PC boot problem

Anyone had this before ...

PC allways in good shape, booted perfectly,

but after one year on the machine:

- PC boots, but very slow, ... I mean, real slow, it stops booting at a certain point and waits 2 or 3 minuts, then it continu's, even after a windows XP re-install.

+??

What kind of processor do you have. A Intel P4 slows down if it doesn't get enough cooling. After a year there can be a lot of dust in the cooling block and fan. So if you have P4 your processor slows down to prevent burning the CPU (and your PC is than very slow). That can be the problem...

Open up Windows Explorer and right-click on your hard drive (C:\ or whatever). Click on properties and go to the tools tab. Under Error Checking click on check now and put a check in both boxes in the dialogue box that pops up. Click Start and answer Yes to the next popup window, then reboot. It may take considerable time depending on the size of your hard drive. This will fix any corrupted files on your hard drive, sounds like maybe the registry got partially hosed.

The single most valuable tool for hard drives is called SpinRite. Go to www.grc.com to find out about it.

If you are in any way responsible for hard drives or PCs, you will want this.

OG

I use Registry Mechanic, lots of dud entries from program installation and removal can really slow things up with Windows looking for things that do not exist or are not located where indicated in the registry.

Also use Spyware Doctor to keep the "nasties" away. Find it is about the best.

Also use Comodo firewall - generally does not leak and is free.

Also use Diskeeper Pro Premier to keep the hard disk compact and clean. It works in the background all the time only using unused resources.

Also use NOD32 virus scanner - according to Virus Bulletin it has not missed a "virus in the wild" in 8 years. Does not hog resources like Norton either and the support subscription is inexpensive and includes all engine updates - no more paying for the privelege of owning the latest version - it is automatically part of the support.

I would try these products and then SpinRite - excellent product also.

Yeah, let's not confuse apps here. Spinrite is simply a hard disk maintenance and recovery tool. If you have a dead hard drive and no backups, Spinrite will very likely recover the disk and your data.

Spinrite also excels as a maintenance tool. It will not cleanup your registry or prevent spyware or viruses, but it can identify surface defects on the disk itself and recover the data in the affected areas and rewrite them to a good sector.

If you have reinstalled Windows and the problem still exists, then Windows and the registry is not likely the issue. More likely a hard drive issue. Now, if you are re-imaging then it is possible the problem also exists in the backup image. But you did say re-install, not re-image.

Is this computer connected to the Internet? If so, try disconnecting all network connections when rebooting. If the problem goes away, then look for spyware. If this PC was connected to the Internet, you might also looking for a program called Rootkit Revealer. This can discover things hidden from Windows. Anti-Spyware and Anti-Virus programs cannot detect rootkits. If anyone ever popped in a Sony Music CD then you might have a rootkit. But they can come from lots of sources, like fake anti-virus programs!!

OG

..

Once booted, it works fine

My Name said:

What kind of processor do you have. A Intel P4 slows down if it doesn't get enough cooling. After a year there can be a lot of dust in the cooling block and fan. So if you have P4 your processor slows down to prevent burning the CPU (and your PC is than very slow). That can be the problem...

Click to expand...

...

The PC takes a break in his booting before the XP logo appears, once the XP logo appears, it's actually continuing like it should.

It takes a break the first steps in booting...

Operaghost said:

Yeah, let's not confuse apps here. Spinrite is simply a hard disk maintenance and recovery tool. If you have a dead hard drive and no backups, Spinrite will very likely recover the disk and your data.

Spinrite also excels as a maintenance tool. It will not cleanup your registry or prevent spyware or viruses, but it can identify surface defects on the disk itself and recover the data in the affected areas and rewrite them to a good sector.

If you have reinstalled Windows and the problem still exists, then Windows and the registry is not likely the issue. More likely a hard drive issue. Now, if you are re-imaging then it is possible the problem also exists in the backup image. But you did say re-install, not re-image.

Is this computer connected to the Internet? If so, try disconnecting all network connections when rebooting. If the problem goes away, then look for spyware. If this PC was connected to the Internet, you might also looking for a program called Rootkit Revealer. This can discover things hidden from Windows. Anti-Spyware and Anti-Virus programs cannot detect rootkits. If anyone ever popped in a Sony Music CD then you might have a rootkit. But they can come from lots of sources, like fake anti-virus programs!!

OG

Click to expand...

I would still have a good look at the registry as there is probably a lot of rubbish in there that Windows is looking for - this will certainly slow down the boot process. Windows itself leaves a lot of rubbish in the registry, not too mention every other program you install.

Definately check the hard disk as well. It could be causing problems as could networking.

There is a way to shorten up the delays in the boot process with XP. I will have a look and see if I can find the magazine article.

What processor? How much memory? How big a hard drive? What size is the cache? They can all contribute.

even after a windows XP re-install.

Click to expand...

If he repartitioned the computer. How can it be the registry? Just curious.

WinXP re-install......this doesn't say much. As there are quite a few ways to re-install WinXP.

I think what most would like to know is:

How did u re-install WinXP?
Did u boot from CD and did clean install, ie. full format of C:?
Fast format?
Popped in the WinXP CD while already running and selected: Install WinXP?

Try the basic PC troubleshoot: eliminate all componants one for one. ie disconnect CD-drive then boot, replace RAM then reboot, till all HW has been tested.

Yes this takes time, but eventually you will find the problem....if it's HW-related

If the hard drive and memory are OK, re-formatting the hard drive (not fast either) will clean the hard drive right out. Then you install Windows XP, then your other programs and straight away there are stray entries in the registery. Would you believe even installing Acrobat Reader leaves stray entries in the registery. Try it on a new machine and then run (yuck) Norton Tools or Registry Mechanic and they will both find a heap of dll files that are not in the places described in the registry as written by Acrobat Reader.

I quite often have to search the net for files that are not installed properly by install programs and download them and place them in the folder described in the registry.

Automation1 said:

If he repartitioned the computer. How can it be the registry? Just curious.

Click to expand...

Windows XP, 512 Ram and 2,2 Ghz,

A common problem solved by removing a flakey USB device or having network connections defined that are no longer there.

Another venue is to load HijackThis to see what is running in Windows. It won't show rootkits but it may be surprising what's running in the background. By making frequent registy backups, googling what an application is, and then remove questionable entries to see if it clears up the slow down. There are forums that are available to analyze the output from the program.

The slow down on boot may also be a device manager hardware resolution issue, go into Settings/ Control Panel/ System and see if there are any yellow circled question marks for any device or if there are more than one instance as this could point to driver conflicts.

Does the speed of the system slow down with time? If so, it may be a memory leak from a program or driver. This is often causes hard drive thrashing (constant read/write to the hard drive). With 512mB of memory and XP and depending on the applications runnning on the PC, alot of thrashing may be occurring that uses up the mechanical life of the hard drive to the point it starts having read/ write errors.

As mentioned earlier, when reinstalling Windows reformat and do a clean install.