Solve : Is F/F slowing my computer or something else??

1.	Solve : Is F/F slowing my computer or something else??
Answer» Hi and thanks for reading my thread. I have been recently having a more and more slow computer. By slow I mean in response to clicking, such as: the computer hangs for some seconds before any indication of data transfer. eg click on a link/instruction to open or go to a webpage etc, computer hangs for a time then the fan speeds up and off it goes. When it gets there ( lets say a webpage), the computer hangs again the little BLUE indicator in the corner (FireFox Browser) hangs, then decides it wants to get some data, and delivers the page. Not only though in the Firefox browser. Say I want to open a word document, same thing. Click to open MSword, the computer hangs for a couple of seconds, then opens the program. The program get the outline (blank in the centre) and fills in after a couple of seconds. (Sorry if this sounds silly but I dont know how else to explain it). Other times when I am not using the computer, but it is on, I can hear the fan grinding away as if trying to cool something really hot. When this fan grinding occurs, if I go to task manager, I find the CPU is maxed out at 100%?? So now I'm thinking its more of a memory problem? I just cant work it out. Now, there are a couple of things that have changed in recent times. Nothing on the side of the computer however, that has been the same for years. No memory upgrades, hard drive changes, CD player is the same... everything is the same. I changed internet provider, but I dont see how that can effect the computer. Other than that I updated Firefox, via their general update downloads. (This is F/F 3.6.27) I run anti-Malware programs regularly, I have AVG and Microsoft Essentials and run them, also SUPERAntiSpyware. Also I have CLEANED out the dust inside the case on a regular basis. I have some thermal paste in a syringe and am thinking of refreshing the chip surface. Can someone please offer any other solutions or methods, to determine the source of my problem. Thank you ImnoGuru.It is not a hardware issue that can be cured with just good maintenance. More likely you have background tasks that are running. It would help of you tell what computer you have and what OS.Quote from: Geek-9pm on February 27, 2012, 04:54:54 PM It is not a hardware issue that can be cured with just good maintenance. I disagree...it's happening in browsing ...but other apps as WELL such as Office. I suspect overheating (loud fan mentioned ) or HDD issues. DLoad install and run SpeedFan and post your temps... Also DLoad and run the Free HDD diagnostics from the dribe manuf. site...run the long test...(i do it at bedtime)Hardware specs? Quote from: ImnoGuru on February 27, 2012, 04:45:07 PM When this fan grinding occurs, if I go to task manager, I find the CPU is maxed out at 100%?? Open Task Manager and see what specific task is consuming CPU resources. Quote I have AVG and Microsoft Essentials and run them If you mean MSE and AVG installed and running at the same time, this is where you should start first. Two antivirus running would cause you a slow to a crawl problems. Quote from: jason2074 on February 27, 2012, 07:25:59 PM If you mean MSE and AVG installed and running at the same time, this is where you should start first. Two antivirus running would cause you a slow to a crawl problems. Well spotted, there's your problem right there. Thanks for your replies everyone and I apologise I havent been able to get back to you till now. Quote from: Geek-9pm on February 27, 2012, 04:54:54 PM More likely you have background tasks that are running. It would help of you tell what computer you have and what OS. Quote from: Raptor on February 27, 2012, 05:50:52 PM Hardware specs? Geek-9pm and Raptor, this operating system is Xp Pro 2002, SP3. The CPU is Pentium 4, 3.00 GHz and 1.5 gig of RAM. I have a newish Western Digital 500 Gig hard drive connected with a Sata cable. The drive is about 2 years old. I cannot think of what type of "Background tasks" you can be referring to, mainly as this computer doesnt do a great deal anymore. I use it (currently) for ebay searches and the TV guide. The kids use it for facebook sometimes but not often. Quote from: soybean on February 27, 2012, 05:51:14 PM Open Task Manager and see what specific task is consuming CPU resources. Thanks soybean. I dont know if I can take a copy of the box with processes running so I copied them over and these are the highest consumers; Firefox.exe is wildly high at 322,372K and currently @ 330,608K, plugin-container.exe @26,266k, SvHost is 42,200k, AVGWDSVC.EXE is 15,988k MSMpEng.exe is 48,185K, Sysytem running @ 10,560K and sysytem idle is 00 K. Most of the rest of the other processes are below 10,00K. The Task manager performance screen shows the CPU running @ 100% and there is a red line on the graph that shows another range of performance in the overlay ( I dont know what this is) that is running variously between 80% but below 90% then drops momentarily to 60% and straight up again. It was something that I changed in the options section of Task Manager. Quote from: patio on February 27, 2012, 05:32:47 PM I disagree...it's happening in browsing ...but other apps as well such as Office. I suspect overheating (loud fan mentioned ) or HDD issues. DLoad install and run SpeedFan and post your temps... Also DLoad and run the Free HDD diagnostics from the dribe manuf. site...run the long test...