J
jc
My System:
Dell XPS Desktop, Pentium 4, 3.4 GHz, w/HTTechnology & 1 mb cache; 1 gig DDR2
SDRAM at 533MHz; running Windows XP Media Center v5.1, SP2; 256mg Nvidia GeFOrce
6800 graphics card; 160 gig serial ATA hd; Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS THX sound
card; MS wireless keyboard & mouse; Eset NOD32 AntiVirus; Spambrave Spamguard;
I also use Spybot Search & Destroy, MS Defender and MS Firewall. The computer
is on an average of 10 hours per day and is seldom, but sometimes, left on
24/7. I have recently installed a DSL connection but all of these problems
pre-date this by a wide margin.
My Confuser's Problems:
Over a year ago, the computer suddenly began running slow. This started right
after I'd installed a game (I don't remember for certain but I believe it was MS
Flight Simulator). On the same day there was an MS Update that installed
itself. Things went down hill rapidly and there are now several problems. I am
not at all sure if they are related or not but they all began at the same time.
When starting, the computer boots a little slower but nothing
intolerable. After I enter my password and the icons appear, as long as too
much time does not pass (perhaps a minute or so) it will allow one program,
e.g., a game, such as Realflight RC Simulator (but not a Windows program, e.g.
Windows Explorer) to be opened. As long as no parameters of the game are
changed, e.g. changing from one aircraft type to another, that program
continues to run ok; that is, the airplane continues to work properly,
including sound and will reset after a crash.
However, if:
1. a different parameter is selected or
2. another program is opened
the computer locks up completely, always for around 5 minutes and several times
for as long as 15 minutes. During this time the hard drive seek light pulses
rhythmically.
Even after the computer has finished with it's starting 'spasm,' when I open any
other Windows program, for instance, OE, it locks up for that 5 - 15 minutes.
Other programs work fairly normally, however if I open, for instance, something
like a CD burner program or VLC (a media player), it will open fine but when I
select a folder to choose files from, it goes through the spasms.
If after a fresh boot I open any MS program (OE, WE, Word, etc) it immediately
locks up for that 5 - 15 minutes.
After the computer has been on for awhile and has gone through the spasms at
least once, at all times when I access W.Explorer, all tasks work very slowly.
If I open that same CD burner program again, it will go through it's little
spasm again but usually only for 1 to 3 minutes.
I will admit to having several folders that contain from several hundred to as
many as 3,000 files each (I collect airplane pictures, amongst others) but all
folders, even those nearly empty, are affected by the slow running (as an
example, MS Defender just finished running… it checked 39,940 objects in 16
minutes). Just changing from one folder to another can take as long as a
minute, occasionally longer. Other functions, such as copy, delete, etc, also
take much longer than normal. This is constant and does not ever improve no
matter how long the computer has been on.
My first thought when this started was that the HD was failing. Using chkdsk, I
found 24 meg of 'bad sectors' but did no repairs. The latest chkdsk results
(11/03/07) are:
Besided the usual "CHKDSK is verifying files…." routine, it also said it was
"correcting errors in the master file tables <MFT> BITMAP attribute." and it
was "correcting errors in the Volume Bitmap." The last thing possibly
significant: "Windows found problems with the file system. Run CHKDSK with /f
option to correct these.""
151332299kb total disk space
74797528kb in 243695 files
102732kb in 10303 indexes
16kb in bad sectors
464683kb in use by the system
65536kb occupied by the log file
75967340kb available on the disk
4096 bytes in each allocation unit
37833074 total allocation units on disk
18991835 allocation units available on disk
I have run *no* repair programs of any kind, including the /f function of
chkdsk.
I fully expected a HD fail at any time and was (am) properly backed up for it.
However badly, it kept running and I continued to put up with it's quirks,
mainly due to much more pressing personal problems. While those problems, like
Windows problems, persist, I am at the point where I am willing to take the time
to try and resolve the computer problems.
Additional Problems
It also seems that most (but not all) of the constant MS updates, probably from
around the time these problems started, have failed to install. I inadvertently
found that I have hundreds of folders named $Ntxxxxxxxx$ in blue in my Windows
folder (a place I seldom have cause to look). In addition, of late the computer
has started to mirror every file I open in Word with a ~$xxxxx.doc file (it
usually goes away when the original file is saved and closed… but not always; I
have some I can not delete. I'm looking into the admin 'thing' in regard to
that).
