[RESOLVED] XP Is too S L O W

[WesTurrant]

What can I do to speed up XP? I reformatted my computer and this time only installed Home Edition because I thought it used less memory. I Changed a few of the performance settings so try and speed things up and I upgraded my memory, but its still SLOW! Its a fresh install and there is nothing on the system except for Norton Internet Security 2007... maybe that is what is slowing it down?

P4 3.0Ghz - 2 GB DDR

It takes a long time to load Visual Studio and move around in projects.

Also is there a way to stop the stupid Startup Page from showing in Visual Studio each time it loads? Its extremely annoying and I think it also slows things down when it tried to connect to the internet everytime I start VS.

[PeejAvery]

If it is a fresh install and running slow, then automatic updates are probably slowing the machine down. Have you fully updated the machine? If not, open Internet Explorer. From the Tools menu, select Windows Update.

You can check this by seeing if Task Manager CPU usage is up. Then, right-click on My Computer and go to Properties. Select the Automatic Updates tab and disable automatic updates. Now see if the Task Manager registers less CPU usage.

Note: Do not install hardware/driver updates from Microsoft. They tend to screw up machines.

Here are some other options to try. All are free.

Spyware/Antivirus
AVG Antivirus (http://free.grisoft.com)
Spyware Terminator (http://www.spywareterminator.com)
Spybot - Search & Destroy (http://www.spybot.info/en/download/index.html)
LavaSoft Adaware Personal (http://www.lavasoftusa.com/products/ad-aware_se_personal.php)

Maintenance
Tweaknow Regcleaner (http://www.tweaknow.com/RegCleaner.html)
Dustbuster XP (http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=1182)
TuneXP (http://www.download.com/TuneXP/3000-2086_4-10290928.html)

Also, don't forget to defrag your hard drive. To truly defrag...


Disable the page file
Reboot
Defrag
Enable the page file **


** Set the maximum and minimum to the same number. That should be about 1.5 times the MB of RAM.

[TheCPUWizard]

WATCH the hard drive light. If it is on more than 5% of the time (while the system is idle), then something is running and accessing your drive.

Start to use PerfMon (available under Control Panel) to monitor key system metrics.

[WesTurrant]

I know about that, I installed a new mouse driver from MS and it totally messed up my mouse. Its a simple $5.00, 2 button mouse. It shouldnt need any special drivers. Since I formatted the only hardware update I installed was for my modem, and I'm going to rollback that driver and see what happens.

I turned off system restore and also file indexing service on my entire drive. I know those things show stuff down a lot. I also turned off all XP settings and reverted to the Standard Windows Theme which I like better anyway.

I know that there is nothing on the system since I just installed windows yesterday and I did a complete low-level format on the drive. Unless there was something in the MBR but Norton IS 2007 would have noticed that.

I installed SP2 for XP but there were still almost 200 updates I needed to download (stupid MS). I downloaded 84 updates on the first shot, and then there were 30 more to fix those, and then more to fix those, it was inscane. I'm begining to think MS doesn't know *** they are doing.

I'm still downloading two update for Visual Studio SP1 and SQL 2005 SP1. I HOPE those are the last two updates.

Anyway things seems to have sped up quite a bit since I shuft all the stuff off. I will see what happens when all the updates are completed. Then I will turn off automatic updates and check for them manually each week. I don't want to shut that off now because im 80% done downloading those to service packs which are huge, because I'm only using dial up.

BTW: There is never any hard drive activity unless I am loading something then it pounds for ever, so I enabled system managed virtural memory... I think that might do something? Unless with 2GB of RAM should I disable virtural memory?

[TheCPUWizard]

It is *generally* a bad idea to disable virtual memory on a typical "development" machine. Just make sure it is a fixed size and not fragmented.

The reason is that as you use your machine, physical memory is sure to become fragmented. The way Windows (at least NT3.51-->2003) work is to use the page file area to assist in defragmenting.

[WesTurrant]

Well If I turn off system managed setting, what should i use for a min and max values? So I can give it a fixed size? I normally dont play with it so I have no idea what the best setting would be.

I also never thought about running defrag on my hard drive either, I will check that and use scan disk as well. I haven't done that since I formatted. Virtural memory will be defragmented with the defrag program? Since its on the file system?

Thanks.

[TheCPUWizard]

The page file can not be defragmented when it is use. That is why the earlier sequence is critical.

As for Size, it should show a "recommended" size on the dialog box. That is usually sufficient.

[S_M_A]

On my home machine I run McAfee and the difference loading for instance IExplorer while running antivir and not running it is about a factor 5. Very often I experience that entering a subdir (with many big files) freezes the window for minutes, this never happens when McAfee is disabled. This is also the behaviour of my corporate machine (can't remember what antivir it's running). Lately it seems like a standard that "all" antivirus software consume more or less all available cpu-cycles...

So, try to temporary disable your antivirus. If this don't make a difference maybe you have some hardware that is not fully healthy?

Double-clicking a sln-file to load my Studio2005 takes about 3 seconds (antivir disabled) on my P4 3.6GHz / 1 Gb RAM with XP Professional so I guess if you experience your machine to be slow it should not be due to XP.

