Windows XP Running Slow

[Frank]

Hopefully someone can help me. I purchased a new desktop PC with Windows XP
installed on it over 5 years ago. I have had no problems with speed until
recently. The PC has 1GB of RAM and a Pentium 4 processor, but like I said, I
have never had problems with speed, etc.

What has been happening is that the PC is has begun to run very slow over
the last 3-4 months. Good examples of this are when I click on IE to get into
the Internet, it takes a couple minutes to connect where it never did before
(I have a fast cable internet provider) and most noticeably is that when I
use Outlook Express to check my emails, it takes several minutes to retrieve
mail where up until a few months ago, it was almost instantaneous. Also, when
I get out of IE - the hour glass stays on for a bout a minute while back to
the desktop.

I am very good about keeping the PC clean and well maintained, and run
several different anti-virus and malware programs on a weekly basis, so I
don't think thats the problem. I have noticed that there have been many
Windows updates in the past 3-4 months and don't know if its a coincidence
that this is about the same time that the PC started running slower. I also
just upgraded to IE 8 thinking this would help but no such luck.

I am looking for ideas. Could it just be that the PC is old and I need to
reinstall XP again? Or do you think the updates have caused this. or - so you
have any other recommendations? Your expert help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

 

[R. McCarty]

Have you run a Chkdsk on drive C: to verify it is not marked "Dirty".
Disk inconsistencies can cause sudden/abrupt loss of performance.

 

[SC Tom]

Hopefully someone can help me. I purchased a new desktop PC with Windows
XP
installed on it over 5 years ago. I have had no problems with speed until
recently. The PC has 1GB of RAM and a Pentium 4 processor, but like I
said, I
have never had problems with speed, etc.

What has been happening is that the PC is has begun to run very slow over
the last 3-4 months. Good examples of this are when I click on IE to get
into
the Internet, it takes a couple minutes to connect where it never did
before
(I have a fast cable internet provider) and most noticeably is that when I
use Outlook Express to check my emails, it takes several minutes to
retrieve
mail where up until a few months ago, it was almost instantaneous. Also,
when
I get out of IE - the hour glass stays on for a bout a minute while back
to
the desktop.

I am very good about keeping the PC clean and well maintained, and run
several different anti-virus and malware programs on a weekly basis, so I
don't think thats the problem. I have noticed that there have been many
Windows updates in the past 3-4 months and don't know if its a coincidence
that this is about the same time that the PC started running slower. I
also
just upgraded to IE 8 thinking this would help but no such luck.

I am looking for ideas. Could it just be that the PC is old and I need to
reinstall XP again? Or do you think the updates have caused this. or - so
you
have any other recommendations? Your expert help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

Check your event logs and see if there are many/any warnings and/or errors.
Try to make any corrections based on that and see if it helps.
Defrag your hard drive.
While Windows is running, use Task Manager or Process Explorer
(http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx) to see
what's running in the background. Is there anything running that you don't
know what it is?
Are you running a firewall? If so, whose?

SC Tom

 

[Frank]

Yes, I run Chkdsk at least one every week to two weeks with non issues.

 

[Frank]

Hi - not sure I know how to check event logs. maybe you can explain.

I defrag my hard drive every two weeks.

yes, I am running a McAfee Security Suite as provided by Comcast (my
internet provider). It does have a firewall.

I will try your ideal on the process explorer, but need to know how to check
event logs.

 

[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.

 

[Keith Wilby]

yes, I am running a McAfee Security Suite as provided by Comcast (my
internet provider). It does have a firewall.

McAfee is a notorious resource hog. IMO you'd be much better off with
something like Comodo and AVG (both free).