I also have a few files I received in OE (from one specific individual) as
attachments that I had to save to HD before I could view. These were sent by a
Firefox user, which sends messages as ludicrous, renamed multi-level forwards
that end with a ] and have no extension (plus other oddities). As a result,
OE/Windows can't see these files (I assume other Firefox users can see them
without problem but I've no desire to switch to another browser or email
program… I happen to like OE, even with it's warts; I should also mention that
I am not the only one that has had this problem with emails sent by this
individual in my circle of email friends); I saved a few of them, put the
proper extension on them, looked at them… at which time they simply refuse to be
deleted! (I seldom have just one little problem at a time).
Talking to others, who at least say they understand computers (as with women, I
profess no such understanding of computers at all), and in addition, reading
some of the threads on this group, I have gleaned a few bits of information to
add to the mess. For one, I have a huge number of entries in my Event Viewer -
just 3 Application errors but around 225 System warnings and 22 Information
entries.
The Application errors all refer to Automatic LiveUpdate Scheduler
failures (as do the Information entries) while the System Warnings, under the
Source heading, are virtually all "disk" entries (I did not check each and every
one) that refer to "An error was detected on device \device\harddisk0\D during a
paging operation." The event ID is 51. It gives a Help and Support Center
link, http//go.microsoft/fwlink/events.asp There were 104 of them in a one
hour period. Each of the H&SC addresses are the same and the link refers to a
HD failure.
However, since this problem has gone on so long I am not at all certain
it is true about the HD failing. In addition, there are other quirks, such as
the computer not shutting down completely at times, instead popping up a dialog
box with a statement referencing "xxx32.dll is not a valid file" and other such
technical stuff, which I seem to have misplaced the exact contents of the box I
had written down… things tend to get lost and buried on my desk after any period
of non-use, much like dinosauor bones. Clicking ok continues the shutdown, even
after it's been sitting there all night long… I know this from experience, of
course.
Also, if I stress the memory too much, have too many programs open, or
too many things going on at once (usually having to do with moving files, having
one or more Word docs open and manipulating pictures (I use MS Picture It 99,
generally), the computer locks up completely for as much as 15 minutes and once
for over 30 minutes. There have a been a couple of times I've lost patience and
just turned the drun thing off and restarted. So far, I've yet to lose any
information - something I'm sure has completely used up my store of luck and is
sure to end at any given time. I remain dilligent about backing up docs and
pictures.
I should also mention one other event that took place soon after the computer
started working slow. During an attempt to shut the computer down, I lost
patience (see above paragraph) and tried to turn the computer off - and it would
not do so. Holding the power button down for up to 30 seconds at a time had no
effect at all, even with several tries. I left it sit for well over an hour and
nothing happened… just the background picture on my desktop and no icons or
toolbar. I tried holding down the power button a few more times, again with no
results and finally had to resort to climbing under the desk and literally
pulling the plug. Again, there was no information lost but it was one of the
few times the computer ran a diagnostic on it's own when I booted it again (I
do not remember what it was, sorry).
What I've done: I have defragged the disk several times (no help); run the
spyware programs (no help), deleted all the temp internet files several times
(no help), cleaned out the recycle bin (no help); I used CCleaner to remove
those files they thought were not needed (no help); I identified every checked
entry in my msconfig.exe and found nothing that wasn't supposed to be there; as
per my brother, who knows a bit about these things, I pinged a Yahoo address and
everything came back fine, total time 4.5 seconds and all parameters normal with
an average of 76ns (do not ask me to explain what that stuff is, however!); he
also had me do a DNS Cache dump; neither of these things helped. One last
note, when I go to the DOS command prompt, the computer seems to work as fast as
it ever did, when changing directories, copying, etc. I do not have any
programs I can run in DOS, however, that would check it's speed. I am currently
trying to create a new user to see if the problems continue but I've had a
couple of hiccups doing so. I'm still working on it.
Ultimately, my brothers suggestion, as is the suggestion of others I know, is to
format the drive and reinstall everything again. That is a daunting task and
one I do not want to suffer though, without some guarantee it will actually
work. No one I know and trust has so far been able to express that guarantee.
So, finally the bottom line.
1.What are the chances all of these problems are related and
2. is it repairable without formatting the HD and reinstalling everything?
I am prepared for the worst yet keep a small kernel of hope close to the vest.
Cheers and TIA,
jc
One last thing to add… I recently downloaded and saved, but have not yet had a
chance to read, Shehan Stanley's tune up/maintenance tutorial for XP. I suspect
the answer may well be in there somewhere but reading and understanding
something that size could take quite a while for someone as thick as me. I'll
slogg through it, if no has any immediate thoughts regarding the resolution of
these problems, but it could take more time than I have allotted! (not time
alloted for the computer but for life itself!)
