I recently formatted my hard drive and now my computer is slower now with less programs than before. I'm just puzzled about this. running win98 gateway g6-350 320 mb of ram(probaly overkill). any suggestion appreciated thanks

Are the CAS settings in BIOS correct for the installed memory?

Have you tried just the new memory by itself?

Is the L2 cache enabled? (BIOS setting)

Any always on programs that weren't there before the new memory?

Is the amount of memory within the max allowed on the motherboard (some systems say that they can have x amount but significantly slowdown over 64MB or 128MB, others say 256MB max and if you exceed that then you will either have a serious slowdown or it won't even be recognized or both)?

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mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.fortunecity.com/skyscraper/highrise/11/index.htm)

468th Rule of Aquistion: Debugging of software is foolish, there is much profit in updates and upgrades.

the memory was installed long before I reformated. Don't know how to check the other things you mentioned. I'll look to find out how.

The CAS settings should be available in the BIOS setup, the specs for the memory should be in the packaging that the memory came in, or you can set it all to CAS3, the least likely to cause problems, sometimes if the settoings are mixed it really slows things down. The L2 cache should also be in BIOS (could be external cache).

Also a long time without running defrag could cause slowdowns.

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mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.fortunecity.com/skyscraper/highrise/11/index.htm)

468th Rule of Aquistion: Debugging of software is foolish, there is much profit in updates and upgrades.

Right click on My Computer, click Properties then the Performance tab and see if it says anything about any drives running in MS-DOS Compatability Mode. That will cause major slowdowns.

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So many idiots, and only six bullets...
Note: Please post your questions on the forums, not in my email.

Computer Information Links (http://www.geocities.com/paleopete/)

Paleo Pete
No,it doesn't say that.

When you formatted and reinstalled .......how many little icons do you now have next to the time down in the bottom right corner of your desktop?? The only thing that comes to mind is that you have a ton of stuff running "resident" at startup.......or perhaps have contracted a virus......run a virus scan here: http://housecall.antivirus.com/default.asp
It's free and does a thorough job.
If you have a bunch of little icons down next to time....tell us what they are and someone can help you "pare" it down.

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Will XP save Me ?

No virus Found


little icons are
AVG anti virus
SB AudioPCI 64D mixer
Volume Control

If you formatted and reinstalled.....Did you by chance go from one version of Windows to another?? Win 98 runs slower than Win95 for example and Win Me is slower than Win98.....Is that what might have happened?? Let us know, this is a puzzling one for sure.

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Will XP save Me ?

No, I Didn't change OS. I stayed with Win98.

Up

The best way to improve swap file usage on systems with more than
64Meg RAM is this:

Designate a partition of 200 - 300 Meg (preferably closer to
beginning of drive) for your swap file and DON'T set any min/max
parameters (That's right . . . Let Windows handle it! If there's
nothing else on the drive you don't have to worry about it becoming
fragmented!) THEN: put this entry in the system.ini file under
[386enh] ConservativeSwapfileUsage=1 Check on your swap file
occasionally; if you haven't been playing games or running
intensive apps, the swap file often will be 0 (zero). What could
be more efficient?