 

[db]

unfortunately, geritol is
not compatible with
old electronics.

however, simple logic
would be that if your computer
"only" had windows on it
and no other programs,

then your computers
performance would be
pretty good.

that said, my recommendation
is to initiate a clean boot as
the first step to optimizing your
system.

the next step is to review your
virtual memory.

open up the virtual memory
control panel and review the
recommendations posted
at the bottom portion of the
dialog window.

compare what is being
"currently allocated" to
what is "recommended"



--
db·´¯`·...¸><)))º>
DatabaseBen, Retired Professional
- Systems Analyst
- Database Developer
- Accountancy
- Veteran of the Armed Forces
- @hotmail.com
"share the nirvana" - dbZen

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

 

[Gerry]

Frank

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.

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?

You should be able to gather more information from Task Manager. With
the Processes tab open select View, Select, Columns and check the boxes
before Peak Memory Usage and Virtual Memory size. What are the figures
for the 6 processes using the largest amounts?

--


Hope this helps.

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

 

[Frank]

Much of the feedback is confusing to me but I see a consensus that I should
be running and event log and process explorer. I will read the instructions
and do so. My concern is that if I do have a problem with something running
in the background - I may not know its a problem. What tips can you provide
to help recognize what is normal and what may be a problem?

 

[SC Tom]

You can access event viewer from Start, Run, eventvwr, and press enter.
There will be 3 sections of interest- Applications, Security, and System.
Check any of the ones that say 'warning' (yellow !), and error (red X).
To copy one and post it here, open it and click on the 2-pages icon near the
upper right, just below the up and down arrows. That copies the info to the
clipboard, and you can paste it into a reply here.

SC Tom

 

[PA Bear [MS MVP]]

Help! My computer is slow!
http://miekiemoes.blogspot.com/2008/02/help-my-computer-is-slow.html

 

[JS]

Since your PC is running slow in Process Explorer
look for a process that is taking a large % of your
CPU's resources (25% of more). Click on that process
(if you see a "+" it means there are more subprocces, so
click on the + to expand the list and show the sub-processes.
If it's one of the sub-processes click to highlight it and then right
click to "Search Online" for more information a bout a process.

Keep in mind that if Process Explorer is the only application
you are running then on a PC that's functioning normally you
would expect to see the "System Idle Process" at about 99%.

Double clicking on a process will open up a window with
additional information such as the "Path" and file name.

You will note that 'Company Name' is the last column displayed.
To add addition columns place your mouse cursor to the right of
'Company Name' and right click for a list of other columns that
can be added.

 

[Unknown]

Do you run disk cleanup regularly?

Much of the feedback is confusing to me but I see a consensus that I
should
be running and event log and process explorer. I will read the
instructions
and do so. My concern is that if I do have a problem with something
running
in the background - I may not know its a problem. What tips can you
provide
to help recognize what is normal and what may be a problem?

 

[Daave]

Comments inline.

Hopefully someone can help me. I purchased a new desktop PC with
Windows XP installed on it over 5 years ago. I have had no problems
with speed until recently.

That is useful information. That means that something happened recently
to cause this sluggish behavior. Hopefully we can pinpoint it quickly.

The PC has 1GB of RAM and a Pentium 4
processor, but like I said, I have never had problems with speed, etc.

Nor should you; those are good specs.

What has been happening is that the PC is has begun to run very slow
over the last 3-4 months. Good examples of this are when I click on
IE to get into the Internet, it takes a couple minutes to connect
where it never did before (I have a fast cable internet provider) and
most noticeably is that when I use Outlook Express to check my
emails, it takes several minutes to retrieve mail where up until a
few months ago, it was almost instantaneous. Also, when I get out of
IE - the hour glass stays on for a bout a minute while back to the
desktop.

I would be curious to know if you would have the same sluggishness using
another browser. Opera, Firefox, and K-Meleon are all very good. Links:

http://www.opera.com/

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/ie.html

http://kmeleon.sourceforge.net/

If the other browsers work fine, you need to address your IE issue. When
was the last time you emptied your cache? Which add-ons do you use?
(Sometimes a toolbar can bring a system to a crawl.) Have you tried
running IE in the No Add-ons mode?

