Computer Problem

galway.gaa

my computer is fairly new about a year. its windows vista but its gone really slow. it takes ages to open any window and its not the broadband connection. i have avg downloaded on it.
i dont know much about computers. just wonderin could it be a virus or somethin? if anyone can tell me what the problem is or how it can be solved it would be hugely appreciated.

thanks

Pablod

It could be a number of things ,

Start by Running a Virus Scan.
a couple of questions though
Do you know what memory (Ram) your PC has?
have you downloaded any new programs and vista may have warned you about
or do you have many other programs that could be running in the background

neil_hosey

backup all important stuff.. reinstall windows... dont bother trying to fix it.

Pablod

neil_hosey wrote: »

backup all important stuff.. reinstall windows... dont bother trying to fix it.

Not exactly the best advice - considering galway stated he doesn't know much about computers

and then theres the possibility it did not come with OS discs if the pc was just purchased from a retail shop

Black Swan

galway.gaa wrote: »

my computer is fairly new about a year. its windows vista but its gone really slow. it takes ages to open any window and its not the broadband connection. i have avg downloaded on it.
i dont know much about computers. just wonderin could it be a virus or somethin? if anyone can tell me what the problem is or how it can be solved it would be hugely appreciated.

Could you please provide more details?

• How much RAM does your computer have?
• When did you first notice it slow up?
• At the time of the slowing, had you added any programmes (applications or utilities)?
• How often to you update your Vista?
• Did you recently upgrade your Vista to SP2?
• Did you upgrade from IE7 to IE8 in the last couple months? (IE8 has been posing some problems affecting overall performance)
• Do you use Firefox? Which version? If using FF3.0, have you updated it to FF3.0.11? Have a friend that had not done so, and believes that the vulnerability in FF3.0.10 allowed for an attack, and he claims sluggishness in the last 3 days as a result.
• You are running AVG anti-virus? If so, how often to you update it? If not, then what anti-virus programme?
• How often to you do a scan with your AVG?
• What firewall are you using? If not Microsoft, do you keep it updated?
• How often do you disk clean using the Microsoft utility?
• How often do you defragment?

I've been running Vista for over two years now, and it now runs just as fast as when I had XP SP3, so it should not be sluggish.

neil_hosey wrote: »

backup all important stuff.. reinstall windows... dont bother trying to fix it.

I would not recommend this action without knowing a lot more about the current status of your computer, and having tried many other simpler solutions towards a fix.

galway.gaa

• How much RAM does your computer have? 1gb
• When did you first notice it slow up? about 2 weeks ago
• At the time of the slowing, had you added any programmes (applications or utilities)? i dont think so but other people use the computer
• How often to you update your Vista? i havnt, didnt know you had to. this could be it???
• Did you recently upgrade your Vista to SP2?
• Did you upgrade from IE7 to IE8 in the last couple months? (IE8 has been posing some problems affecting overall performance)
• Do you use Firefox? Which version? If using FF3.0, have you updated it to FF3.0.11? Have a friend that had not done so, and believes that the vulnerability in FF3.0.10 allowed for an attack, and he claims sluggishness in the last 3 days as a result. have it downloaded but dont use it
• You are running AVG anti-virus? If so, how often to you update it? If not, then what anti-virus programme? i use avg. updaye it every other day. do i need any other spyware?
• How often to you do a scan with your AVG?
• What firewall are you using? If not Microsoft, do you keep it updated?

Pablod

• How much RAM does your computer have? 512

This could be one part of the problem, becuase if you have loaded extra programs the 512 will definitly not be enough, you would need 1gb min for vista anyway - I would have taught.

Black Swan

galway.gaa wrote: »

How much RAM does your computer have? 512

Vista is sluggish on anything less than 1 Gig, no matter what someone tells you. If you can add another 512, your performance would increase considerably (but this does not seem to be the immediate problem).

galway.gaa wrote: »

When did you first notice it slow up? about 2 weeks ago...
At the time of the slowing, had you added any programmes (applications or utilities)? i dont think so but other people use the computer

Other users may have visited web sites that are loaded with malware, or perhaps downloaded programmes without your knowledge? Ask them.

galway.gaa wrote: »

How often to you update your Vista? i havnt, didnt know you had to. this could be it???

Yikes! Yes, you should put your Vista on "automatic update" so that whenever you go online it will update without you thinking about it.

galway.gaa wrote: »

[*]Did you recently upgrade your Vista to SP2?

You should upgrade to SP2 as soon as possible, as there are several security patches as a part of the upgrade, and you are currently vulnerable.

galway.gaa wrote: »

Did you upgrade from IE7 to IE8 in the last couple months? (IE8 has been posing some problems affecting overall performance)

IE7 and IE8 are versions of Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser, which you may use to surf the web or access boards.ie. Do you use it and have you upgraded it recently?

galway.gaa wrote: »

Do you use Firefox? Which version? If using FF3.0, have you updated it to FF3.0.11? Have a friend that had not done so, and believes that the vulnerability in FF3.0.10 allowed for an attack, and he claims sluggishness in the last 3 days as a result. have it downloaded but dont use it

You should update it to FF3.0.11 when convenient. You have allowed others to use your computer, and they may be using it, which would make you vulnerable.

galway.gaa wrote: »

You are running AVG anti-virus? If so, how often to you update it? If not, then what anti-virus programme? i use avg. updaye it every other day. do i need any other spyware?

I would recommend it. There are free versions of Ad-aware and Spybot S&D that will identify, and eliminate many types of spyware. You can find their URLs in the stickies of the security forum. If you are loaded up with spyware, they too can slow down your system.

