Windows Forum

Ask something
Discussion Locked

Anemic PC

0 helpful
16 replies

by brifd1

Closed to new repliesThis discussion is closed. It stays readable, but it takes no new replies.
My Dell PC (XP SP2) suddenly slowed to an anemic pace. It takes F O R E V E R to do anything with it. I called Dell tech support, and they suggested trying CounterSpy. It took me F O R E V E R but I finally was able to get the Safe bootup w/network support and to be able to download it. It took F O R E V E R to get it installed (it rejected many times), but now it hangs up. My other spyware programs (Spy Sweeper, AdAware, Spybot) all are similarly stymied. I have a 2nd HD on this PC, so I've been attempting to migrate my data files over there (they're not backed up), but thus far haven't been successful. I cannot get Windows Update to run (yet). Any other ideas???

16 replies

by bmedlock

Do you have any means of testing your hardware? If so, test it. If not run your spyware programs in Safe Mode, also check for virus. I'd also run sfc /scannow.
Can you do a system restore? If none of this works you have two choices, reload the OS, or have someone else test the hardware.
If it's still acting up in Safe Mode, it's most likely a hardware issue.

by normh3

I would try unplugging the second hard disk and then rebooting. It's possible that it is causing issues on the bus. Secondly, it wouldn't hurt to remove all I/O cards that aren't necessary to booting the PC (ie.. network card). You might also check bios and see how much memory is listed. Bottom line...take the PC down to bare configuration and see if the symptoms change.

-Norm

by cg it

yeah I'm thinking the same thing as Norm. The second drive is cauing the problem.

by cg it

Its happened to me on occasion on a W2003 server where we had a hardware RAID array and an IDE drive and the IDE drive just make the server take forever to do anything. Once we took off the IDE drive zippty do dah. We reformatted the IDE drive and volia! problem gone.

by lmayeda

Did you check some other basic stuff like ... how much free space do you have on your C: drive, how fragmented is it? Check your Task Manager to see what processes are monopolizing the CPU. How much memory do you have installed? Task Manaager would give you an indication if your PC has been hijacked (lookup processes that you cannot identify via google to see if they are valid or spyware). If the problem truly started "suddenly" then it would tend to indicate hardware issues and the suggestions above are good.

by brifd1

Yes, I did all of that. It was about 50% full. I also checked to see if the memory was properly seated...no reason that it wouldn't be, but just in case...and it was, 1GB worth.

by brifd1

It's still crawling, but I downloaded the allegedly-missing DLL file (for CounterSpy to run) on another PC and transfer it to this one, then run CounterSpy. It found 3 spyware-one a key logger, which I had never had flagged by my existing spyware, along with the perennial Dogpile-which the Microsoft spyware program always/exclusively/and only flags, and what was termed as a minor one for Ad-Aware. Hopefully, by the time I get home again, CounterSpy will have finished quarantining the first two. I was also able to xfer all of the docs from the HD to the spare HD, again crawling to do so. But, heck, it's better than losing it all.

by brifd1

More information:
The CPU constantly shows 100% usage (per TaskMgr)-
no wonder it's slow, huh?
Also, in the list, it showed multiple copies of
msmsgs.exe, then one disappeared; multiple copies of
realplay.exe, and most noticably, 6 copies of
svchost.exe running (3 attributed to SYSTEM-sizes
3820 5148 and 18876-2 to NETWORK SERVICE-sizes
4276 and 2624-and 1 to LOCAL SERVICE (4192). I've
been able to-via a jump drive-slowly install a variety of
diagnostics programs. If I get a report from those, I'll
comment about it. Next is to look up what svchost.exe is
for.

by brifd1

System Mechanic finished the registry cleanup, and now I'm about 2/3rds through the "find duplicates" process that the message says will take "several minutes" but in fact has taken closer to several days. This may/may not be the last of the various processes that System Mechanic has available. Whether or not that's the case, I think I'll re-boot after this process is done-maybe by this weekend? It appears to be running a bit faster...at least when I do a Start/Explore, there's only about a 15 second delay now (vs. at least a couple of agonizing minutes before), and TaskMgr has indicated CPU usage occasionally dropping into the 60% range.

by brifd1

Found the problem. My son had made some changes to the BIOS settings without my knowledge, and he didn't think that had anything to do with it until recently. He had also swapped processors with his previously-slower computer! Now, having cleaned up this PC's registry etc. in search for the "holy grail" as to why this PC as so anemic, it runs faster than it ever has.

This discussion is closed to new replies.