Slow computer - CPU?

[Deleted member 13571]

yeah, 12.6V is just at the high end of the spec. I'd doubt that'd be your issue (http://www.formfactors.org/developer/specs/ATX12V_1_3dg.pdf).

With respect to heat, did you try something like speedfan to check temps? I've had stepdown problems before on client computers and, yes, it does really cause problems when doing other tasks.

 

[Skyhooker]

Check the IDE channels in the Device Manager and make sure the one the hard drive is on is running at Ultra DMA Mode 5 (if available on that machine), not a lower mode, and ESPECIALLY not PIO mode. Since this is a new drive it might not have been properly recognized and set up by Windows.

 

[joydivision]

Already is UDMA . Everything in windows appears fine

 

[Cybjun]

Any easy way (at least to me) to eliminate software as a cause of the problem is to throw a temp hard drive in with the original hard drive disconnected and load windows on it of the same version.

 

[gazza]

I replaced the hard drive on a P4 2.4Ghz with 512MB RAM and the client is complaining its still slow. The old drive was full of bad sectors.

It seems to take too long to boot and it takes several seconds to load IE, its a clean install and only MSE is running. Its a P4 2.4Ghz with 512MB RAM, I know this is not state of the art but on a clean install and a brand new system it should run a lot quicker. Sometimes the HD light stays on solid. There are no problems in event viewer. I have swapped the RAM and no difference. I have changed the IDE cables - no difference.

The fan is spinning quite fast and I have noticed the heatsink is stone cold and the CPU temperature is running at 34c so something isn't right. I thought P4s ran hotter than that anyway. I suspect the heatsink isn't doing its job and the CPU is over heating, would this make it run so slow though?

Any other ideas? I am also going to test the PSU. I've charged my client £80 so far and in his eyes its not fixed it. He has been very nice and patient about it and I am willing to go to the extra mile to sort this. He kept aplogising and said its ok its just slow but I told him I am not happy with it as its not right.

If I can't fix it I have offered to fit a new motherboard and processor for free if he pays the parts.

What do others think the problem could be?

My first question is you mention the original hard drive had a lot of bad sectors, did you ask yourself why? Could be a failing motherboard or PSU?

Anyway, I would first do a clean install of Windows and only setup the graphics card, make sure that you have the correct chipset drivers for your P4 motherboard installed as well, do not setup any other hardware or install any third party software.

If the system is still slow swap out the psu first (most techs would have a P4 psu for testing on hand) if there is no change add more memory and last resort I would recommend another motherboard only rather than a cpu as they rarely fail unless overclocked.

Gazza

 

[joydivision]

The reason I suggested getting a new motherboard is getting hold a 478 would be will be tricky and you can get dual core processors cheap now. The PC is 7 years old so I simply put the failed hard drive down to wear and tear.

 

[computerdoc]

512 MB is really too little for XP in general. Windows update using up a ton of memory makes the problem much worse.

Windows update recently inflated a lot and can take up most of the 512. Once your over the ram limit, you're into virtual memory swapping with the hard drive which is really slow.

If this is your problem, change the Windows update service to manual or disabled and it will free up a ton of memory and could get you back into running out of ram and running much faster.

 

[joydivision]

As said though its not a RAM issue, it just slows down when the computers doing nothing. There is a big difference between it going slightly slow due to swap file being busy to the entire thing taking 15 minutes to load control panel at idle.

 

[MobileTechie]

So how does it run from a linux CD?

 

[joydivision]

The problem with a Linux CD is it would run slow anyway but I suppose once its copied into RAM it should be fine. I will try it to see what happens .

 

[Onouris]

Sorry to resurrect... but ran into a system with the Trusteer Rapport program installed. Have been working on it for about 2 days, explorer freezes and hangs a lot (Win Vista x86) and once Rapport was removed from the system, it came to life. That is what caused the performance issue on the system I just finished.

 

[Tom Hudson]

Use the performance monitor and see if any programs are hogging your hard drive or cpu. I would place money on it being the windows indexing service. If you install all of the windows optional updates it does become rather bloated.