Slow start up?

[jordane182]

Hello

Yesturday when i turned on my comp it took about 2 min to load up from the windows picture thing and just sits at a black screen with the cursor. It has never taken this long. I ran spyware,virus,defrag and checked the start up programs but nothing worked. I also tried to boot in safe mode to but that also took a long time. If anybody else had this problem and knows how to fix this can you plz help me out.

Thanx

[skinonmyteeth]

I had this kind of problem on my notebook. I reckon u should try to disable firewall settings or Anti Virus or kinda . In my case it was due to the in built wireless settings and if i Let it ON then it starts to look for available networks. Try doing something like this, it might help.

[NITROUS SYSTEM]

To hell give it a format.....My pc does that kind of things after a few months i do my formating..

[jordane182]

Well i dont want to reinstall every thing. So i guess ill have to just deal with it.

[Crypton]

Do me a favor,

Download HiJackThis
http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/

Choose Scan + Log Only

Post the log file here as an attachment so I can have a look.

[jordane182]

K i already have hjack and it was the first thing i checked when it happend but i didnt see anything that was obvious. Heres the log.
Thanx crypton

[jordane182]

Hey i looked around on the internet and i seen a program called bootvis. Has anyone tried it and no if it works good or not?

thanx

[Crypton]

yes, bootvis works,

But, question, is that XP Home or Pro?

Anyhow, log looks clean enough.

Slowdown is most likely due to McAfee AntiVirus. Which in that case you can try Bootvis, or try uninstalling McAfee then rebooting a couple times just to see if it is the cause. You can always reinstall it.

Also take note, if in McAfee options you have it set for active file protection, it will scan EVERY file loaded during startup, while this is good, it is also a major performance hit.

Suggestion, disable Active File Protection and do manual scans at least once every few days.

[jordane182]

K thanx crypton.
I have xp pro and ill try messing around with mcaffe but i dont why all of a sudden it did this cuz ive had mcafee for years and i havent changed any thing lately.

Thanx again.

[Crypton]

Few questions:

When is the last time you ran scandisk and defrag on your drives?

Have you played with any tweaking tools lately?

If so, which one(s)?

I will post a couple files for you after I get up in the morn with some instructions, will clean your system a bit and see if it helps, in the meantime, goto start > run and type in chkdks /f

It will ask if you want it to run on next boot up, type Y and press enter

Then reboot and let it do its thing, it will scan, and autoreboot itself again,

After that, run defrag on your drive(s)

Anyhow, check back later and I will have a few things for you to try. Atm, I gotta hit the bed, dead tired and got alot of things to do in the morn.

[Crypton]

Download attachment and read readme inside.

[jordane182]

Ok ive ran scan disk , chk disk , norton win doctor, O&O defrag (complete name) , tweaknow regCleaner.

Thanx

ill download the attachment when i get home.

Thanx again

[jordane182]

Ok i downloaded that attackment and followed your instructions. I notice a difference in my comps performance but not the start up. I was wondering where you got the speedboot?And also the xp clean up thing compressed old files. What files does it compress and does it compress program files? I was wondering if would compress some of my program files and mess things up?

I was looking around and found a site that said that if you start in safe mode and it stills takes a long time its a driver problem. I tried safe mode and it takes just as long as normal mode. Do you think my problem is because of drivers?

Thanx for all your help crypton.:)

[Crypton]

The cleanup and speedboot are scripted myself, I do almost all my tasks such as cleanup using batch files.

And actually, some of my tools are simple batch files which I put into an installer, such as Safedisc 4 Blocker on the gameburnworld.com site.

And yes, the site you read is correct, it can be a driver issue, however, if you feel it may be a driver issue, you should uninstall video/sound drivers, reboot, then reinstall latest versions to see if it fixed the issue.

Also, make sure to run Windows Update and grab any updates on the MS Upsate Site.

Alot of small conflicts can be sorted by updating.

However....

What size Hard Drive are you using AND how much space is left?

Alot of times slowdowns can be caused by a drive that is more than 80-85% full. If you have a pretty full drive, you may want to try uninstalling things you no longer use or need and then try running defrag again to push things to the front of the drive.

As for your question, the compression of old files will not hurt anything, it is built into Windows XP and when the file is accessed it is uncompressed on the fly for usage. Mainly files that have not been accessed in a while (say 2 weeks or so) will be compressed to increase freespace.

[jordane182]

Well my C: drive is a 250gb(but only really has 233gb) and im using 57% of it and i also have another hard drive that is 40gb and im using 63% of it. So i dont know if that has anything to do with it. Im just going to have to deal with it and start using stand by more.

Thanx For your help.

