Very slow XP performance

[kgkphd]

I am running XP Professional SP3. Recently, the thing has slowed to the
point where it can take a minute to load a web-page. I've done lots to try
and fix this:

1. Cleared out all unnecessary files (permanent, temporary --- both
internet and desktop) --- I now have 70GB free and 22BG stored on the HD
2. Run 2 scans --- one with Symantec 360 and another with TrendMicro (with
only one system at a time on the computer, and both of which were updated to
the minute.
3. I've gone to clean boot status.
4. Checked running programs (nothing) and performance at ctrl-alt-del.
Performance reads 90%+ of CPU used!
5. I've run Disk Cleanup and defragmented.
6. Removed an obviously unneeded programs.

I thought there might be a registry error, but I don't know how to
fix/repairthat without wiping out the system.

I've run the gamut. But with the 90%+ CPU usage --- which would certainly
cause a problem --- I figure out that there must be some program running in
the background that is using up band-width. The problem: It doesn't show up
on ctrl-alt-del and I can't find it and shut it down.

Does anybody have any ideas?

Thanks

Ken

 

[JS]

It could be a sub-process or application that's running in the background
and taking all the CPU resources.

To find and display what could be the problem try Process Explorer:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx

Once you have Process Explorer installed and running:
In the taskbar select View and check:
'Show Process Tree' and the 'Show Lower Pane' options.
Move your mouse cursor over any column in the right hand pane and
right click and check the following boxes:
'Command Line' and 'Version'.
Then expand the process named 'Explorer' (click on the + sign)
In the column on the left named 'CPU', look for any high CPU usage.
Next click on the CPU column to sort the processes by %CPU usage
(Highest to Lowest).

Move the mouse cursor over any process,
you should see a popup with some detailed info.
Then mouse over the process that's using most or all the CPU %.
Then click on that process to highlight it,
Now that it's highlighted, right click and from the options listed select:
'Search Online'.
This should display what out there on the web about that process.
You can also double click on any process to open up a more detailed
'Properties' window.
Note: some entries like Explorer, System/Services, and Svchost
may need to be expanded to show the detail (sub processes),
in this case click on the + located to the left of the entry.

An alternate method when using Process Explorer
is to double click on the Graph just below the Menu bar.
This will open the 'System Information' window, which has a larger display
of all three graphs. Move your mouse over any spike in the
CPU Usage graph to see what process/application or service is the cause
of the spike.

Another tool available is: What's Running
http://www.whatsrunning.net/whatsrunning/main.aspx

 

[EtherStreams]

I do not pretend to be an expert. If it's a program that you think may be
running in the background, there are free programs out there that scan and
show hidden programs that run in the background ( I was amazed to find 3
programs that the task manager was not showing ). Possibility 2, is you can
have some kind of mal-ware such as a keylogger,etc... installed. There are
many free scanners out there for these as well. Possibility 3, is that you
may be having hardware trouble. In my case, when I was having trouble like
the one you have posted here, it was my power supply burning out.

 

[Gerry]

JS

Symantec 360

--


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

 

[Gerry]

kgkphd

Symantec 360. Dump it!

http://service1.symantec.com/Support/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039


--


Hope this helps.

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

 

[kgkphd]

Thanks for your help. I have dumped 360. If you ever run across somebody
with 360 and an iMac partitioned with boot-camp, they should definitely dump
it. I had shut downs, freezes, etc right after I got my iMac. (I wanted an
iMac because I hate Vista and Vista system won't let you go back to XP --- or
I just couldn't figure out how to.) I brought it back for a hardware check
--- nothing. Then the tech asked me about the configuration and he said
"Dump the 360. It interferes with the Windows/Apple partition." Now I have
TrendMicro and I find it performs (the iMac and the TrendMicro) much better
than before.

Ken

 

[kgkphd]

Thanks for your help. I'll try it.

Ken

I do not pretend to be an expert. If it's a program that you think may be
running in the background, there are free programs out there that scan and
show hidden programs that run in the background ( I was amazed to find 3
programs that the task manager was not showing ). Possibility 2, is you can
have some kind of mal-ware such as a keylogger,etc... installed. There are
many free scanners out there for these as well. Possibility 3, is that you
may be having hardware trouble. In my case, when I was having trouble like
the one you have posted here, it was my power supply burning out.

 

[Gerry]

kgkphd

What is your system performance like now?

What is the CPU and how much RAM does the computer have? Right click on
the My Computer icon on ther Desktop and select Properties to get this
information.

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?

In what ways is your system slow? Is it booting or overall performance?

Is your system free from error?

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.

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

 

[Jim]

I am running XP Professional SP3. Recently, the thing has slowed to the
point where it can take a minute to load a web-page. I've done lots to
try
and fix this:

1. Cleared out all unnecessary files (permanent, temporary --- both
internet and desktop) --- I now have 70GB free and 22BG stored on the HD
2. Run 2 scans --- one with Symantec 360 and another with TrendMicro
(with
only one system at a time on the computer, and both of which were updated
to
the minute.
3. I've gone to clean boot status.
4. Checked running programs (nothing) and performance at ctrl-alt-del.
Performance reads 90%+ of CPU used!
5. I've run Disk Cleanup and defragmented.
6. Removed an obviously unneeded programs.

