I have a problem with my computer. After I turn it on, and after 1 minute I'm using the computer, it starts to slow down, the programs take long to load up and the mouse does not respond quickly and then after some time, it just stops working. It happened after I installed a certain program. I uninstalled it already but it got worse. I tried to use System Restore but it didn't fix it. Does anyone know how I can fix this problem?
And another thing too, how can I delete the icons that appear in the taskbar (sytem tray I think it's called?)? I went to start up but it shows no icons but still when I turn the computer on, many icons start loading up.
Thanks for your help.

Hi ya Tony_Lb http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif Welcome to the PC Guide!

It always helps if you provide as much info about your system that you can (is CPU, RAM, Operating System etc.)

What was this program? Is this pc a HP or Compaq (they always throw in a lot of useless junk that runs in the background hogging system resources)?

To stop these monsters from running in the background start by right-clicking on the icon in the systray (lower-right-hand corner) and looking through the options or preferences for ways to not have it run at startup. This is the preferred way.

If there are no options...then (Win 98 & naybe Win ME) Start/Run type msconfig and hit enter...click on the tab Startup and there you can de-select non-essential items from running. Be careful to only select progs you recognize as nonessential. If you have a scanner leave the StilMon (something like that)checked. Here (http://www.pacs-portal.co.uk/startup_pages/l.htm) is a pretty good site for decyphering what some of those progs are.

Start there and see what happens. Come back and let us know what happens.

If you have Win ME you can cut down the percentage of which the system restore function uses for cacheing purposes...I think default is 12% of your hard drive space...thats way too much...I'll find the link for you if you are interested.

Good Luck http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

------------------
Join the Circus (http://www.helpfromtechs.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi) friday nights.

Flush 'N' Forget (http://www2.apex.net/users/hwuswtp)

[This message has been edited by bassvax (edited 12-18-2001).]

Hello, thanks for replying, my computer have Windows ME, 20 GB of HD (I only have 500 MB remaining) and 128 MB of RAM. it's a Pentium III 900 Mghz. Well, actually I was installing two programs at the time, i didn't notice which might have slowed down my computer or changed something inside... the programs I installed was McAffee Utilities and Corel Bryce 5 Trial version. After uninstalling these 2 programs my computer became unstable. I turned off the pc and turn it back on and that's when it started acting that way.
Everthing boots up ok but after a while (no less than 5 minutes after it's on) it just stops responding. Any ideas what might have happened? or where I go to fix this problem?
Thank you for your help http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

Tony,

When you uninstalled the couple programs were you questioned about the possiblity of any shared .dlls? It's possible if you elected not to keep any/some of these that you might have affected some other program. I'm not sure in a system restore if the deleted files are replaced.

Do you routinely dump your temporary internet files?



------------------
May all your dealings in life be win/win!

Whyzman

Hey,

You need to do some serious housecleaning. Only 500mb's left on a 20gig harddrive? The system is probably choking for lack of harddrive space. Do you get "out of memory" errors? If not, you soon will.

Do you use a fixed size swap file or do you let Windows handle virtual memory?

Uninstall programs that you don't use. As suggested, clean out your temp files and temp internet files.

Either do some serious housecleaning or get yourself a larger harddrive. Have you defragged that beast lately?

And as suggested, disable non-essential programs from loading at startup.

Cheers,

Big Blue 66


------------------
Reach high, for stars lie hidden in your soul. Dream deep, for every dream precedes the goal.
- Pamela Vault Starr

Hello guys, thanks for replying. Well, I let Windows handle Virtual Memory.. and I do clean up my temp files frequently. What I want to do is defrag my hard drive but every time I try to do it, it doesn't defrag my computer, it asks I scandisk the HD first.. which I do too but most of the time I run scandisk, it just stays checking the files .. it says that some programs are running but I have everything closed so maybe a program in the background is running which I don't know about.
How can I know what other programs might be running and how can I close them??
I was thinking of running scandisk and defrag in MS-DOS mode, Is that possible? but I don't want Windows ME to load up yet before I run scandisk and defrag. How can I do that? What commands do I need to use??