[jordane182]

Today i went to wake my computer out of stand by and it crashed.It got to the desktop but the taskbar didnt load. So i rebooted and tried to stand by againg and it barely loaded back. It took a pretty long time to wake out of stand by. I restarted and it said primary master drive boot failure and primary slave drive boot failure. So i turned off my comp and unpluged it and pluged it back in. When i restarted i went to look on the internet and my computer started going really slow. And then it just restarted its self. I dont know what to do now. If anyone else had the same problem plz help me out.

Thanx

[Crypton]

I would check the Manufactures Website for the hard drive you have such as MAxtor, Seagate, Western Digital, they will have tools you can download to test your hard drive to see if it is in fact failing.

However, HDD (Hard Drive) problems does not always mean the drive is going bad, it can be as simple as the BIOS battery or IDE Cable needs to be replaced, HEAT, or even something a bit more extreme such as the IDE Controller on the motherboard going bad.

Without testing the hardware with some tools, there will be no real way of telling unless the Drive is making odd sounds or something decides to die.

I would recommend if you have a CD Burner to get Ultimate Boot CD, it contains a collection of tools that are free and useful for testing your hardware ect..

** NOTE ** You only need the "Basic" version, unless your a power user and know how to use Linux ect. Then you do not need the "Full" version.
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com

[jordane182]

I tried testing some things and found out its my hard drive.When i try starting the hard drive makes clicking noises and it says it has failed. When i got my new western digital hard drive it came with that copy tool to clone your old drive to your new one. So i saved my old drive(with windows) and it booted up fine. Then i set my failed drive to a slave to try and access it but it wouldnt boot up(Primary slave failed). So my hard drive is in the shop right now and hopefully he can recover my files. Could this hard drive problem been messing up my booting up and stand by problems?

Thanx for your help crypton.

[Crypton]

**SNIP**
I tried testing some things and found out its my hard drive.When i try starting the hard drive makes clicking noises **SNIP**

eww, yeah clicking is definately dead hard drive. I would not run it anymore m8, get a new one, then if your lucky, you can plug the new one up (leave old one out) install windows on the new one, then you can hook the old one up as well and may still be able to recover stuff off of it by copying from the old one to the new one.

Sorry your drive went out :( I know the feeling though, have had that happen quite a bit over the years.

And yes, hardware failure can effect anything and everything.

[jordane182]

Ya im going to have to get a new one. The guy at the shop said its probily the arm thing that is broken and wont let it spin. And he tried all his ways of recovering it and they didnt work.Good thing its still under warrenty. Im going to start buying maxtor because i have 2 maxtors hard drives that have lasted over 6 years and i havent had a problem with them and this western digital couldnt even last 6 months.

Thanx again for your help crypton.

[Crypton]

aye np m8 :) The All mighty Maxtor! I love their drives myself,

But I do not recommend the "Fireball" series. They tend to be trouble.

[UPucker]

I would also make a ghost backup image after you get window/drivers/updates installed. Then again after you get everything you always use installed. That way if you ever have to switch drives, or have problems, you can go back to a cleanly installed state in a few minutes.

[jordane182]

what should i use to make this image. also if i ever crash again to restore everything wont i have to reinstall windows again to be able to restore my image?

thanx

[Crypton]

what should i use to make this image. also if i ever crash again to restore everything wont i have to reinstall windows again to be able to restore my image?

thanx
Programs such as Norton Ghost, Drive Image can make a backup image.

It is sorta like installing Windows, cept, you do not have to really "reinstall" from scratch.

The idea is, you install Windows, get it running how you want it, such as drivers, ect.. tweak it up so it is running nice.

Then make an image using the said programs. This image can be burned to CD/DVD and made into a custom Restore Disc.

If you have issues at some point in time, such as a nasty virus, or even if Windows just starts runnin like crap and your unable to get it running smooth again, you can pop in the restore CD and overwrite the Partition/OS with the good copy you had made.

Yes, if you have stuff you want to keep, you would need to back them up prior to running the restore from the image, anything and everything on there would be wiped out and replaced with the clean copy you had made.

So, it would be good to invest in another Hard Drive or even just back things up to CD/DVD before you run a restore.

[jordane182]

Ya i dont think ill go out and buy norton just for that i dont mind just starting over.

Thanx

[UPucker]

Crypton explained it well. Its really a good investment. You make a snapshot image of your boot drive, every month or whatever. Then even if windows is corrupted, you can boot the install cd, and install the image in about 10 minutes. It just copies everything over the existing data. You can also install a new hard drive, and do the same.

Instead of waiting more than an hour to install windows, drivers, updates, plus whatever else has been installed, you can do it in around 10 minutes. :) I dont know how much your time is worth, but that should make it worth it alone. Plus doing it monthly to save important emails, etc is a must anyway.

[NITROUS SYSTEM]

Nice method of cleaning your pc....