Dell XPS Desktop, Pentium 4, 3.4 GHz, w/HTTechnology & 1 mb cache; 1 gig DDR2
SDRAM at 533MHz; running Windows XP Media Center v5.1, SP2; 256mg Nvidia GeFOrce
6800 graphics card; 160 gig serial ATA hd; Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS THX sound
card; MS wireless keyboard & mouse; Eset NOD32 AntiVirus; Spambrave Spamguard;
I also use Spybot Search & Destroy, MS Defender and MS Firewall. The computer
is on an average of 10 hours per day and is seldom, but sometimes, left on
24/7. I have recently installed a DSL connection but all of these problems
pre-date this by a wide margin.
My Confuser's Problems:
Over a year ago, the computer suddenly began running slow. This started right
after I'd installed a game (I don't remember for certain but I believe it was MS
Flight Simulator). On the same day there was an MS Update that installed
itself. Things went down hill rapidly and there are now several problems. I am
not at all sure if they are related or not but they all began at the same time.
When starting, the computer boots a little slower but nothing
intolerable. After I enter my password and the icons appear, as long as too
much time does not pass (perhaps a minute or so) it will allow one program,
e.g., a game, such as Realflight RC Simulator (but not a Windows program, e.g.
Windows Explorer) to be opened. As long as no parameters of the game are
changed, e.g. changing from one aircraft type to another, that program
continues to run ok; that is, the airplane continues to work properly,
including sound and will reset after a crash.
However, if:
1. a different parameter is selected or
2. another program is opened
the computer locks up completely, always for around 5 minutes and several times
for as long as 15 minutes. During this time the hard drive seek light pulses
rhythmically.
Even after the computer has finished with it's starting 'spasm,' when I open any
other Windows program, for instance, OE, it locks up for that 5 - 15 minutes.
Other programs work fairly normally, however if I open, for instance, something
like a CD burner program or VLC (a media player), it will open fine but when I
select a folder to choose files from, it goes through the spasms.
If after a fresh boot I open any MS program (OE, WE, Word, etc) it immediately
locks up for that 5 - 15 minutes.
After the computer has been on for awhile and has gone through the spasms at
least once, at all times when I access W.Explorer, all tasks work very slowly.
If I open that same CD burner program again, it will go through it's little
spasm again but usually only for 1 to 3 minutes.
I will admit to having several folders that contain from several hundred to as
many as 3,000 files each (I collect airplane pictures, amongst others) but all
folders, even those nearly empty, are affected by the slow running (as an
example, MS Defender just finished running… it checked 39,940 objects in 16
minutes). Just changing from one folder to another can take as long as a
minute, occasionally longer. Other functions, such as copy, delete, etc, also
take much longer than normal. This is constant and does not ever improve no
matter how long the computer has been on.
My first thought when this started was that the HD was failing. Using chkdsk, I
found 24 meg of 'bad sectors' but did no repairs. The latest chkdsk results
(11/03/07) are:
Besided the usual "CHKDSK is verifying files…." routine, it also said it was
"correcting errors in the master file tables <MFT> BITMAP attribute." and it
was "correcting errors in the Volume Bitmap." The last thing possibly
significant: "Windows found problems with the file system. Run CHKDSK with /f
option to correct these.""
151332299kb total disk space
74797528kb in 243695 files
102732kb in 10303 indexes
16kb in bad sectors
464683kb in use by the system
65536kb occupied by the log file
75967340kb available on the disk
4096 bytes in each allocation unit
37833074 total allocation units on disk
18991835 allocation units available on disk
I have run *no* repair programs of any kind, including the /f function of
chkdsk.
I fully expected a HD fail at any time and was (am) properly backed up for it.
However badly, it kept running and I continued to put up with it's quirks,
mainly due to much more pressing personal problems. While those problems, like
Windows problems, persist, I am at the point where I am willing to take the time
to try and resolve the computer problems.
Additional Problems
It also seems that most (but not all) of the constant MS updates, probably from
around the time these problems started, have failed to install. I inadvertently
found that I have hundreds of folders named $Ntxxxxxxxx$ in blue in my Windows
folder (a place I seldom have cause to look). In addition, of late the computer
has started to mirror every file I open in Word with a ~$xxxxx.doc file (it
usually goes away when the original file is saved and closed… but not always; I
have some I can not delete. I'm looking into the admin 'thing' in regard to
that).
