WinXP EXTREMELY slow now

[Aaron]

My computer was recently reformatted and WinXP
reinstalled along with MS Office and Norton home edition.
Although opening and using files doesn't seem to be a
problem, navigating with Windows Explorer is a lengthy
process especially when browsing other computers on the
network( there are 5 computers total). After selecting
another computer in Explorer and then getting about 2
levels deep into the directory it will take about 1 to 2
minutes to reveal in the right pane what I expanded in
the left (CPU usage is at 100% during that time). When
navigating on my computer response time is better but
still about 2-3 times slower than what it should be. I
have no slowdown when browsing the internet. I thought
Norton might be slowing things down but I turned that
completely off with no difference that I could tell.
Here are some specifics on my computer:

Win XP Home Ed Version 2002 SP1
Intel Pentium III
666 MHz
256 MB RAM


Any ideas?

 

[Alan]

It appears that the only idea that Wyse1 had was to regurgitate Aaron's
message without adding anything.

Alan

 

[Guest]

I am seeing an extremely slow response as well. All I did different was to install the latest automatically-downloaded update.

It takes, literally about 45 minutes to boot, and about 3-5 minutes to respond to a mouse click.

What can I do??????

 

[John G.]

Hello Aaron, I have encountered this problem before, the first thing I
would do is to find out what programs are running the "background".
The cause for slow downs like this are:

Spyware running the background trying to check every webpage you
access for keywords.

Anti Virus software constantly detecting some sort of suspicious
activity from these spywares or simply surfing the net

Too many programs running the "background"

Defragmented hard drive

Bad Registry entries

Hardware Drivers need revision

Bad Hardware

Hard drive with damaged sectors
0. Disable Norton, this will speed up you computer a little.

1.
Run a scan disk for your hard drive, you can access this by going to
my computer, finding the hard drive Icon, right click on it select
properties tab and then click on tools then click on error-check now
button, make sure the two little boxes are clicked then press start
you will most likely have to reboot your computer.

2.
After you're done error-checking repeat the same process above except
this time click on defragment now, if you have a large hard drive you
might want to do this overnight.

3.
I recommend you download a program named "Code Stuff starter", it is
free, yet very well programmed with a nice interface:

http://www.simtel.net/product.download.mirrors.php?id=57830

This program allows you to turn on or off any programs running the
"background" also it shows you how much memory each program is using
as well CPU time.

4.
After you turn off all non-essential services with Code Stuff starter
Download Spybot search and destroy:

http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html

This program will search your computer for spyware, install, update,
then run spybot and delete all spyware on your computer, once that is
done use the immunize button in spybot.

5.
Now comes the real deal, registry fixing, if you have norton utilties
run the norton registry fixer, and authorize all recommened fixes. If
you don't have norton registry fixer, you can download a fully
function trial version from here:

http://www.winguides.com/regmech/?ref=Googlerco

You have to pay for the full version, but the trial version works
quite well, its a good investment anyway. Run it and authorize all
fixes.

4.
If none of the above works, then try to update your ethernet card
drivers or motherboard drivers.

5.
If that doesn't work check your hardware, bad memory, bad HD, bad
ethernet card, bad motherboard interface with ethernet card,...

John

 

[Guest]

I am not aaron, but appreciate your help and comments.

I am currently running adaware but it seems to be stuck on a key. In case this means anything to you, it is stuck on this key:
CLSID\{94abaf2a-892a-11d1-bbc4-00a0c90640bf}

It literally takes about 3-5 minutes for the @#$% thing to respond to a
mouse click, so this is a very long process (obviously I am writing this on
the laptop). When things get "stuck" I am not sure if it is just the slow computer, or if it is actually hung up.

I don't download any music, don't open any suspicious files. Norton's catches and deletes anything with a virus in it anyway (yeah, I know there could be one sneak through that Norton's doesn't know about yet). But I only open things from trusted
sources.

The only thing I can think of was that the MS update was infected!!!! Or
maybe I don't understand Spyware. Doesn't Norton prevent that from being
installed?

Grrrrrrrrrrr

So I guess if adaware doesn't fix things, my options are to:
-- go buy another hard drive (not a bad idea anyway, you can never have too
much space, or too many shoes, but that is another story) and just
reinstall everything
-- take the thing somewhere and let a tech figure it out