I thought there might be a registry error, but I don't know how to
fix/repairthat without wiping out the system.

I've run the gamut. But with the 90%+ CPU usage --- which would certainly
cause a problem --- I figure out that there must be some program running
in
the background that is using up band-width. The problem: It doesn't show
up
on ctrl-alt-del and I can't find it and shut it down.

Does anybody have any ideas?

Thanks

Ken

What program is getting the most time? Either Task Manager of Process
Explore can disclose the name.
Jim

 

[JS]

The current version of 360 is not necessarily the cause.
But if both 360 and TrendMicro are actively monitoring
disk activity at the same time ...

 

[kgkphd]

Jim --

Thanks for getting back to me. Before I got your message, I was removing
some programs that my wife doesn't use anymore. When I went back into Task
Manager to check on performance, it was normal --- about 6% with spikes to
about 24%. HOWEVER, at that time Explorer was not running. I brought up
Explorer and everything slowed down again --- and Explorer was like a slug in
molasses. Shut of Explorer, and the performance of all the other programs
went up. Do you think it would work to download something like Firefox or
Orchestra and ditch Explorer?

Ken

 

[Jim]

Jim --

Thanks for getting back to me. Before I got your message, I was removing
some programs that my wife doesn't use anymore. When I went back into
Task
Manager to check on performance, it was normal --- about 6% with spikes to
about 24%. HOWEVER, at that time Explorer was not running. I brought up
Explorer and everything slowed down again --- and Explorer was like a slug
in
molasses. Shut of Explorer, and the performance of all the other programs
went up. Do you think it would work to download something like Firefox or
Orchestra and ditch Explorer?

Ken

Was that Internet Explorer or Windows Explorer?
A reason for excessive CPU usage by IE8 is a consequence of the Immunize
feature of Spybot S & D or one of many third party programs which populate
the hosts file with numerous possibly (more likely probably) dangerous web
sites.

As for using Firefox, et el., I would do so only if one of them had features
that I thought I needed. I certainly would not ditch IE8 just to save
myself from the consequences of my own actions.

I am using Windows XP SP3 with IE8, and I see no significant increase in cpu
usage of IE8. By the way, while I have discontinued immunizing with Spybot,
the host file still has numerous relicts of previous immunizations. IE8
does take a little time to get started, and this is probably the result of
the size of the hosts file (it is my fault consequently). I have more
pressing things to do right now, but I will fix it eventually.

Jim

 

[Daave]

You are apparently confusing Windows Explorer with Internet Explorer.
When you are in Task Manager, the former is called explorer.exe and the
latter is called iexplore.exe.

Windows Explorer is an integral part of Windows that can't be removed.
Internet Explorer (which is linked to Windows Explorer) is a Web
browser. What version of IE are you running? If you are running IE8, it
is crucial to turn off things like Spybot Search & Destroy's
immunization feature.

There's nothing wrong with running Firefox as your main browser and you
will find there are many useful addons available for it. But you should
definitely address your performace issue. If it is with *Internet*
Explorer, I would first look into third-party programs (like Spybot S&S)
interfering with it. Also, you can run IE in no Add-ons mode to compare
performance to determine if there is a specific add-on that is
problematic.

 

[kgkphd]

Daave - Thanks for the response. I don't have Spybot or anything like it. I
ditched Symantec 360 because I know it has a lot of stuff in it that causes
interferences in some cases and installed TrendMicro. Doesn't help.

I just used Explorer in stead of Internet Explorer to shorten the typing.
Sorry I caused confusion. The thing is that this just happened. Even with
the 360 it was running fine. 360 was updated regularly and scans were done
on a scheduled basis. We never had problems with it until recently.

How do you get to the IE no-add-ons mode?

This is driving my wife crazy. It's her computer. And when she's in a bad
mood . . .

How is Google chrome versus IE? Do you have experience wih it?

And why do people seem to be down on Firefox?

Thanks again.

Ken

 

[kgkphd]

Jim -

That was Internet Explorer. Sorry for the confusion.

The thing is, when I look into Task Manager, IE is not using the top memory
by any means. Frankly, it's Skype by almost 3 times. But, this problem
occurred BEFORE my wife added Skype, so it's not that. And IE comes up VERY
slowly.

Roxio Media took up more space than IE and I deleted that since my wife
never uses it, but that didn't help.

I just don't get it. Nothing on Task Manger seems to be an issue as nothing
is that big in memory.

360 always blocked suspicious websites and my wife is not a "surfer" anyway.
She uses the computer primarily for doing her school work (she's a teacher),
paying bills through our bank, and buying things (clothes, airline tickets,
etc) through companies that should have reliable websites. Anyway, there's
got to be something in there that is not shwing but is somehow triggered by
IE8.