I also have a few files I received in OE (from one specific individual) as
attachments that I had to save to HD before I could view. These were sent by a
Firefox user, which sends messages as ludicrous, renamed multi-level forwards
that end with a ] and have no extension (plus other oddities). As a result,
OE/Windows can't see these files (I assume other Firefox users can see them
without problem but I've no desire to switch to another browser or email
program… I happen to like OE, even with it's warts; I should also mention that
I am not the only one that has had this problem with emails sent by this
individual in my circle of email friends); I saved a few of them, put the
proper extension on them, looked at them… at which time they simply refuse to be
deleted! (I seldom have just one little problem at a time).
Talking to others, who at least say they understand computers (as with women, I
profess no such understanding of computers at all), and in addition, reading
some of the threads on this group, I have gleaned a few bits of information to
add to the mess. For one, I have a huge number of entries in my Event Viewer -
just 3 Application errors but around 225 System warnings and 22 Information
entries.
The Application errors all refer to Automatic LiveUpdate Scheduler
failures (as do the Information entries) while the System Warnings, under the
Source heading, are virtually all "disk" entries (I did not check each and every
one) that refer to "An error was detected on device \device\harddisk0\D during a
paging operation." The event ID is 51. It gives a Help and Support Center
link, http//go.microsoft/fwlink/events.asp There were 104 of them in a one
hour period. Each of the H&SC addresses are the same and the link refers to a
HD failure.
However, since this problem has gone on so long I am not at all certain
it is true about the HD failing. In addition, there are other quirks, such as
the computer not shutting down completely at times, instead popping up a dialog
box with a statement referencing "xxx32.dll is not a valid file" and other such
technical stuff, which I seem to have misplaced the exact contents of the box I
had written down… things tend to get lost and buried on my desk after any period
of non-use, much like dinosauor bones. Clicking ok continues the shutdown, even
after it's been sitting there all night long… I know this from experience, of
course.
Also, if I stress the memory too much, have too many programs open, or
too many things going on at once (usually having to do with moving files, having
one or more Word docs open and manipulating pictures (I use MS Picture It 99,
generally), the computer locks up completely for as much as 15 minutes and once
for over 30 minutes. There have a been a couple of times I've lost patience and
just turned the drun thing off and restarted. So far, I've yet to lose any
information - something I'm sure has completely used up my store of luck and is
sure to end at any given time. I remain dilligent about backing up docs and
pictures.
I should also mention one other event that took place soon after the computer
started working slow. During an attempt to shut the computer down, I lost
patience (see above paragraph) and tried to turn the computer off - and it would
not do so. Holding the power button down for up to 30 seconds at a time had no
effect at all, even with several tries. I left it sit for well over an hour and
nothing happened… just the background picture on my desktop and no icons or
toolbar. I tried holding down the power button a few more times, again with no
results and finally had to resort to climbing under the desk and literally
pulling the plug. Again, there was no information lost but it was one of the
few times the computer ran a diagnostic on it's own when I booted it again (I
do not remember what it was, sorry).
What I've done: I have defragged the disk several times (no help); run the
spyware programs (no help), deleted all the temp internet files several times
(no help), cleaned out the recycle bin (no help); I used CCleaner to remove
those files they thought were not needed (no help); I identified every checked
entry in my msconfig.exe and found nothing that wasn't supposed to be there; as
per my brother, who knows a bit about these things, I pinged a Yahoo address and
everything came back fine, total time 4.5 seconds and all parameters normal with
an average of 76ns (do not ask me to explain what that stuff is, however!); he
also had me do a DNS Cache dump; neither of these things helped. One last
note, when I go to the DOS command prompt, the computer seems to work as fast as
it ever did, when changing directories, copying, etc. I do not have any
programs I can run in DOS, however, that would check it's speed. I am currently
trying to create a new user to see if the problems continue but I've had a
couple of hiccups doing so. I'm still working on it.
Ultimately, my brothers suggestion, as is the suggestion of others I know, is to
format the drive and reinstall everything again. That is a daunting task and
one I do not want to suffer though, without some guarantee it will actually
work. No one I know and trust has so far been able to express that guarantee.
So, finally the bottom line.
1.What are the chances all of these problems are related and
2. is it repairable without formatting the HD and reinstalling everything?
I am prepared for the worst yet keep a small kernel of hope close to the vest.
Cheers and TIA,
jc
One last thing to add… I recently downloaded and saved, but have not yet had a
chance to read, Shehan Stanley's tune up/maintenance tutorial for XP. I suspect
the answer may well be in there somewhere but reading and understanding
something that size could take quite a while for someone as thick as me. I'll
slogg through it, if no has any immediate thoughts regarding the resolution of
these problems, but it could take more time than I have allotted! (not time
alloted for the computer but for life itself!)
