Slow computer any idea why?

[stocks]

I'm not really the best with computers so maybe theres a simple reason why my computer is super slow lately. I dont have much stored on it and I've deleted anything I dont use and also the red light by the power button I call it the work had light that seems to be on just about all the time now even for the simplest tasks.

Also I got DSL 100 mbps

and in my high speed connection manager it says
Bytes sent 51,000,000
recived 400,000,000

I dont know if thats a lot and also there a couple more computers and an xbox hooked up to the interent aswell dont know if that makes a differance.

Anyway any ideas on why my coputer is so slow.

 

[Barrucadu]

Have you tried running your computer with the others disconnected? If it is a network problem, that would be obvious then. However, if it the actual computer that is slow, it could indicate a very fragmented harddrive, RAM problems, not enough virtual memory, or lots of other things.

 

[stocks]

Thanks Mikor I'll try disconnecting everything else

By the way is there a way I can check for fragmented harddrive, RAM problems, not enough virtual memory

Thanks

 

[Barrucadu]

I assume you are using windows.
Fragmented Harddrive
Go to Start -> Run
Enter "dfrg.msc"
Click OK
Then defragment your harddrive.

RAM Problems
There is a link in Ratmasters computer troubles thread to memtest - which you will need to check all of your RAM.

Not enough Virtual Memory
I can't remember this, as I haven't needed to do it for a long time. Although, unless Windows is telling you that you don't have enough virtual memory, it's unlikely that this is the cause.

 

[stocks]

Thanks you and windows do tell me sometimes I dont have enough virtual memory

 

[gmtfan]

and in my high speed connection manager it says
Bytes sent 51,000,000
recived 400,000,000
.

You must connected and work with internet so long. You should delete all Internet Temporatory files. :imho:

 

[sunken]

Make sure that the drive (normally C) that you have your Virtual Memory paging file on is not full. This can cause a lot of problems, not just slowdowns, but crashes as well.

It does sound like something is running though that shouldn't. Have you tried running spyware detectors? Like SpyBot Search and Destroy or Adaware?

Another thing you might want to check is your Task Manager to see if there is a program tying up CPU cycles. To do this, open Task Manager and go to Applications. The first one in the window should be System Idle. If that says 0 in the column marked CPU, then something is eating up the processor. Then you can click on CPU to see what it is. You can look up each of those applications that are running on Google and find out what they are and who they belong to. Or you can get the shareware program Security Task Manager which will pretty much do that for you. That is a great program by the way. Very useful.

Just some thoughts...

 

[stocks]

Hey sunken thanks for the advice I finally figured it out in the task manager to find what was using up all my cpu I think you ment processes not applications but anyway it was a file in norton "appsvc32.exe" so I searched it in google and found out this was a very common problem and found a fix for it so thanks man my computer is running fine now.