.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\usbehci.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\imapi.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\cdrom.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\redbook.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\HDAudBus.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\serial.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\serenum.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\parport.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\i8042prt.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\mouclass.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\Rtnicxp.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\aheh1ims.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\audstub.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\rasl2tp.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\ndistapi.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\ndiswan.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\raspppoe.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\raspptp.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\msgpc.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\psched.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\ptilink.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\raspti.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\termdd.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\kbdclass.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\swenum.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\update.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\mssmbios.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\NDProxy.SYS
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\NDProxy.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\usbhub.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\RtkHDAud.sys
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\lbrtfdc.SYS
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Sfloppy.SYS
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\i2omgmt.SYS
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Changer.SYS
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Cdaudio.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Fs_Rec.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Null.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Beep.SYS
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\kbdhid.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\drivers\vga.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\mnmdd.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\DRIVERS\RDPCDD.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Msfs.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Npfs.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\rasacd.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\ipsec.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\tcpip.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\ipnat.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \??\C:\Program Files\Common
Files\BitDefender\BitDefender Firewall\bdftdif.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\wanarp.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\netbt.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\vsdatant.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\drivers\afd.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\netbios.sys
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\PCIDump.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \??\C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\VCdRom.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\rdbss.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\mrxsmb.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\mfehidk.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Fips.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\usbccgp.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\BTHUSB.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\USBSTOR.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\hidusb.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\kbdhid.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\rfcomm.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\BthEnum.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\bthpan.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\bthmodem.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Modem.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Cdfs.SYS
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\ndisuio.sys
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\rdbss.sys
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\mrxsmb.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\wdmaud.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\sysaudio.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\splitter.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\aec.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\swmidi.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\DMusic.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\kmixer.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\drmkaud.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\mrxdav.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\srv.sys
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\ipnat.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\bdfsfltr.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \??\C:\Program Files\BitDefender\BitDefender
2009\bdselfpr.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\bdfm.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\HTTP.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\system32\drivers\kmixer.sys
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\Fastfat.SYS

 

[Macamba]

Hi Gerry,

I think I found the event viewer you mentioned. I found an interesting entry
when my system was booting:
DCOM error
Type event: Error
Source of event: DCOM
Category of event: None
Event-ID: 10005
Date: 17-1-2009
Time: 10:30:05
User: WALHALLA\Macamba
Computer: WALHALLA
Description:
DCOM got the error message 'The service did not respond to the start or
manage(?) instruction in the correct way.' while startint the
ServiceLayer-service with the arguments" to start server
{ACF50018-41F8-476D-85FD-CD953DAE4A49}

(Hope my translation is usable...)

Is this something you can use?

 

[Gerry]

The question is what is calling DCOM and this may be difficult to
determine.

This guid ACF50018-41F8-476D-85FD-CD953DAE4A49 is also difficult to
identify. I found a reference to Nokia PC Suite. Does this ring any
bells?

Are any devices malfunctioning?

Select Start, All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, System
Information. Open Components under System Summary and click on Problem
Devices. Is anything listed there?

Are there any yellow question marks in Device Manager? Right click on
the My Computer icon on your Desktop and select Properties,
Hardware,Device Manager. If yes what is the Device Error code?

We may need to try to rule out malware. What are your anti-virus and
anti-spyware arrangements?

aheh1ims.SYS What is this item in your ntbtlog.txt? Right click on the
file in Windows Exp;orer and select Properties. What does it say about
the purpose and source of the file?

There are too many entries in your ntbtlog.txt to check. I looked at a
few and the above was the only mystery.

I do not know what controls whether Administrative Tools dispays in
Control Panel.

Using Regedit check whether you have this key. This is just a guess on
my part.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ControlPanel\NameSpace\{D20EA4E1-3957-11d2-A40B-0C5020524153}

--



Hope this helps.

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

 

[Macamba]

Hi Gerry,

You raise a few interesting observations. Yes, I have 'Nokia PC Suite'
installed. It worked fine in the past. But as I just tried to synchronize
with it, I found out synchronization failed. As a matter of fact, tiered of
having to plug in the bluetooth dongle in my system I pushed it in, and never
got it out again. Might that create the issues?