• What firewall are you using? If not Microsoft, do you keep it updated?
• How often do you disk clean using the Microsoft utility?
• How often do you defragment?

galway.gaa

sorry i was mistaken it is 1gb of ram. how do yoiu go about updating vista?
how do you upgrade to SP2?

Im sorry if im annoyin people with my lack of knowledge but i really appreciate the help

WIZE

Start - Control Panel - Windows updates - Check for updates - Install.

If you go to control panel Please change to Classic view if you can not see windows update

galway.gaa

ya theres a few updates that need to be done alrite. hopefully thatll relieve some of the problem but automatic updates are turned on

WIZE

You will have to reboot the PC when its finished . I think the automatic update is crap . You should do that every 2-3 days . do you know how much space is left on you C drive.
To check this go to Start - Computer - right click on Local C drive - Properties. Check the Blue section

Black Swan

BVB wrote: »

I think the automatic update is crap . You should do that every 2-3 days.

I would agree with you, but only because I manually run MS update whenever I log on the first time a day (Only takes a couple minutes to check, unless there are several fixes and patches to install). Some don't think of it and need this feature, rather than let it go for weeks or months, as was the case with the OP?

The only auto-update I use is KIS2009, and it's user-friendly and can run in the background without any hassle with my apps. Now I have 2gigs memory and run Vista SP2, but if I had only 1gig or less, I would not have KIS2009 on auto-update, because Vista sucks up the first 1gig on boot and is a real resource hog during normal operation.

Black Swan

galway.gaa wrote: »

ya theres a few updates that need to be done alrite. hopefully thatll relieve some of the problem but automatic updates are turned on

Hope that our posts helped. I got side tracked and have not visited your thread in awhile. Is your rig running better, or do you still need help?

galway.gaa

ive run the vista updates but the computer is still slow.
thanks for helpin and comin back to check on me but really id like it to be faster

i dunno:o

mp22

hold down ctrl and shift press esc once windows task manager will open click processes look at the bottom of open window and see how many processes are running over 60 or 70 and this could be why pc is running slow

Black Swan

galway.gaa wrote: »

ive run the vista updates but the computer is still slow.
thanks for helpin and comin back to check on me but really id like it to be faster

Questions?

• How often do you disk clean? Start > Control Panel > System & Maintenance > Free up disk space > For all users on this computer (This should take a few minutes. I would do this weekly)
• How often do you defragment? Start > Control Panel > System & Maintenance > Defragment your hard drive (This may take a couple hours. I would do this once every couple of months)

You might also consider downloading a freeware disk clean utility. I use Ccleaner (the first "C" stands for "crap"). It cleans several items missed by Microsoft's disk cleaning utility and is compatible with Vista. See Link: http://www.ccleaner.com/

Let me know if this helps. You can post your progress here or send me a PM.

galway.gaa

mp22 wrote: »

hold down ctrl and shift press esc once windows task manager will open click processes look at the bottom of open window and see how many processes are running over 60 or 70 and this could be why pc is running slow

87

galway.gaa

Blue_Lagoon wrote: »

Questions?

• How often do you disk clean? Start > Control Panel > System & Maintenance > Free up disk space > For all users on this computer (This should take a few minutes. I would do this weekly)
• How often do you defragment? Start > Control Panel > System & Maintenance > Defragment your hard drive (This may take a couple hours. I would do this once every couple of months)

You might also consider downloading a freeware disk clean utility. I use Ccleaner (the first "C" stands for "crap"). It cleans several items missed by Microsoft's disk cleaning utility and is compatible with Vista. See Link: http://www.ccleaner.com/

Let me know if this helps. You can post your progress here or send me a PM.

right ive never done any of those things. i cant find System & Maintenance, just system and then i cant find what im lookin for i downloaded ccleaner and have it running

daveyboy_1ie

galway.gaa wrote: »

right ive never done any of those things. i cant find System & Maintenance, just system and then i cant find what im lookin for i downloaded ccleaner and have it running

To run a disk cleaner or defrag all you have to do is the same process you did to check available space on local drive (C Drive) (My computer, right click on C Drvie) and this time when you right click on C Drive click on properties and then on the 'Tools' section and then this will give you options of running system maintenance or defrag. Defrag slows your machine down considerably so should probably be run overnight or at least when you don't actually need to use your machine for a few hours. However in Vista I don't know how much of a help this will do, but its always worth the updates and system clean/ defrag routes just to make sure you are running a healthy PC.

Also I noticed the answer:

galway.gaa wrote: »

87

This seems high, maybe something is running in the background that you may not want. To stop any program running on start up just do the following 'Click START-RUN' and then type in msconfig and this will allow you to stop programs on the startup that you need by unclicking items like itunes etc. However I would be careful if you dont recognsie items to leave them alone, or at least do a little research with all the services/ programs that are running in the background as many of them you would need and the last thing you want is to stop vital services/ programs. After you make your changes you would need a reboot of your machine.

Also, one question, is this a PC or a laptop? if its a laptop the power settings might need to be changed to 'home/office' as this can slow down machines terribley. this can be changed in the control panel or even a shortcut is right click the mouse on your desktop, choose properties then screen saver and then power options and then you can change the power options here. Hopefully all these things can improve oerformance. Do you have the original disks that came with the machine?

mp22

galway.gaa wrote: »

87

if you are not happy using msconfig just use the stop process button in device manager if you stop any thing vital you can just reboot and all will be back to square one. note the processes that you can stop safely then use misconfig to stop them starting with windows