Need computer help bad.(XP issue)

[Sandman_GN85]

Alright this problem has bothered me long enough. One day outa the blue my computer began to start going slow. REAL slow. But only with microsoft applciations(Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, My Documents, MY Computer etc). Its friggin ridiculous now. I searched the net and can't find anything to help. My computer was bought in like september, 2.2ghz 496 ram laptop. Ppppplease help a poor sap . Thank you.
BTW I have Ad-aware and norton all up to date and run.

 

[jays87gn]

try defraging

 

[Sandman_GN85]

Defragged tonight, cleaned registry, even deleted file microsoft screwed up on in the SP1 for xp like microsoft.com said. Still slow as a honda.

 

[gn85]

Have you tried to deactivate or stop the Messenger chat program?

Often times that will slow everybody else down.

Do MS programs go slow all the time, or just at certain events. What happens with Control-Alt-Delete? Is your processor showing any strange amount of usage? Network activity? How many processes are running?

 

[Sandman_GN85]

The windows messanger? YEa killed that in the beginning i believe, cause it was popping up like spam. Only MS programs are slow like All Windows explorer, my documents, Internet explorer, etc. Netscape which i downloaded so I could even surf the net with this problem, works fine. No computer nutball useage, the usual processes running since I got it I believe.

 

[gn85]

Yes, you may want to take a look at that. My Outlook Express was taking an extremely long time to get mail when I tried to take out Messenger. Eventually I ended up leaving Messenger running (after a reinstall). The icon stays in the system tray and the program runs. I just customize the system tray to not show that icon. All MS programs seem to run fine.

I agree, Messenger is annoying and I don't use it. But it can cause problems with other programs. Darn MS has them tangled together.

 

[Sandman_GN85]

so how can i enable messenger again, but not get the spam windows? thanks
(PS it worked fine when i took it out for about a month.)

 

[JFH]

Check the Microsoft web site (Search in Knowledge base ) they tell you how to disable it.

JFH

 

[Sandman_GN85]

Tried everything now, notta. Even installed System MEchanic 4 , did everything it can do, and still no fix. Grrrrr I HATE Computers.

 

[krom]

Use your system restore to a date when it was running good.

Start, then help and support,system restore

 

[HellOnWheels]

Computer help

Sandman,

I had the same problem and fought it for days finally cured the problem by going into Tools-internet options-advanced-and blanked Multimedia and was instantly back up to speed.

Good luck,

HellOnWheels

 

[Sandman_GN85]

System restore wouldnt work for some reason, never was able to restore on any date i selected, tried everyone of them one day.
About blankin the media, how do you see pics, and how did it affect your speeds of my documents.

 

[jays87gn]

if all else fails you can always reboot the computer

 

[3mta3]

hit control alt delete and you'll get your task manager, go into processes and see what is hogging up your cpu time and memory usage. The system idle process should be the highest. If anything else is as high as that, click once on it and then hit end task at the bottom. It'll give you a warning but that's ok. Write down what it is (or what they are) and let us know. You may have some spyware that's killing your machine, if your processor and memory are maxed then everything will be slow.

I hope this helps

 

[striker_29]

Run spybot and ad-aware.

 

[Sandman_GN85]

Been running Ad-aware since i bought the computer, one of the first programs I downloaded. System idle is the most CPU useage. Ran Spybot, Adaware, and did everything on Iolo System mechanic. Notta. I would reformat but never could find the blasted XP cd.

 

[3mta3]

question, have you updated the referrence files??? If not you may want to update them, it's like running an old version of anti virus, it may not see anything new running on your pc

 

[kgouldsk]

I had a hard drive go bad on me recently, started logging media errors and becoming unresponsive. When it did that, XP makes a change to put the IDE port into a compatibility mode. Kind of like a "limp home" Right click my computer and manage it, then

device manager
ide/atapi
do properties on your primary ide channel and look at advanced.

If it's not set to "DMA if available", set it to that and reboot.

There is also a registry key XP will set sometimes, and you have to delete it manually, but I don't know what it is. I remember having a b1tch of a time finding it.

 

[d0n_3d]

funny i deleted msn messenger on my computer and my windows xp pro runs faster than ever before...i always delete stuff i never use...like our cars, computers need "TUNING"...you need to run system mechanic on your computer as well as get mcafee virus scan and one of the adware programs like spybot or ad-aware...those will clean your computer in a hurry