System slows to snail pace-Help!

[bm]

I have a desktop and a portable pc both with the same software including XP
SP2 The desktop has 512Mb RAM and the laptop has 215 Mb RAM
Until recently the laptop has performed satisfactorily but now is extremely
slow in any operation . At one stage I got a message that the Virtual Memory
was too low so I upped it which give a slight improvement but the
performance is still unacceptable
I run AVG,Defender,Spybot, Ad-Aware, Spyware Doctor, A Squared and
Smithfraud.. I thought Spyware Doctor might be the cause so deleted it on
the laptop with no change in performance
I regularly clean and defrag and have only used 20Gb on a 37 Gb HD
Is it possible that someone could give me guidance on how I can find out
what is causing the problem?
Blair

 

[DL]

IMO 512mb is the minimum for acceptible performance

Whats the performance like if started in safe mode?

 

[Gerry]

Did you mean to say your laptop only has 215 mb of RAM?

Try Ctrl+Alt+Delete to select Task Manager and click the Performance
Tab. Under Commit Charge what is the Total, the Limit and the Peak?

Please post copies of all Error and Warning Reports appearing in
the System and Application logs in Event Viewer for the last boot. No
Information Reports or Duplicates please. Indicate which also appear in
a previous boot.

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

Part of the Description of the error will include a link, which you
should double click for further information. You can copy using copy
and paste. Often the link will, however, say there is no further
information.
http://go.microsoft.com/fw.link/events.asp
(Please note the hyperlink above is for illustration purposes only)

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

 

[Blair]

Thanks for your help. My laptop has 256 Mb RAM My error
Under Commit Charge Total - 279108 Limit - 1032152 Peak 407080
I have 19 errors and 15 warnings
I have started with the first error.Before I do the rest is this sample what
you are loking for? It's going to be a very long list
Blair


Event Type: Error
Event Source: Application Hang
Event Category: (101)
Event ID: 1002
Date: 04/11/2007
Time: 19:55:36
User: N/A
Computer: LAPTOP
Description:
Hanging application msimn.exe, version 6.0.2900.2180, hang module hungapp,
version 0.0.0.0, hang address 0x00000000.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 41 70 70 6c 69 63 61 74 Applicat
0008: 69 6f 6e 20 48 61 6e 67 ion Hang
0010: 20 20 6d 73 69 6d 6e 2e msimn.
0018: 65 78 65 20 36 2e 30 2e exe 6.0.
0020: 32 39 30 30 2e 32 31 38 2900.218
0028: 30 20 69 6e 20 68 75 6e 0 in hun
0030: 67 61 70 70 20 30 2e 30 gapp 0.0
0038: 2e 30 2e 30 20 61 74 20 .0.0 at
0040: 6f 66 66 73 65 74 20 30 offset 0
0048: 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 0000000

 

[Gerry]

Blair

Did you make the original post to start the thread? In the headers the
original post says (e-mail address removed) and the latest post shows as
(e-mail address removed) !

The Commit Charge figure suggest the system is having to use the
pagefile. This will slow the system. You can checkon this using
pagefilemon but a solution is to increase the RAM memory to 512 mb.

Use page file monitor to observe what is the peak usage. Start it to run
immediately after start-up and look at the log. Pagefilemon takes
snapshots. You need to run it at the beginning of the session at then
run it again at intervals throughout the sessions. The log is Pagefile
log.txt. If you right click on the file in Windows Explorer and select
Send to, Desktop (Create Shortcut). The same applies to
XP_PageFileMon.exe.

A small utility to monitor pagefile usage:
http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm

Note that programs using undo features, particularly those associated
with graphics and photo editing, require large amounts of memory so if
you use this type of programme check these first observing how the page
usage increases when they start and whether the usage decreases when you
close the programme.

The error report relating to Outlook Express struggling for memory or
CPU? Some processes undertaken by Outlook Expres can be quite demanding.
It creates large file sizes which require resources to handle them.
Avoid keeping large number of messages in your Inbox and Sent Items
folders. Empty your Deleted Items folder regularly' Otherwise regular
compacting can be important.

To compact place the cursor on Local Folders and select File, Work
Offline followed by File, Folder, Compact All. Do not try doing anything
else on the computer until the process has finished. When you compact
Outlook Express now copies all dbx files to your Recycle Bin. Given that
dbx files can be fairly large it is a good idea after compacting is done
to run Disk CleanUp followed by Disk Defragmenter.

The Event Viewer Report was fine but concentrate on the System log. No
Information Reports or Duplicates please. Indicate which also appear in
a previous boot as repeating Warning / Error Reports are the ones
needing attention..


