Slow computer fixes????

[Cyclonesrule91]

My Dell Laptop that I use for work has all the sudden decided to imitate a turtle in it's speed and although I am trying to remain calm, I have work to be done on this computer and I am currently thinking about throwing the SOB out the window.

It started when I started getting these Sonic Updat Manager update errors. I googled it and found out how to get rid of that but it is still slow and what used to take under a minute to get booted up now takes about 10 minutes. I just installed Office 2007 Ultimate and the Outlook that I use takes forever to get running as well. I went to the website and found a program called RegCure that said it was a free download and says it will optimize and speed up my computer. I download it, scan my computer and it finds 1,143 errors(WTH???) but when I go to fix it they can't do it unless I register the full version($79.95) so I uninstall because I KNOW my fellow CF'ers can help me do it better and/or cheaper then that, or to tell me to fork over the cashola and buy the software.

I am using Windows XP if that helps.

Any help would be much appreciated and save me from spending more by replacing this one if I do throw it out the window........GGGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRr

Thank you in advance.

 

[isucyfan]

Here's what I'd do:

1. At the "Run" prompt, type "chkdsk" and push enter. Run through that utility and see what it fixes.
2. Run a complete virus and spyware scan. Adaware and Spybot are good free spyware utilities.
3. Defrag
4. Make sure you have adequate hard drive space. Clean up files if you don't
5. (Probably should have already done this, but) Back up important files
6. If all else fails, reinstall XP and have a snappy new machine!

 

[Cyclonesrule91]

I have Adaware and Spybot and run both pretty often and they don't find anything. I will try the "chkdsk" and let you know what it says.

When I get it rebooted up..........which might be awhile.

 

[Cyclonesrule91]

I am defragging right now. what does all the lines that look like a barcode with red, blue and green lines mean on the computer. It shows 117Mb out of 144Mb as free space. It must take a while.

 

[isucyfan]

The colored lines are just a visual representation of the file portions. The computer rearranges them back to a more organized state so they can be accessed faster.

I take it you mean you have 117 Gigabytes free, not Megabytes. If so, that is not your problem.

 

[4429 mcc]

Here's what I'd do:

1. At the "Run" prompt, type "chkdsk" and push enter. Run through that utility and see what it fixes.
2. Run a complete virus and spyware scan. Adaware and Spybot are good free spyware utilities.
3. Defrag
4. Make sure you have adequate hard drive space. Clean up files if you don't
5. (Probably should have already done this, but) Back up important files
6. If all else fails, reinstall XP and have a snappy new machine!

What does this do and how do I do it if I need to.

 

[cytech]

chkdsk is a program that checks your hard drive for error's in previous versions of windows it was called scan disk.
A easy way to locate both chkdsk and defrag is to open up my computer then locate your hard drive generally drive letter C: . Right click on it and goto proterties, under the tools tab you will find both check disk and defrag.

 

[isucyfan]

What does this do and how do I do it if I need to.

It (theoretically) scans your hard drive for corrupted files, bad sectors, etc. and then fixes them. You can access it through My Computer, selecting the HD the operating system is on, then right-clicking, selecting Properties, then Tools, then "Check Volume for Errors".

The steps and wording may be a little different than what I outlined, as I am on Vista now, and on XP it is different. The concept is the same, however.

Note: This scan takes quite a while if you have a newer, large capacity HD.

 

[Skyh13]

What does this do and how do I do it if I need to.

chkdsk is a disk check utility that windows has built-in. It's a handy little thing that can occasionally fix some errors.

My suggestion for chkdsk would be:

For Windows 2000/XP:

Click "Start"
Click "Run"
type in: cmd
when the command prompt appears, put the following:

chkdsk %HomeDrive% /F /R

That will do the most thorough version of chkdsk, although it pretty much guarantees that you'll have to restart your computer and run it before windows loads up. If you want to do it with windows running (less time, less thorough), then just put

chkdsk %HomeDrive%

Also, as far as free utilities, there are a couple that I have which work nicely, I believe one of them is RegClean
Welcome to RegClean - Scan, Repair & Speed up your PC!

And the other is

CCleaner
CCleaner - Home

CCleaner gives you all the basic options for free, and simply helps clean up some unnecessary files on your computer. RegClean does the whole, cleaning up errors in your registry which can cause problems/slowness.

By the way, all you Dell users.. that Sonic Update Manager is for your CD burning software. It's Sonic! something.. don't remember the exact name. So, that's what it's for. In reality, it isn't actually anything that important.

 

[cytech]

Easy cleaner is a good free utility too for cleaning up the registry and temp files, deleting start up items, removing programs etc.


http://personal.inet.fi/business/toniarts/files/EClea2_0.exe

 

[Bader]

CCleaner is a great tool for cleaning up crap (its called CrapCleaner) and fixing registry problems

CCleaner - Home

Also Diskeeper is another good tool for Defraggleing and doing HD maintenance. You have to buy it but you can use the trial which will clean up a lot of problems and keep you going for quite a while. M$ defrag utility really blows

Diskeeper - Maximizing computer performance and reliability automatically utilizing defrag