Thanks for your help!! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

Scandisk can be run in DOS, not defrag...and in ME you can scandisk in DOS by using a bootdisk (W98 one would work well)...BUT if you have all the background tasks turned off and you are still getting errors that something is using the drive, run, don't walk to a virus scan!!!!

Disappearing disk space, something running in the background that can't be found.....sounds like an infection to me. Don't rely on just whatever AV program you currently have on the drive either, if you are infected it may be compromised...try an on-line scan, try here (http://housecall.antivirus.com/pc_housecall/) also use your AV programs emergency disk...

------------------
mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

Here's a great resource with scores of tips for renewing life to a system which has slowed down with age:
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/win98/maintain/first.asp?frame=true

I'm not very familiar with Windows ME, but I know it "evolved" from 95/98 - I think you'll find some good advice here even though it is targeted at 98 users.

Also, if you've got more than about 5 or 6 icons in your system tray immediately after Windows loads, I'd take bassvax's advice and look in msconfig. That is discussed in the Microsoft resource.



------------------
...
If my computer were the eighth dwarf, it would be Dumpy.
-Chris

Hi Tony

I had about the same problem! In my case it was a virus, called: W32.Nimda (http://www.sarc.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.nimda.e@mm.html). Maybe this my cause your problems also.

Good luck

Hi guys, thank you very much for replying and for your help. I've been able to fix the problem in my computer. Too many programs were loading up in the background http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif but now it's working good.

One thing I want to ask now is if there is another program that can defrag the hard drive faster than window's own defrag program. It took me almost 2 full days to defrag my pc, maybe it's because I have a big hard drive (20 GB) but still it's too much.

One little problem I am having now is I don'w really know what I did but I belived I deleted some files and now when I try to use Nero to burn some CD's , it says "The Win-ASPI file '?..?' can't be found" .. has anyone encouentered this problem, I can't burn CDs now http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/frown.gif ....

Thank you! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

Tony,
Next time try running defrag while in "safe mode". Tap f8 repeatedly while boot starts to get there. All your other stuff was running at the same time as scandisk.

re Nero: just uninstall Nero, restart, reinstall Nero. Might do the trick and can't hurt anything.

Yeah there are other defrag programs, but if this was the first defrag in a while or after doing a bunch of installations it will take a long time no matter which one you use...

Vopt (http://www.vopt.com/voptme.htm) is one....


------------------
mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

Tony it isn't the size of your hard drive that causes defrag to go slow it is all the running programs accessing the drive it's kindof like cleaning the kitchen and everyone is comming in and cooking, you never get done because you keep having to start over and over and over again. defrag in safe mode or ctrl-alt-del and end task on every thing but system tray and explorer. Win ME has the fastest defrag engine I have seen yet, faster than any third party defrag program it will defrag my 40GB drive in about an hour most times less than an hour.

------------------
I think Windows XP and Microsoft use more of my bandwidth than I do!

[This message has been edited by rond36 (edited 12-24-2001).]

I'm with Rond on this one. My ME machines seem to defrag quite quickly compared to the 98 machine.
Along with the "ctrl-alt-del" thing, you need to be sure screensavers and scheduled tasks are turned off. I am not sure about Task scheduler(if it is not actualy running at the time) but screensavers don't show up in the shutdown box.
Good luck http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/cool.gif

------------------
Please go HERE (http://www.pcguide.com/ubb/Forum10/HTML/000225.html)
Frank's Place (http://www.members.aol.com/frankscompsrvice)

Vopt is quick too...but the ME defrag is about the quickest that MS has, and it works in 98 too.

------------------
mjc
Links list:Computer Links (http://www.dreamwater.org/tech/mjc/index.htm)

Celts are the men that heaven made mad, For all their battles are merry and their songs are all sad.

Hi guys, well, I guess I'll stick with Window's defrag http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif I guess it took that long because I had not defrag my hard drive for about 8 months and all the programs I installed and uninstalled and installed again etc had an effect too. I'll try to defrag it once a week at least from now on!

I was able to fix the problem I had with Nero and all my CD burning programs (I only have 2). hopefully everthing will be running ok for now

Thank you guys for all your help and suggestions! But I have the feeling I'll be back :P with more computer troubleshooting questions and desperate for answers!! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif hasta la vista!