--



Hope this helps.

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

 

[Blair]

The reason I have two addresses is I started replying from my desktop
because of the slowness of the laptop. I didn' relaise that the addresses
were different. However since they are false it doesn't matter.
I will find out how much an update to 512 Mb RAM memory wiill cost. The
laptop is my standby machine and is mainly used for backing up my system on
the Desktop and it may not be worth the cost.
1st 2nd 3rd
I downloaded the page file utility and the first reading was Current Page
File Usage 149mb 160mb 206mb

Session Peak Usage 172mb 172mb
207mb

Current Pagefile size 768mb 768mb
768mb
Sometimes I got an error report; Run Time Error 70
Permission
denied

I had not compacted my Outlook express files which I have now done so.

Amazingly the system has improved already and is almost acceptable.

System report
Event Type: Error
Event Source: W32Time
Event Category: None
Event ID: 29
Date: 05/11/2007
Time: 17:30:14
User: N/A
Computer: LAPTOP
Description:
The time provider NtpClient is configured to acquire time from one or more
time sources, however none of the sources are currently accessible. No
attempt to contact a source will be made for 14 minutes. NtpClient has no
source of accurate time.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

If necessary I will ost more errors
Blair

 

[Gerry]

Blair


I am sure you appreciate that pagefilemon confirms that you need to add
RAM. Anything up to 50 mb usage can be discounted but your figures go
beyond that.

You could look at what starts when you boot using Autoruns but otherwise
you will need to keep on top of housekeeping.

Use Autoruns to find any unwanted start ups!
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/ProcessesAndThreads/Autoruns.mspx

The Error report regarding time is one to be ignored. What else by way
of Error Reports do you have?


--



Hope this helps.

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

 

[Blair]

I have learned a lot from you and the latest Autiruns programme is very
revealing and enabled me to reduce the number of programmes at startup. Many
thanks

Below are three further System Errors

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Service Control Manager
Event Category: None
Event ID: 7000
Date: 07/11/2007
Time: 05:12:25
User: N/A
Computer: LAPTOP
Description:
The PCAMPR5 NDIS Protocol Driver service failed to start due to the
following error:
The system cannot find the file specified.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Event Type: Error
Event Source: Windows Update Agent
Event Category: Installation
Event ID: 20
Date: 06/11/2007
Time: 18:27:33
User: N/A
Computer: LAPTOP
Description:
Installation Failure: Windows failed to install the following update with
error 0x80070643: Security Update for Flash Player (KB923789).

For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
Data:
0000: 57 69 6e 33 32 48 52 65 Win32HRe
0008: 73 75 6c 74 3d 30 78 38 sult=0x8
0010: 30 30 37 30 36 34 33 20 0070643
0018: 55 70 64 61 74 65 49 44 UpdateID
0020: 3d 7b 32 36 44 41 35 37 ={26DA57
0028: 31 36 2d 35 39 39 39 2d 16-5999-
0030: 34 41 42 32 2d 38 38 30 4AB2-880
0038: 36 2d 38 30 30 46 37 41 6-800F7A
0040: 46 39 33 43 39 33 7d 20 F93C93}
0048: 52 65 76 69 73 69 6f 6e Revision
0050: 4e 75 6d 62 65 72 3d 31 Number=1
0058: 30 35 20 00 05 .

Event Type: Error
Event Source: W32Time
Event Category: None
Event ID: 17
Date: 05/11/2007
Time: 17:30:14
User: N/A
Computer: LAPTOP
Description:
Time Provider NtpClient: An error occurred during DNS lookup of the manually
configured peer 'time.windows.com,0x1'. NtpClient will try the DNS lookup
again in 15 minutes. The error was: A socket operation was attempted to an
unreachable host. (0x80072751)

For more information, see Help and Support Center at
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

Blair

 

[bm]

I was expecting a reply from you Gerry when you asked me what other error
reports do you have?
However I am grateful to the help you have given me already
Blair

 

[Gerry]

Blair

This thread from Google links to the first error report:
PCAMPR5 NDIS Protocol Driver
http://groups.google.com/group/micr...7ca5b574cd85?hl=en&lnk=st&q=#ad697ca5b574cd85

For the second error relating to the failure to install the KB923789
Security Update it is necessary to find out the error code. Select,
Start, Help and Support, Keep your Windows up- to-date with Windows
Update, Review your Update History and click on the Failed Icon (if any)
in the Status Column. What does it say for the failed update??

I would ignore the third error.

--

Hope this helps.

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

 

[bm]

Thanks again Gerry. You have been most helpful
Regards from Blair, Pitlochry, Scotland