(i do it at bedtime) Thanks too patio, I have speedfan and that tells me that the HD0 temp is at 90 degrees F and the cpu at 100%. I tried to find this diagnostics from (dribe manuf. site) but Im not sure that I got the correct one. I picked the Acronis site from a selection from Google but havent DLoaded anything yet, till I find out if that is the right one to use? Quote from: jason2074 on February 27, 2012, 07:25:59 PM If you mean MSE and AVG installed and running at the same time, this is where you should start first. Two antivirus running would cause you a slow to a crawl problems. Quote from: reddevilggg on February 28, 2012, 08:25:39 AM Well spotted, there's your problem right there. Thank you both jason2074 and reddevilggg, I can see where you are coming from with this too and I agree that it might be a cause. I had some previous problem with MS Essentials that is now fixed. I havent noticed any problem during the past with both of these running at the same time, so I will disable AVG or uninstall it first to see if that brings any joy. Again thanks for the input everyone, I will follow these suggestions remove AVG and see if I can get a HDD diagnostic. I had a program once that showed the different type files and directories .... Ah I remember its called WinDirStat, is that of any use to us ? The only new additions to my programs list is; DivX Plus. Not that I have used it yet for anything I think it was just an update addition with an IE update.... I dont use IE at all actually, I hate it. (with a passion). (Just an info comment there.) Hi its been a while and I have tried a couple of things to reduce the difficulties with this computer. I cleaned out all the dust internally (not that there was much. I keep my computers pretty clean actually.), reseated the ram and did a few scans with updated antivirus programs. I removed the fan and checked operation, gave it a bit of a lube job in the bearing and reseated the chip. Now with all of that, the best results seem to have been the virus scans. The computer has certainly not raced away to 100% use of the CPU as before. ( probably a product of the virus scans) The scans only responded to 1 (what it called ) a virus. The fan has definitely reduced in noise, although I'm not sure that was a product of the oiling or the scans. Using speed fan as suggested and going through some of the features in the tabs, "INFO". "DIMM Info". "Read info." .. the readings for DIMM#0,1,2,3 show 2 @ 512 & 2 @ 256. Quote from: patio on February 27, 2012, 05:32:47 PM Also DLoad and run the Free HDD diagnostics from the dribe manuf. site...run the long test...(i do it at bedtime) patio, I havent been able to locate this drive diagnostics that you replied about. Can you make a new suggestion for a HDD diagnostics feature that I can use please? The good news in all this is, that the computer no longer is using 100% of the CPU and is now at a very satisfying 1 - 3% and up 23% during use, even with several windows open and the temperature has dropped to 84 degrees F. The bad news is that the curser is still lagging as is the computers response to everything. & by everything I mean everything. Opening a program sometimes gives me a white box where the screen is loading the program... then it catches up and the blinking curser takes several seconds to appear. This occurs during all sorts of operations, opening webpages , clicking on an article in a webpage opening office, moving through a document while in word, opening the start menu and trying to see a additional list that a program has and so on. Even typing this reply the curser doesn't keep up with my ridiculously slow typing pace. I am TOLD that memory issues are most likely to be the cause of the lag in the computer. Could maybe the memory modules be causing this problem or should I be looking at the chip? Thank you to all with your suggestions. ImnoGuru Quote patio, I havent been able to locate this drive diagnostics that you replied about. Can you make a new suggestion for a HDD diagnostics feature that I can use please? Quote The bad news is that the curser is still lagging as is the computers response to everything. & by everything I mean everything. Opening a program sometimes gives me a white box where the screen is loading the program... then it catches up and the blinking curser takes several seconds to appear. Why not use SeaTools ? MHDD also works good for detecting bad sectors. Google how to run a scan with it. It will also erase what are called "software bad sectors" which are sectors on the drive that have been marked by the drives error correction as bad. Sometimes sectors can be marked bad due to drive overheating, or power issues... But this erases data on the drive so back up first. It may serve well to try a Live Puppy Linux CD to help isolate the issue. Your computer may still be infected. I wouldn't install an AV with all features enabled on a single core processor. But that's just me.. As always suggested, make sure you have complete back-up of all important files. In any case the hard drive is suspected being faulty. While downloading the hard drive diagnostic, you can use also the Windows error checking tool. Post the result and any unrecoverable boot sector could mean a hard drive is inevitably going south anytime. If you are having online and offline lagging problem, check the hard drive status first.