Malfunctioning devices:
Again the issue with a Dutch OS. I think I found what you were requesting. I
do not have anything listed under 'Problem Devices'.

Anti-virus and anti-spyware arrangements?
I have just installed Bitdefender as anti-virus software. Before that I had
MacAfee installed. I do not have specific software for anti-spyware.

aheh1ims.SYS:
That is a nice one. I searched for it in 'Windows', and after that in
'Program Files'. I had no luck in finding it. I looked it up in my
ntbtlog.txt file and found out it was loaded from
\SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\. When I tried to find the file in
C:\WINDOWS\System32\Drivers\ I came up empty. So, although it should be
loaded, it does not reside on my harddrive.

Finally your request to check my registry, yes it contains
D20EA4E1-3957-11d2-A40B-0C5020524153 on the location you mentioned. It
contains:
Name - (Default)
Type - REG_SZ
Data - Systemmanagement
(again translated from Dutch).

Should I remove the Bluetooth dongle from my system?

Thanks for your help.

Macamba

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

I have a fairly new system (8 months), using an AMD64 dual core processor
with 4G internal memory. As operating system I use XP Home/SP3.

I noticed that booting the system takes a lot of time (2 -3 minutes). I
often gaze at the picture of my desktop waiting for something to happen. All
the time I see no icons on the desktop, nor is a taskbar available.

Two points:

1. I don't think 2-3 minutes is a lot of time at all, and doesn't
necessarily represent a problem. Many people, including me, have a 2-3
minute or longer boot time.

2. My personal view is that the attention many people pay to how long
it takes to boot is unwarranted. Assuming that the computer's speed is
otherwise satisfactory, it may not be worth worrying about. Most
people start their computers once a day or even less frequently. In
the overall scheme of things, even a few minutes to start up isn't
very important. Personally I power on my computer when I get up in the
morning, then go get my coffee. When I come back, it's done booting. I
don't know how long it took to boot and I don't care.

However if you do want to address it, it may be because of what
programs start automatically, and you may want to stop some of them
from starting that way. On each program you don't want to start
automatically, check its Options to see if it has the choice not to
start (make sure you actually choose the option not to run it, not
just a "don't show icon" option). Many can easily and best be stopped
that way. If that doesn't work, run MSCONFIG from the Start | Run
line, and on the Startup tab, uncheck the programs you don't want to
start automatically.

However, if I were you, I wouldn't do this just for the purpose of
running the minimum number of programs. Despite what many people tell
you, you should be concerned, not with how *many* of these programs
you run, but *which*. Some of them can hurt performance severely, but
others have no effect on performance.

Don't just stop programs from running willy-nilly. What you should do
is determine what each program is, what its value is to you, and what
the cost in performance is of its running all the time. You can get
more information about these with google searches and asking about
specifics here.

Once you have that information, you can make an intelligent informed
decision about what you want to keep and what you want to get rid of.

The previous week I bought myself a HP Deskjet D2560. And because I was not
paying attention during installation a lot of junk was installed on my
harddrive (which I deinstalled yesterday).

Exactly *what* was the "junk" you uninstalled? How did you uninstall
it?

Today I started up XP, and could
not make it do anything. Everything I do, like starting the taskmanager,
takes more then 5 minutes. I'm not able to do anything. I can not start a
browser to look on the Internet for solutions.

I'm rather at a loss, and considering to reinstall the system. But me thinks
that a daunting task, as all the drivers need to be gathered, all software
needs to be installed and the like. So I was hoping for some pointers to do
before I wipe the hard drive clean.

Two points here too:

1. That problem sounds very much like you are infected with malware,
and checking for malware and eliminating any that's found should be
your first consideration.

What anti-virus program do you run? What anti-spyware programs do you
run? Are they up to date?

