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tuning up a slooooooow computer

  
 
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LimpinAintEZ
Old 10-23-2006, 05:20 PM     Post subject: tuning up a slooooooow computer #1 (permalink)  
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Hey everyone,

been having a lot of issues with computer for past 2 weeks - Seems like since I went to Ultimate and got the Ultimate History program, my computer is running like crap - I have played at maybe 6-7 sites but I always uninstall them after im done - I'm deleting cookies and temporary internet files 2x/week - I only have Full Tilt, Ultimate with HH and PokerTracker as main poker programs running - I don't even run PokerTracker while im playing - I've got cable internet so its not (shouldnt' be) a connection issue -

I have went through a big defrag last week and tried to get some cleanup and analysing programs that actually only slowed it down more (uninstalled all those 2 but didn't help enough) - My D drive only has 12% remaining space in a 512GB (or MB - its only a year old computer with 2.1GHZ speed) but I can't remove enough programs, it seems, to clear anything up - The biggest program i have besides the mandatory computer office stuff/photo shop stuff, is Tracker which is about 90MB -

I want to get PokerAceHUD and run that with Tracker, but my stuff is already so slow i don't want to bog it down anymore -

Does anyone know some stuff I can do to clean the Recovery D drive out? Should I buy RAM or just get a new computer (not really an option for at least a few months) are there plenty of useless programs installed in general that i can delete? What about Itunes? We have like 5k songs on our Itunes so maybe that is a problem....any help is appreciated - thanks
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swiggidy
Old 10-23-2006, 05:53 PM #2 (permalink)  
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 buy a new hard drive Linky

When they get full, hard rives do slow down. The 8MB cache and 7200 RPM are things you want.

1) For now, right click on the recycle bin -> properties. It's usually set to 10% which may be a ridiculous number. Scale that back to ~500MB (or even less ~100mb) and empty the recycle bin.

2) Control Panel -> System -> Advanced tab -> Performance
You can disable effects here which will improve performance.

3) RAM would help, although I'm running 512MB with no problems.

4) Go to the task manager and look in the bottom left corner.
Processes: ##

If your number is bigger than ~35 there is extra crap running in the background.
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biondino
Old 10-23-2006, 08:06 PM #3 (permalink)  
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My PC's not too slow but I do have 64 processes running. Is there any one place online where I can analyse each of these and work out which I can shut down?
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swiggidy
Old 10-23-2006, 08:26 PM #4 (permalink)  
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 Close everything you don't use is in the bottom right icon tray. If you never use it check the preferences or options and disable auto start. This will also help windows start-up faster.

hijackthis is a program you can use to identify stuff that gets loaded. Following all the clean-up steps might be like hitting a nail with a sledgehammer (it's designed to aid spyware removal).

You can google the process and get several helpful results (e.g. "HKWnd.exe", a sony vaio configuration untility for hot keys). By doing that I found processlibrary.com which looks good. Sometimes getting rid of the process requires more searching (you can "end process" through task manager, but then it reloads at next start-up).

WARNING - following can fuck up your computer, save a copy of the registry first
Most misc stuff is loaded through the registry. Run "regedit" and browse to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\software\microsoft\windows\curre ntversion\run
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\software\microsoft\windows\curre ntversion\runOnce
You can probably delete all entries in these two paths.

Some principal offenders are:
Microsoft Office Toolbar
Language Toolbar
Quicktime quickload (quickload for any software is a waste IMO)
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AHiltz
Old 10-23-2006, 10:48 PM #5 (permalink)  
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You can also download a program called HijackThis. It shows things that run at startup. Go through the list and get rid of shit you know to be useless.
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sndp
Old 10-24-2006, 06:25 AM #6 (permalink)  

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Before upgrading your hardware, I always recommend a format and re-install of the OS.

I'm guessing that 512mb stat is your ram, not your harddrive. If you right click on, and goto the Properties of the My Computer icon on your desktop, it'll give you your ram and CPU speed. It is unlikely that a a year old PC running at 2.1ghz has a 500+gb disk, and it's also very unlikey that it has a 5 or less gb disk.

Often the "bogged down, sluggish" feeling comes not from the hardware but from the OS. After a while things get sloppy (there's tons of reasons) so people assume their hardware is degrading or getting outdated, when really it's a software thing. Back up your essentials, and do a clean format and re-installation of windows before you upgrade anything.

If you do plan any upgrades, the harddrive is not the best place to start. Your bottle neck will be at the RAM and CPU before anything else. The problem with a RAM upgrade now is if you're planning on upgrading your entire system soon the stuff you buy now will likely be incompatible with your new system.

Make the decision as to whether or not you want to upgrade partially now, or wait entirely for the new system a year or two down the road. Do this, however, after you've formatted.