EDIT: I know thread is "closed" but after catching up the new entries I just have to give a word of warning about buying McAfee... Wizard, I don't know how other antivirus SW can be configured these days but McAfee has removed all useful configuration that could be made in previous versions. Instead they have replaced it with a useless home made security center with fancy animations. On top of that the SW calls upon manual login actions now and then requiring a password to be able validate that SW is genuine. Of course it also pops up an ad now and then telling me that they have other overpriced SW to sell... As Wes I'm also stuck with a 1 year subscription so these days I only enable McAfee when surfing the Web.

[WesTurrant]

I'm not sure how to defrag the page file then.

The recommened was 3067 I think, what ever it was I put both the initial and maximum to the same number I think it was 3067.

[TheCPUWizard]

Of course if you configure ANY antivirus so it performs virus scans on information loaded from a local drive you are going to cripple your machine.

Just think for a second, it is going to have to do a complete scan against the database of known virus's and/or calculate a "validation code".

Better to insure that a varius can not get onto the drive in the first place (as best as possible). Then run a periodic scan incase anything slipped through.

Of course a regular backup process is critical to system security. For example an image of my development machines HD is taken every saturday night [and new images do NOT overwrite old ones].

[WesTurrant]

My quess would be that norton internet security is to blame. I think it scans everything. but i dont know enough about it to shut off the scanning of files when they are loaded, etc. and only maintain minimum protection. The firewall should do ok, and as long as I dont download and use any files from the internet prior to running a manual scan on the file I think and running full system scans. I think I should be protected for the most part, but I don't know how to configure it.

I am just starting to program, so I dont have a "backup system" yet. I just backup my projects to 3 seperate USB drives every night. I don't have any backup tools except USB, I don't have and Burners.

If speed doesnt improve I will have to figure out how to disable norton. maybe their tech support can help,.

[PeejAvery]

It is *generally* a bad idea to disable virtual memory on a typical "development" machine. Just make sure it is a fixed size and not fragmented.
I would disagree with this point. As long as you have double the OS's recommended memory, disabling virtual memory is not a problem. However, I personally only disable virtual memory for defragmenting purposes.

My quess would be that norton internet security is to blame
That could be a great possibility. I personally, am not a fan of Norton. I believe that Symantec tends to be a resource hog with a well known name. Windows XP's firewall is secure enough for home users. If you are worried about viruses, stick with AVG as I have linked beforehand. For Spyware, use Spyware Terminator (http://www.spywareterminator.com/). Uninstall Norton and reboot. See if there are any differences.

[TheCPUWizard]

PeejAvery,

How long do you let your machines run without a reboot? If you cycle them every few days then physical memory fragmentation will usually not get critical [e.g. You turn the machine off most nights].

OTOH: If you expect a machine to be up for long periods of time [my backup server has been up 11 mointh 14 days right now(who says windows is not stable :D ], then not giving the OS to do some "shuffling" can (notice I did not say will) cause problems.

[PeejAvery]

How long do you let your machines run without a reboot? If you cycle them every few days then physical memory fragmentation will usually not get critical [e.g. You turn the machine off most nights].
Well, my Mac I shut down about once every 2-3 months. My PC I shutdown once a week. On my PC, I have Windows tweaked to unload DLLs on application shut down. You will also notice, I stated that I personally only would disable the page file if you were defragmenting.

[WesTurrant]

I disabled all of nortons auto protect features and turned on the windows firewall. I kept norton installed because I want to use its virus program. On top of that I just bought it 2 days ago for $50 and I have a 1-year subscription to updates. There is no way I can take it back to the store now so I am going to use it.

After restarting several times and running some programs my computer is at 110% now. It is extremely fast even with VS. I figured out how to shut off that start page in VS and now even that loads instantly. I knew that start page was slowing stuff down.

Thanks for all then help.

[PeejAvery]

You're welcome. Glad to hear you are back with some speed. :wave:

[TheCPUWizard]

Also glad to hear :wave:

Now you know that it is NOT XP that is slow! It is what you do with it... :p

Haven't used Norton for a while, and dont know if you are on a network (where you dont control all the computers), but it is typical to "auto-protect" network and other non-local drives in these situations.

As pointed out earlier, a nightly scan is usually a good idea [I have to resort to weekly because my HD array is so huge [5TB] it takes quite a while, so Saturday night is with the family, and I sleep in on Sunday, the perfect time to scan]

Also remember, that the Firewall does NOT protect in any way against virus's, it protects against external programs accessing your machine without your knowledge. Simerially, an anti-virus, does not protect against external access. For example if you have the telnet port open and no firewall, someone can access your machine and type "format c:", and no anti-virus in the world is going to care [I am NOT talking about packages that have antivirus+firewall of course]

Good Luck.

[dglienna]

Nobody mentioned AVAST from avast.com
I got rid of Norton after using it for years. Fate finally crippled my drive, and Norton didn't prevent it. :(

I was shocked not having to do a weekly 3 hour scan! I like the auto-scanning feature.

Looks like they bundled NAV with Vista on a clients machine.
We're going to restore it, and secure it properly. (might even recommend Avast)