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Thread: Windows XP Startup Lag

  1. #1
    Member Predator33's Avatar
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    Windows XP Startup Lag

    Hi, quite a while ago my pc began to take forever to startup. When i boot my pc it does all its stuff than takes me to my login screen, i choose my account and it takes me to my desktop. I see everything on my desktop but i cannot do anything until the windows startup tune plays, than i can finally do my work, i have to wait quite a while until it plays. My paint also takes forever to load (about 3minutes). Help would be much appreciated. Thx

  2. #2
    Member Radi0h3ad's Avatar
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    Well I'm by no means an expert but if it were me, and my computer was experiencing ridiculously long loading times, even for just paint then I would scan it for viruses... like I say, I'm no expert.
    Do you maintain your system at all? i.e defrag regularly etc? How long have you had it? What's it used for? 'Cos I do know it's very possible for a system to experience slow down if there's alot of rubbish lurking around that's never used.
    Mine had a few problems, long start ups was one of them. A complete system format and reinstall of OS sorted it, no problem!

    Maybe someone can offer better advice, but that's my opinion.

  3. #3
    Senior Member BuildItYourself's Avatar
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    maybe hibernate instead of shut down and restart every now and then? hiberntion on my machine takes about 15 seconds to completely start up.

  4. #4
    Ultimate Member cdroman's Avatar
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    Check the condition of your hard drive. I had a similar problem of very long start-up times and long load times for certain apps and it was caused by a dying drive that had terrible uncached performance.

  5. #5
    Hail to the Victors dajogejr's Avatar
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    Originally posted by Radi0h3ad
    Well I'm by no means an expert but if it were me, and my computer was experiencing ridiculously long loading times, even for just paint then I would scan it for viruses... like I say, I'm no expert.
    Do you maintain your system at all? i.e defrag regularly etc? How long have you had it? What's it used for? 'Cos I do know it's very possible for a system to experience slow down if there's alot of rubbish lurking around that's never used.
    Mine had a few problems, long start ups was one of them. A complete system format and reinstall of OS sorted it, no problem!

    Maybe someone can offer better advice, but that's my opinion.
    All good advice, let me offer some more.

    1st, Welcome to Sysopt.

    We could use the system specs. Mobo type, CPU, amount of RAM, etc.

    Also, what operating system...

    Have you looked into running a spyware checker/remover.

    spbybot and Ad Aware are tops in my opinion... Free downloads, free updates, and compliment eachother quite well.

    How many programs do you have starting up automatically when you boot into windows?

    Kazaa, AOL AIM, printer software, firewall, antivirus....the more, the slower the startup.

    How bout some more info...and I think we'll be able to help out nicely!!

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    He said he had XP.

  7. #7
    Hail to the Victors dajogejr's Avatar
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    Darn that header...always forget that one...

    Anyways...still need more info.

  8. #8
    Member thefossil's Avatar
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    Isn't this something to do with the "prefetch" feature?

    do a search for prefetch on sysopt and you'll find many little tweaks to help with the boot, I can't remember which one worked on the office PC.

    as I am still a win98se holdout, I'll just keep looking at the fetching-looking ones myself... would that be "self-prefetching?"


  9. #9
    Hail to the Victors dajogejr's Avatar
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    C:\windows\prefetcher

    I clean out this folder once every few weeks....

    Don't think that's his problem, unless it has about a million things in it...

    I think it's more or less a housecleaning thing...

  10. #10
    Extreme Member! BipolarBill's Avatar
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    MS MCP, MCSE

  11. #11
    Member Predator33's Avatar
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    Just to reply to your questions:
    I maintain my system regularly, i've had this pc for about 5months and i use it mostly for gaming, web surfing and the occasional homework.

    System Specs.
    OS: Windows XP Home Edition
    Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-8IG1000 http://tw.giga-byte.com/MotherBoard/...A-8IG1000.htm#
    Processor: Intel Pentium 2.4GHz w/ Hyperthreading
    Memory: 2x 256mb PC2700 DDR Ram
    Video: Radeon 7000 64mb
    Harddrive: Not to sure on this one but i think it's a 120GB Deskstar 180GXP, 7200rpm Hitachi or an IBM.

    I have used Adaware and i usually scan once a week.

    I don't quite think they are programs but if you are talking about the icons at the taskbar, when i start up theres a Sound Effect and Intel(R) Wired Network Adapter then later on the sound once comes on

    I use to have kazaa lite on my computer but i took it off for all that RIAA stuff going on, and I didn't use it to often anyways.

  12. #12
    Hail to the Victors dajogejr's Avatar
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    Sounds like you've got the basics covered, pretty well!! Good job.

    I would open it up, find out what hard drive you have....and run the manufacturer's diagnostics on it.

    Oh...and a good third party defragment tool wouldn't hurt, if you aren't already doing that.

  13. #13
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    I think you guys missed something.

    Choose run from your start menu and type in "msconfig". Hit enter and click the startup tab. In this list uncheck everything you dont recognize. In fact, with winXP, it's ok to jsut hit "disable all". Click ok and restart. This will not cause any harm. If, however, something stops working, jsut go back to this utility and recheck the appropriate box.


    Now if that doesnt help go to the same utility and click the "services" tab. Look through for something suspicious. Hit the "hide all microsoft services" button to make this easier. If you find something, disable it. Again, you will not cause any harm, just mite disable soemthing you need. In which case, you can u jsut re-enable it.

    Also, a lot of the microsoft services can be disable bcuase they are useless. You can find lists on the web. Anyone have a link? Though these are not gonna be responsible for the loading times that you are describing.

  14. #14
    Senior Member mpacey's Avatar
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    Originally posted by Predator33

    Harddrive: Not to sure on this one but i think it's a 120GB Deskstar 180GXP, 7200rpm Hitachi or an IBM.

    You can download (for free) AIDA32, and it will not only tell you exactly what type of Hard Drive you have, but more info. about your system than you will probably ever need to know.
    Dell PIII 1000MHz, Maxtor 30GB Maxtor 20GB, Western Digital 10GB, Seagate SATA 250GB 7200, LG DVDRW D/L, LG DVD-ROM, HP DeskJet 1120C, Canon BJC-2000, BJC-2100, HP PSC 750xi, Dual-Boot (XP SP3 Home - ME), etc.

  15. #15
    Hail to the Victors dajogejr's Avatar
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    Or...Device Manager in XP...

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