If you've never done it before, consult with someone who knows what they're doing. Jumping into it without the tools (especially access to your drivers, and windows serial number), is a bad idea.
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swiggidy
Old 10-24-2006, 03:06 PM #7 (permalink)  
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 I thought OP mentioned CPU was only a year old. I also assumed he had considered the formatting option.

I disagree with the hard drive bottleneck statement.

A 2GHz processor is more than sufficient to run almost everything (except processor intensive stuff: video games, graphic design, movie editing, etc). If you're playing poker and jerking off to internet porn while posting on FTR your processor isn't the problem.

If the machine is indeed older and is a slower drive (5400 RPM) with a small cache (2 MB) he will definitely notice an improvement with a new drive (especially if his is almost full). Although it would probably require the OS being re-installed on the new drive.

More RAM will also help.

IMO, after computers hit the 2GHz, 512MB ram, they reached a point where there is more computing power than 90% of the population needs.
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AHiltz
Old 10-24-2006, 05:58 PM #8 (permalink)  
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Quote:
A 2GHz processor is more than sufficient to run almost everything (except processor intensive stuff: video games, graphic design, movie editing, etc).
No entirely true. I have a 1.5ghz AMD 1700+ that's about 5 years old. I've played Doom3 and Half-Life 2 on it with no vid issues. I can 6 table with PT and PAHud running and I also used it to capture my old vid camera movies and convert to dvd. It also rips dvds at a nice pace.
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LimpinAintEZ
Old 10-25-2006, 04:00 AM #9 (permalink)  
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the system monitor says 2.2GHz and 448MB or RAM - The shell says 512MB PC2700, 200GB 7200RPM and the processor speed says 2.20GHz, 512KB L2cache, 400MHz Front Side Bus

Its all greek to me yall

how od you format and reinstall the OS? I know how to defrag -

Also, when you go through startup and delete stuff, does this just delete it from the Startup menu (to stop extra background processes)? Or delete from the computer? Cause the Quicktime is what the computer uses for the Itunes, which i found out can't be removed (not with running Itunes that is -

thanks
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swiggidy
Old 10-25-2006, 05:03 AM #10 (permalink)  
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 @Hiltz - I made those numbers up, but thanks for proving my point. PC's have been faster than necessary for a long time

Quote:
Originally Posted by LimpinAintEZ
the system monitor says 2.2GHz and 448MB or RAM - The shell says 512MB PC2700, 200GB 7200RPM and the processor speed says 2.20GHz, 512KB L2cache, 400MHz Front Side Bus
2.2GHz - processor speed
448MB (?), 512MB - amount of RAM
PC2700 - type of ram (? not sure on that one)
200GB - size of hard drive
7200RPM - speed of hard drive
512KB - processor specific memory (I believe)
400MHz - Max speed of communications between RAM and processor

These are all good numbers. I still recommend you buying a new hard drive if yours is getting full, just because they're cheap. You'll probably need a friend to help.

Formatting: sounds like you need a friend to help.

When deleting something from the Start -> Programs -> Start-up menu, it just prevents it from loading at startup, it does not delete the program. Very few programs are loaded at startup this way.
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jyms
Old 10-25-2006, 05:09 PM #11 (permalink)  
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 Get ADaware and Spybot search and destroy. They are free. Why has nobody mentioned he has spyware? Click CTRL,Alt,Del. at thte same time, ONCE. When program manager pops up, How many processes are running when you have nothing open poker related. Reboot the computer and without opening anything, 25 or so process only, any more and we have problems. I have 33 running right now and thats including two work programs firefox and IE explorer, MSN and AIM
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LimpinAintEZ
Old 10-27-2006, 03:22 PM #12 (permalink)  
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that Spybot really kicked ass - i got my processes down to like 29 (deleted something important, but went and got it back luckily) after that Spybot though, my computer kicked into high gear...

thanks!
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jyms
Old 10-27-2006, 06:12 PM #13 (permalink)  
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 Swelcome. Did you run both? One picks up things that the other doesn't.
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swiggidy
Old 10-27-2006, 07:06 PM #14 (permalink)  
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 I guess I was thinking one level too high.

Glad your running goot.
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lolzzz_321
Old 10-27-2006, 07:13 PM #15 (permalink)  
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Quote:
Originally Posted by swiggidy
448MB (?), 512MB - amount of RAM
I believe the 64 megs are going to his on-board video card.
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LimpinAintEZ
Old 10-28-2006, 01:38 AM #16 (permalink)  
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so i run it last night - everything is just going fabulous then i get back on today....Same slow shit - Not as slow, but when I go check processes, i've got 40 of them running again - Do I need to delet every single day? Or run the spybot every day? Seems excessive -
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swiggidy
Old 10-28-2006, 05:14 AM #17 (permalink)  
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 Do this:
http://forums.majorgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=35407
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