Do you think if I downloaded Firefox, wiped out IE8, then reloaded IE8 and
wiped out Firefox it could work?

Do you know anything about Google Chrome?

WOW! I just started my wife's computer --- it started out at 100% CPU usage
without IE8. That's not what happened yesterday. It's dropping somewhat now
but is still high.

This is driving me nuts and puts my wife in a bad mood, and you know what
that measn . . . if you're married.

I'm still looking at this thing. TrendMicro is downloading an update and
CPU usage went up to 100% and now it's bouncing around; everyplace between 4%
and 100%. Nots --- totally nuts.

Thanks again,.

Ken

 

[Daave]

YW.

You still need to answer the question:

What version of IE are you running?

To run IE in No Add-ons mode, right-click the desktop shortcut and
select:

Start Without Add-ons.

Yeah, you don't want your wife in a bad mood!

Firefox is fine. I've never seen anyone down on it.

Is your slow performance *only* with regard to IE? Or is it slow in
other ways?

 

[JS]

If the problem started recently (last few weeks)
un-install Microsoft's May Security updates and
see if that helps.

 

[kgkphd]

Daave --

RUnning IE7 but am now downloading IE8.

It's slow all over the place when IE is running. Last night, when I turned
off IE, CPU usage went down and other programs worked just fine. When IE was
up, they slowed down a lot.

This morning, I got up and started my wife's computer and went right to Task
Manager. CPU use was way up (100%) even without IE on and they trickled down
but not by much. This just dumb.

I look at Task Manager Processes, but unless it's obvious, I don't lnow what
most of these things are. One may be something small causing it. Once in a
while DrgToDsc comes up on Task Manager, but (if I have ths right) nothing is
being dragged to a disk. My wife is not that into computers.

I started in 1965 in the Army --- when 360k took up a the space of a three
car garage, the hard drive (1 Mb) was the size of beer barrel; and we had a
party when we could attach teletypes to communicate with the computer --- the
Stone Age. I'm still pretty savvyand can "thibk" like a computer, but don't
keep up with it like I used to and so I can't deal with lots of the new stuff
--- actually, the vast majority of it. Frankly, Windows is good, but I
preferred DOS. Again, that ages me.

Thanks

Ken

 

[Jim]

Jim -

That was Internet Explorer. Sorry for the confusion.

The thing is, when I look into Task Manager, IE is not using the top
memory
by any means. Frankly, it's Skype by almost 3 times. But, this problem
occurred BEFORE my wife added Skype, so it's not that. And IE comes up
VERY
slowly.

Roxio Media took up more space than IE and I deleted that since my wife
never uses it, but that didn't help.

I just don't get it. Nothing on Task Manger seems to be an issue as
nothing
is that big in memory.

360 always blocked suspicious websites and my wife is not a "surfer"
anyway.
She uses the computer primarily for doing her school work (she's a
teacher),
paying bills through our bank, and buying things (clothes, airline
tickets,
etc) through companies that should have reliable websites. Anyway,
there's
got to be something in there that is not shwing but is somehow triggered
by
IE8.

Do you think if I downloaded Firefox, wiped out IE8, then reloaded IE8 and
wiped out Firefox it could work?

Do you know anything about Google Chrome?

WOW! I just started my wife's computer --- it started out at 100% CPU
usage
without IE8. That's not what happened yesterday. It's dropping somewhat
now
but is still high.

This is driving me nuts and puts my wife in a bad mood, and you know what
that measn . . . if you're married.

I'm still looking at this thing. TrendMicro is downloading an update and
CPU usage went up to 100% and now it's bouncing around; everyplace between
4%
and 100%. Nots --- totally nuts.

Thanks again,.

Ken

It is the percentage of the cpu that is important. Excessive memory usage
may (possibly should be MAY) cause your problem. So, what is the process
which has the highest cpu percentage?

I don't have this problem with IE8, and I certainly didn't have the problem
with either IE6 or IE7. I certainly would not install IE8 until I had this
problem solved.

Jim

 

[Daave]

Daave --

RUnning IE7 but am now downloading IE8.

Don't do it! Upgrades only should be performed if everything is 100%
fine!

It's slow all over the place when IE is running. Last night, when I
turned off IE, CPU usage went down and other programs worked just
fine. When IE was up, they slowed down a lot.

What about in No Add-ons mode?

This morning, I got up and started my wife's computer and went right
to Task Manager. CPU use was way up (100%) even without IE on and
they trickled down but not by much. This just dumb.

Okay, so can we now rule out IE as a problem?

I look at Task Manager Processes, but unless it's obvious, I don't
lnow what most of these things are. One may be something small
causing it. Once in a while DrgToDsc comes up on Task Manager, but
(if I have ths right) nothing is being dragged to a disk. My wife is
not that into computers.

Configure a clean boot:

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

Now, how is your performance?

If it's still bad, I would suspect a malware infestation.