I am very good about keeping the PC clean and well maintained, and run
several different anti-virus and malware programs on a weekly basis,
so I don't think thats the problem.

Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. It's impossible to know. Which anti-malware
programs do you use? Do they have the most up-to-date definitions?

I have noticed that there have
been many Windows updates in the past 3-4 months and don't know if
its a coincidence that this is about the same time that the PC
started running slower.

In fact, it *is* possible for a Windows update to do just that. One of
the offerings -- Windows Search 4.0 -- is a well known dog.

I also just upgraded to IE 8 thinking this
would help but no such luck.

That was a bad move. Upgrading while having problems very often results
in more problems. Upgrading should only be done while trouble-free.
Also, it is well documented that IE8 doesn't play well with Spybot
Search & Destroy's immunization feature. The first thing I would do is
uninstall IE8! (At a later time, if you wish to upgrade to IE8, start a
new thread to get proper guidance as there are a number of precautions
that should be taken first.)

I am looking for ideas. Could it just be that the PC is old and I
need to reinstall XP again?

No. Then again, it would solve your problem. Until it comes back.
Better to identify the problem and solve it with a scalpel rather than
with a sledgehemmer.

Or do you think the updates have caused
this. or - so you have any other recommendations? Your expert help is
greatly appreciated. Thanks!

More (boilerplate) info on slow PCs follows. Pay special attention to
number 5 -- your hard drive's access mode.

Here are the typical causes of sluggishness:

1. Malicious software (malware). You need to rule this out first! This
page has excellent information:

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

2. Certain programs that are designed to combat malware (e.g., Norton
and McAfee). Ironically, they can slow things down because they simply
use way too many resources. Sometime they cause conflicts with other
programs. And their default mode is to scan your entire hard drive each
time you boot up. Fortunately, there are other antimalware programs
available that use far fewer resources (e.g., NOD32, Avast, and Avira).

3. Too many of certain types of programs always running in the
background -- with or without your knowledge.

Use these sites to determine what these programs are and to learn how to
configure them not to always run at startup:

http://www.pacs-portal.co.uk/startup_content.php#THE_PROGRAMS
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/startups/
http://www.answersthatwork.com/Tasklist_pages/tasklist.htm

Sometimes it is recommended to use msconfig to configure the programs to
not run at startup. A better, more thorough program is Autoruns:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.aspx

But before you do this, you should use the preference settings of the
program in question. Otherwise, for some programs, they will return to
the startup list anyway!

4. Not enough RAM, which causes the PC to overly rely on the pagefile. A
quick way to determine if this is happening is to open Task Manager
(Ctrl+Alt+Del) and click the Performance tab. Then note the three values
under Commit Charge (K): in the lower left-hand corner: Total, Limit,
and Peak.

The Total figure represents the amount of memory you are using at that
very moment. The Peak figure represents the highest amount of memory you
used since last bootup. If both these figures are below the value of
Physical Memory (K) Total, then you probably have plenty of RAM.
In case you want to explore this further, you may run Page File Monitor
for Windows XP:

http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_pagefilemon.htm

5. You might also want to check that your hard drive's access mode
didn't change from DMA to PIO:

http://www.technize.com/2007/08/02/is-your-hard-disk-cddvd-drives-too-slow-while-copying/

and

http://users.bigpond.net.au/ninjaduck/itserviceduck/udma_fix/

 

[Frank]

I hope I did this correctly. I had a number of errors and warnings under the
applications section and they pretty much were numerous repeats of what I
pasted below. Not sure what this tells me but maybe you can shed some light.
Thanks.