Answer»

Hi and thanks for reading my thread.

I have been recently having a more and more slow computer. By slow I mean in response to clicking, such as: the computer hangs for some seconds before any indication of data transfer. eg click on a link/instruction to open or go to a webpage etc, computer hangs for a time then the fan speeds up and off it goes. When it gets there ( lets say a webpage), the computer hangs again the little BLUE indicator in the corner (FireFox Browser) hangs, then decides it wants to get some data, and delivers the page.

Not only though in the Firefox browser. Say I want to open a word document, same thing. Click to open MSword, the computer hangs for a couple of seconds, then opens the program. The program get the outline (blank in the centre) and fills in after a couple of seconds. (Sorry if this sounds silly but I dont know how else to explain it).

Other times when I am not using the computer, but it is on, I can hear the fan grinding away as if trying to cool something really hot.
When this fan grinding occurs, if I go to task manager, I find the CPU is maxed out at 100%??
So now I'm thinking its more of a memory problem? I just cant work it out.

Now, there are a couple of things that have changed in recent times. Nothing on the side of the computer however, that has been the same for years. No memory upgrades, hard drive changes, CD player is the same... everything is the same.

I changed internet provider, but I dont see how that can effect the computer.
Other than that I updated Firefox, via their general update downloads. (This is F/F 3.6.27)

I run anti-Malware programs regularly, I have AVG and Microsoft Essentials and run them, also SUPERAntiSpyware.

Also I have CLEANED out the dust inside the case on a regular basis.

I have some thermal paste in a syringe and am thinking of refreshing the chip surface.

Can someone please offer any other solutions or methods, to determine the source of my problem.

Thank you ImnoGuru.It is not a hardware issue that can be cured with just good maintenance.

More likely you have background tasks that are running.

It would help of you tell what computer you have and what OS.Quote from: Geek-9pm on February 27, 2012, 04:54:54 PM

It is not a hardware issue that can be cured with just good maintenance.

I disagree...it's happening in browsing ...but other apps as WELL such as Office.
I suspect overheating (loud fan mentioned ) or HDD issues.

DLoad install and run SpeedFan and post your temps...
Also DLoad and run the Free HDD diagnostics from the dribe manuf. site...run the long test...(i do it at bedtime)Hardware specs? Quote from: ImnoGuru on February 27, 2012, 04:45:07 PM

When this fan grinding occurs, if I go to task manager, I find the CPU is maxed out at 100%??

Open Task Manager and see what specific task is consuming CPU resources. Quote

I have AVG and Microsoft Essentials and run them

If you mean MSE and AVG installed and running at the same time, this is where you should start first. Two antivirus running would cause you a slow to a crawl problems.
Quote from: jason2074 on February 27, 2012, 07:25:59 PM

If you mean MSE and AVG installed and running at the same time, this is where you should start first. Two antivirus running would cause you a slow to a crawl problems.

Well spotted, there's your problem right there. Thanks for your replies everyone and I apologise I havent been able to get back to you till now.

Quote from: Geek-9pm on February 27, 2012, 04:54:54 PM

More likely you have background tasks that are running.
It would help of you tell what computer you have and what OS.

Quote from: Raptor on February 27, 2012, 05:50:52 PM

Hardware specs?

Geek-9pm and Raptor, this operating system is Xp Pro 2002, SP3. The CPU is Pentium 4, 3.00 GHz and 1.5 gig of RAM. I have a newish Western Digital 500 Gig hard drive connected with a Sata cable. The drive is about 2 years old.
I cannot think of what type of "Background tasks" you can be referring to, mainly as this computer doesnt do a great deal anymore. I use it (currently) for ebay searches and the TV guide. The kids use it for facebook sometimes but not often.

Quote from: soybean on February 27, 2012, 05:51:14 PM

Open Task Manager and see what specific task is consuming CPU resources.

Thanks soybean. I dont know if I can take a copy of the box with processes running so I copied them over and these are the highest consumers;
Firefox.exe is wildly high at 322,372K and currently @ 330,608K, plugin-container.exe @26,266k, SvHost is 42,200k, AVGWDSVC.EXE is 15,988k MSMpEng.exe is 48,185K, Sysytem running @ 10,560K and sysytem idle is 00 K. Most of the rest of the other processes are below 10,00K.

The Task manager performance screen shows the CPU running @ 100% and there is a red line on the graph that shows another range of performance in the overlay ( I dont know what this is) that is running variously between 80% but below 90% then drops momentarily to 60% and straight up again.
It was something that I changed in the options section of Task Manager.

Quote from: patio on February 27, 2012, 05:32:47 PM

I disagree...it's happening in browsing ...but other apps as well such as Office.
I suspect overheating (loud fan mentioned ) or HDD issues.