2. My view is that reinstallation is a very poor choice for you. It
should always be a last resort, and only done when nothing else works.
You are right that it's a daunting task. Moreover, if that's what you
do, it will fix the problem, but you won't find out what the problem
was. Since the problem was caused by something you did, if you don't
find out what it was, you will very likely repeat that behavior and
quickly find yourself back in the same situation.

 

[Alister]

I do not know what controls whether Administrative Tools dispays in
Control Panel.

Gerry, for future reference, there is an easier way to get to the
event viewer which AFAIK works on all versions of XP and Vista.

Click on the Start button, and then right-click on My Computer and
select Manage from the context menu.
This opens the Computer Management mmc, and the first item under the
computer name is Event Viewer.

HTH

Alister

 

[Gerry]

Alister

I must have posted more posts on Event Viewer than most contributing to
XP newsgroups. Just do a Goole search remembering that I have previous
posted using another email address before I was forced to munge my
address. I cannot recollect a previous complaint. I am not sure it is
any easier your way. It's what suits you that counts.

--



Hope this helps.

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

 

[Gerry]

Macamba

From what you say I suggest you need to check for malware before
investigating other problems.

I suggest you download and run Spybot S & D (freeware version). There
is a freeware version buried in this link:
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/spybotsd/index.html

Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware
1.32 -freeware (if you upgrade you pay).
http://www.download.com/Malwarebytes-Anti-Malware/3000-8022_4-10804572.html

Run Malwarebytes' in safe mode and turn off your current anti-virus
before you do to avoid a conflict. Disregard the invitation on the web
site regarding the Registry Optimiser -a Registry Optimiser is not a
helpful utitity.

aheh1ims.SYS: I am not sure what to make of this item.

Go to Start, Control Panel, Folder Options, View, Advanced
Settings and verify that the box before "Show hidden files and
folders" is checked and "Hide protected operating system files
" is unchecked. You may need to scroll down to see the second
item. You should also make certain that the box before "Hide
extensions for known file types" is not checked.

Try again to see if you can locate aheh1ims.SYS

These lines are strange and seem to be conflicting
Geladen stuurprogramma \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\NDProxy.SYS
Kan stuurprogramma niet laden \SystemRoot\System32\Drivers\NDProxy.SYS

I have found other reports of this combination in Google. NDProxy.SYS is
a Microsoft file genuine but malware has been known to create fake file.
In Windows Explorer check the file detail especially the

For the files to be shown as loading in the ntbtlog.txt files there must
be a StartUp item.

A safer way than msconfig to disable / remove unwanted start up items is
to use Autoruns.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/ProcessesAndThreads/Autoruns.mspx

With Autoruns you can uncheck an item, which disables it from starting,
or you can can right click an item and then delete it. If you uncheck
you can recheck to re-enable the item. It is a much safer approach than
editing the Registry. Another useful feature of the programme is that
you can right click an item and select Search Online to get information
about the item selected.

Please check aheh1ims.SYS

I am still researching the NDProxy.SYS oddity.

--



Hope this helps.

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

 

[Daave]

Gerry, for future reference, there is an easier way to get to the
event viewer which AFAIK works on all versions of XP and Vista.

Click on the Start button, and then right-click on My Computer and
select Manage from the context menu.
This opens the Computer Management mmc, and the first item under the
computer name is Event Viewer.

Different. It works. Not sure it's easier, though.

If you don't mind using the keyboard, there's always:

1. Windows Key + R
2. eventvwr.msc
3. Enter

 

[Gerry]

Macamba

Has there ever been any Norton products installed on the computer? If so
which?


--



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

 

[Alister]

Alister

I must have posted more posts on Event Viewer than most contributing to
XP newsgroups. Just do a Goole search remembering that I have previous
posted using another email address before I was forced to munge my
address.  I cannot recollect a previous complaint. I am not sure it is
any easier your way. It's what suits you that counts.

--

Hope  this helps.

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

Gerry,

It was in no way a complaint, and I am fully aware of the help you
provide on these newsgroups.
However, even the most experienced computer users don't know
everything, and I simply offered the method which I use at work as I
have found it much easier and quicker than going through Control
Panel.