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Application Hang
Event Category: (101)
Event ID: 1002
Date: 7/1/2009
Time: 6:06:24 PM
User: N/A
Computer: FLORIO

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Application Hang
Event Category: (101)
Event ID: 1002
Date: 6/16/2009
Time: 8:17:09 PM
User: N/A
Computer: FLORIO
Description:
Hanging application iexplore.exe, version 7.0.6000.16850, 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 69 65 78 70 6c 6f iexplo
0018: 72 65 2e 65 78 65 20 37 re.exe 7
0020: 2e 30 2e 36 30 30 30 2e .0.6000.
0028: 31 36 38 35 30 20 69 6e 16850 in
0030: 20 68 75 6e 67 61 70 70 hungapp
0038: 20 30 2e 30 2e 30 2e 30 0.0.0.0
0040: 20 61 74 20 6f 66 66 73 at offs
0048: 65 74 20 30 30 30 30 30 et 00000
0050: 30 30 30 000


Event Type: Warning
Event Source: MSSQL$MICROSOFTBCM
Event Category: (8)
Event ID: 19011
Date: 7/1/2009
Time: 4:14:46 PM
User: N/A
Computer: FLORIO
Description:
The description for Event ID ( 19011 ) in Source ( MSSQL$MICROSOFTBCM )
cannot be found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry
information or message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer.
You may be able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see
Help and Support for details. The following information is part of the event:
(SpnRegister) : Error 1355.

Event Type: Error
Event Source: crypt32
Event Category: None
Event ID: 8
Date: 6/26/2009
Time: 4:29:20 PM
User: N/A
Computer: FLORIO
Description:
Failed auto update retrieval of third-party root list sequence number from:
<http://www.download.windowsupdate.com/msdownload/update/v3/static/trustedr/en/authrootseq.txt>
with error: The specified server cannot perform the requested operation.


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



Description:
Hanging application OUTLOOK.EXE, version 11.0.8217.0, 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 4f 55 54 4c 4f 4f OUTLOO
0018: 4b 2e 45 58 45 20 31 31 K.EXE 11
0020: 2e 30 2e 38 32 31 37 2e .0.8217.
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

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Lavasoft Ad-Aware Service
Event Category: None
Event ID: 0
Date: 5/24/2009
Time: 2:29:13 PM
User: N/A
Computer: FLORIO
Description:
The description for Event ID ( 0 ) in Source ( Lavasoft Ad-Aware Service )
cannot be found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry
information or message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer.
You may be able to use the /AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see
Help and Support for details. The following information is part of the event:
Failed to uninstall service.


Event Type: Warning
Event Source: Outlook
Event Category: None
Event ID: 25
Date: 6/8/2009
Time: 7:54:33 PM
User: N/A
Computer: FLORIO
Description:
Unable to update public free/busy data.

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

 

[Frank]

To answer more of your questions...

"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?"

Total - 618544; Limit - 2516832; Peak - 850936

"Select, Columns and check the boxes

before Peak Memory Usage and Virtual Memory size. What are the figures
for the 6 processes using the largest amounts?"

Peak Memory - Svchost.exe - 187616; Outlook.exe - 77344; AAWService.exe -
102168; McShield.exe - 169596;; McProxy.exe - 162596; Explorer.exe - 39196;
hpqgalry.exe - 27212

Virtual Memory - Svchost.exe - 16736; Outlook.exe - 46088; AAWService.exe -
28080; McShield.exe - 165804; McProxy.exe - 5800; Explorer.exe - 29196;
hpqgalry.exe - 20380

I hope this helps!

 

[Gerry]

Frank

Please obtain more readings for McShield.exe for Virtual Memory. Can we
ascertain whether 165804 is typical. Readings, either just after booting
or a scheduled scan, may be high but what is happening at other times?

What is your exact version of McAfee? Does it have the latest updates?
When does your subscription expire? Is your computer a home or business
computer?


--


Hope this helps.

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

 

[Gerry]

Frank

The "Event Source: Application Hang" reports are symptoms of the
problem.

Select Start, Control Panel, Administrative Tools, Services and right
click on Computer Browser and select Properties. The StartUp
type should be Automatic. Is it?

--


Hope this helps.

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

 

[Frank]

Yes, the start up type was selected as "automatic"