DLoad install and run SpeedFan and post your temps...
Also DLoad and run the Free HDD diagnostics from the dribe manuf. site...run the long test...(i do it at bedtime)

Thanks too patio, I have speedfan and that tells me that the HD0 temp is at 90 degrees F and the cpu at 100%.
I tried to find this diagnostics from (dribe manuf. site) but Im not sure that I got the correct one. I picked the Acronis site from a selection from Google but havent DLoaded anything yet, till I find out if that is the right one to use?

Quote from: jason2074 on February 27, 2012, 07:25:59 PM

If you mean MSE and AVG installed and running at the same time, this is where you should start first. Two antivirus running would cause you a slow to a crawl problems.

Quote from: reddevilggg on February 28, 2012, 08:25:39 AM

Well spotted, there's your problem right there.

Thank you both jason2074 and reddevilggg, I can see where you are coming from with this too and I agree that it might be a cause.
I had some previous problem with MS Essentials that is now fixed.

I havent noticed any problem during the past with both of these running at the same time, so I will disable AVG or uninstall it first to see if that brings any joy.

Again thanks for the input everyone, I will follow these suggestions remove AVG and see if I can get a HDD diagnostic. I had a program once that showed the different type files and directories .... Ah I remember its called WinDirStat, is that of any use to us ?

The only new additions to my programs list is; DivX Plus. Not that I have used it yet for anything I think it was just an update addition with an IE update.... I dont use IE at all actually, I hate it. (with a passion). (Just an info comment there.)
Hi its been a while and I have tried a couple of things to reduce the difficulties with this computer. I cleaned out all the dust internally (not that there was much. I keep my computers pretty clean actually.), reseated the ram and did a few scans with updated antivirus programs.
I removed the fan and checked operation, gave it a bit of a lube job in the bearing and reseated the chip.

Now with all of that, the best results seem to have been the virus scans.

The computer has certainly not raced away to 100% use of the CPU as before. ( probably a product of the virus scans) The scans only responded to 1 (what it called ) a virus.

The fan has definitely reduced in noise, although I'm not sure that was a product of the oiling or the scans.

Using speed fan as suggested and going through some of the features in the tabs, "INFO". "DIMM Info". "Read info." .. the readings for DIMM#0,1,2,3 show 2 @ 512 & 2 @ 256.
Quote from: patio on February 27, 2012, 05:32:47 PM

Also DLoad and run the Free HDD diagnostics from the dribe manuf. site...run the long test...(i do it at bedtime)

patio, I havent been able to locate this drive diagnostics that you replied about. Can you make a new suggestion for a HDD diagnostics feature that I can use please?

The good news in all this is, that the computer no longer is using 100% of the CPU and is now at a very satisfying 1 - 3% and up 23% during use, even with several windows open and the temperature has dropped to 84 degrees F.

The bad news is that the curser is still lagging as is the computers response to everything. & by everything I mean everything. Opening a program sometimes gives me a white box where the screen is loading the program... then it catches up and the blinking curser takes several seconds to appear.

This occurs during all sorts of operations, opening webpages , clicking on an article in a webpage opening office, moving through a document while in word, opening the start menu and trying to see a additional list that a program has and so on. Even typing this reply the curser doesn't keep up with my ridiculously slow typing pace.

I am TOLD that memory issues are most likely to be the cause of the lag in the computer.

Could maybe the memory modules be causing this problem or should I be looking at the chip?

Thank you to all with your suggestions. ImnoGuru Quote

patio, I havent been able to locate this drive diagnostics that you replied about. Can you make a new suggestion for a HDD diagnostics feature that I can use please?

Quote

The bad news is that the curser is still lagging as is the computers response to everything. & by everything I mean everything. Opening a program sometimes gives me a white box where the screen is loading the program... then it catches up and the blinking curser takes several seconds to appear.

Why not use SeaTools ?

MHDD also works good for detecting bad sectors. Google how to run a scan with it. It will also erase what are called "software bad sectors" which are sectors on the drive that have been marked by the drives error correction as bad. Sometimes sectors can be marked bad due to drive overheating, or power issues... But this erases data on the drive so back up first.

It may serve well to try a Live Puppy Linux CD to help isolate the issue. Your computer may still be infected.

I wouldn't install an AV with all features enabled on a single core processor. But that's just me..

As always suggested, make sure you have complete back-up of all important files. In any case the hard drive is suspected being faulty. While downloading the hard drive diagnostic, you can use also the Windows error checking tool. Post the result and any unrecoverable boot sector could mean a hard drive is inevitably going south anytime. If you are having online and offline lagging problem, check the hard drive status first.

Solve : Is F/F slowing my computer or something else??

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