If you choose not to use it - or offer it as a method - that's up to
you. I was only trying to be helpful.

Alister

 

[Alister]

Alister

I must have posted more posts on Event Viewer than most contributing to
XP newsgroups. Just do a Goole search remembering that I have previous
posted using another email address before I was forced to munge my
address.  I cannot recollect a previous complaint. I am not sure it is
any easier your way. It's what suits you that counts.

--

Hope  this helps.

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

BTW is a Goole search limited to the area around Hull?

Alister

 

[Gerry]

Yes Alister I do mistype words.

--



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

 

[Macamba]

Hi Gerry,

As far as I know, I never have installed Norton on this system.

Macamba

Macamba

Has there ever been any Norton products installed on the computer? If so
which?


--



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

SNIP

 

[Macamba]

Hi All,

Thanks for your replies in the aria of how I can start up the Event Viewer.
I think the suggestion Daave gave is the one best suited for me, as I do not
have a 'My Computer' either in my start menu, nor on my desktop. But many
roads lead to Rome.

On the issue of 2-3 minutes start up... It took me half an hour before my
system was responding to instructions of me. I think the timing of the events
was as follows:
- 2-3 minutes: Desktop appear
- 15 minutes: Taskbar and icons appear
- 30 minutes: System starts to respond
After that starting a new program takes more time than previously observed,
as in several minutes, instead of several seconds.

I'll surely will scan for malware. I thought that was secured. But I might
have to conclude it was not secure enough.

Macamba

 

[Daave]

"Daave" wrote:

Hi All,

Thanks for your replies in the aria of how I can start up the Event
Viewer.
I think the suggestion Daave gave is the one best suited for me, as I
do not
have a 'My Computer' either in my start menu, nor on my desktop. But
many
roads lead to Rome.

On the issue of 2-3 minutes start up... It took me half an hour before
my
system was responding to instructions of me. I think the timing of the
events
was as follows:
- 2-3 minutes: Desktop appear
- 15 minutes: Taskbar and icons appear
- 30 minutes: System starts to respond
After that starting a new program takes more time than previously
observed,
as in several minutes, instead of several seconds.

I'll surely will scan for malware. I thought that was secured. But I
might
have to conclude it was not secure enough.

Malware, unfortunately, is always a possibility. In the event there is
no malware, the next most common cause is the presence of certain
anti-malware programs! Often, they are configured to scan the entire
hard drive every time you boot up the PC. It's better to schedule a scan
for overnight when you are not using the PC and won't experience any
kind of performance hit.

Question: After the 30 minutes, does your system perform well?

I don't know much about Bit Defender, so I can't give you any feedback
regarding it. However, you stated in another post that you had been
running McAfee. It's possible it was never uninstalled completely (not
your fault; the uninstaller is not a good one). In case you haven't used
it, there is a Removal Tool (MCPR.exe) from their site you should use:

http://service.mcafee.com/FAQDocument.aspx?id=TS100507&lc=1033

If still no joy, configure a clean boot:

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

How is the bootup time after you configure a clean boot? If it's fine,
then you know it's one of your startup programs/processes. Use the
process of elimination to detemine which one it is.

 

[Macamba]

Hi Gerry (and others),

Thanks for your support until now. I just ran a check using Spybot. Only two
problems:
1. DoubleClick Cookie
2. Registry change in Internet Explorer:
HKEY_USERS\S-1-5-21-548039337-2906353147-2206293470-1006\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\NoLogOff
(and yes, I already posted about the second problem. Apologies).
As far as I see not really earth shattering problems. I believe I can live
with these two problems.

I will install the other program you advised me, and will boot in safe mode
to run a check. Hopefully that will give me more joy.

The story continues...

Macamba

 

[Gerry]

Macamba

Did you intentionally set up your computer to have no Log Off?
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/windows2000serv/reskit/regentry/93519.mspx?mfr=true

The other explanation is a Trojan which is more serious than Double
Click.


--



Hope this helps.

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