Why is my laptop so sloooowww...?
 

Ever since I downloaded the 32 updates last week, my computer (MS Vista Basic Home ) has gotten slower and slower. Yesterday and today it's hardly running and taking forever to load a page(s) and keeps telling me "not responding", then the page turns opaque. Before the downloads, it was runnning good.

After the downloads last week, I ran the defrag, clean up, virus and malware scan, etc. Unchecked all start up programs after starting msconfig.

I'm trying to delete the updates form last week to see if that will help, but I can't do anything until the page loads.

I plan on backing it up again as soon as I can get it going.

Any advice besides a Mac?

Is your hard drive almost full?

Even if you defrag, etc. if your drive is getting full (like, 75 percent or more) then it'll bring things to a crawl.

It's about 50% +/- IIRC.

I'm only guessing, but it seems like a RAM, CPU or Disk problem ( maybe that's obvious ).

I'm having to post from my iPhone it's so bad.

go back to a date before your up-date problems
that is far eazyer and quicker then removing the up-dates

also see if your machine is running hot
the CPU cooler has cooling paste that can dry out over time 4-5 years avg
and replaced paste can end the over heating
some north-bridge and/or video chips also many need replacement cooling paste too
but most times it is the CPU cooler

I can hear the fan going and it seems to be putting out about the same heat as before.

The laptop is only about 2 1/2 years old, but a cheapie HP.

I'll try the restore to a previous date next.

If you have access to another machine you can download Ubuntu, slap on a cd or thumbdrive and boot from that.

If the machine runs snappy on Ubuntu then not a hardware issue

^^^. I have a pc I can use. I'll give that a try.

Man, it's so annoying that it's slow. It's driving me nuts.

Whats the boot up time from when you turn it on to when everything loads up? Could have a bunch of crap loading up and running in the background..

Have you opened Task-Manager to see what's what's eating up your memory/CPU? If you want a better process manager, download/run MS Process Explorer (Windows Sysinternals).

I had uploaded 21 express updates from MS on to my XP laptop when things started to go wrong for me.

My computer guys said no way, I think otherwise.

See this thread for possibilities:
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/off-topic-discussions/603279-xp-anti-spyware-2011-has-shut-down-my-pc.html

I have gonorrhea, any advice besides antibiotics? :D:D:D

Yes, keep your pecker out of where it doesn't belong. :)

Exactly. Buy a Mac.;)

I read that and I'm in the same boat. I'm backing everything up right now and am going to try a restore to as a new computer. I tried to restore to an earlier date, but it won't let me (it only gives me today as an option).

I've tried the kids Macs. I just can't get the hang of them. Being computer impaired, I'm stuck with a Windows system...

Do you have Zone Alarm or any other third party firewall installed? People are reporting problems with the April bundle and these products.

Not me.

Maybe I should though.

AVG Free
Spybot
CCleaner
........and today picked up Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware"

I'm now shopping for good anti-virus program. Many of the good ones are reported to be using automatic renewal and difficult to get refunds when you cancel service.

I seem to recall Trend Micro doing the same thing to me years ago, but they took the charges off my card after a single phone call.

Remove all anti-virus, anti-spyware, etc... Reboot and then download Microsoft Security Essentials from the Microsoft website,. It's free and it works. I bet your anti-malware software is slowing things down for you...

It seems to be several minutes. I ran msconfig and checked to make sure nothing is running on start up.

Yes, and it seems to be a ton of stuff. EDIT: It looks like it's running 87 processes. I looked at the resources monitor and the disk and cpu are high it seems.

Resource Monitor
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1303250044.jpg

Task Manager
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1303250165.jpg

Running Programs
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1303250065.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1303250084.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1303250103.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1303250116.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1303250138.jpg

Art I think using Chrome helped you survive the last two years more than MS Security Essentials. Hard to second guess, maybe it's just a good combination.