atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Computers & Programming Computers, Software, Accessories My computer is slow as sap!

I have a hand-me-down computer at home that was so full of corrupted files (my son owned it) that I had to literally wipe it out and start from scratch. At first, it worked great, but it has gotten progressively slower. It often takes up to thirty seconds to load a web page. Today, it finally displayed that I don't have enough virtual memory, but I think there is more to it than that. Running my Magic Jack isn't even an option.

I will say that I tried to download a free registry cleaner and aborted the installation. Ever since then, I've had this problem. I suspect that my registry is screwed up now, causing all kinds of conflicts.

It is a Dell Dimension 2400, Windows XP Home edition, Service pack 3, Pentium 4, 2.20 GHz, 219 GHz, 128MB RAM.

I took this computer because my old PC running on a 486 and Windows 98 was slow, but that was actually much faster than this thing.

Is there something that is fairly easy for a non-CG to do to improve the speed of this thing?

Ed do a Ctrl+Alt+Del and see whats running also check your startup folder and make sure its empty.

Go to Control Panel, Add Remove Programs and clean out any unwanted programs. Also at the same spot you can view Window components. If you have the disk you can remove all the components, reboot then reinstall the components you want. I have found this cleans up Windows to run better.

Ed, I would recommend upgrading the RAM...
I looked up the model on Dell's site and it uses PC-2100 or PC-2700. If you don't mind waiting, I am pretty sure I have a stick of that RAM back home that I would be more than happy to send your way!

Ed, 128MB of RAM is way underconfigured IMHO. a 1GB stick of PC2700 (333 MHz) DDR memory would be like night and day on that thing. It should not cost more than $30 - $40. https://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/category/category_slc.asp?CatId=549&name=PC2700
Pull the stick out and see what the speed of the memory is and then pick up another stick. My experience with those programs that promise to speed up or "improve" your PC are actually spyware themselves. A Pentium 4 2.2GHz should still run pretty well.

Boot into safe mode and see how it runs!

as mentioned, big lack of memory! go to https://www.crucial.com to find exactly what memory you need. download the system memory scanner and run it.

upgrade to the largest amount you computer allows - it's worth it!

i would do another clean install, as well since the "free registry cleaner" may have had a trojan/virus/worm/etc. attached to it or infection may have coincided with the download.

OR

Buy a Mac!

More memory or buy a big....

There's an awful lot of malware out there disguised as registry cleaners, so my policy is to avoid them altogether.

Would bringing the RAM up to 512MB help? Sure. But it IS possible that the utility you downloaded is partly responsible for this problem. I could talk you through undoing it's changes, but the time it would take for such a call would be better spent reloading Windows.

When a program needs more RAM than the 128MB that's installed, Windows will grab a piece of hard drive space and treat it like RAM. Programs don't know the difference between real RAM and Windows "virtual memory", but you might because reading/writing to a hard disc is super slow by comparison.

"Your system is low on virtual memory" means that both RAM and virtual memory are exausted. But virtual memory can be adjusted, and it's pretty easy to do. The shorthand version of the steps are: Control Panel, System, Advanced, Performance, Visual Effects, Adjust for best performance, Advanced, Programs (both radio buttons), Virtual memory, System managed size, Set, OK and reboot.

It's not nearly as confusing as it sounds, but I'll baby step through it below.

1. Go to the Control Panel and double-click on the System icon. This brings up the System Properties window.

2. Click on the Advanced tab, then the Settings button associated with Performance (the topmost of the three shown). This brings up the Performance Options window with Visual Effects as the active tab.

3. Choose "Adjust for best performance", then select the Advanced tab.

4. Choose "Programs" for both Processor scheduling and Memory usage. Next click the Change button in the Virtual memory box. This will bring up the Virtual Memory window.

5. Assure that your primary drive is highlighted in the Drive box and select "System managed size" just below (it may already be selected). Hit the Set button, then OK as required to close 'er up.

6. Reboot.

I have the same model computer and it works fine for web browsing and general use. I agree with the others that you definitely need more RAM. If you can add just one 512 MB stick to your existing 128 MB, that would give an acceptable performance. 1024 MB would be a lot better.

Those memory configurators that others mentioned will tell you exactly what you can add.

I also agree you should reinstall Windows. What I do is make a restorable backup of the system after completing a fresh install. I use Acronis for this, but there are other programs too. That way the next time things get bad, you can restore your system complete with drivers and applications.

I have also been using Avast free antivirus lately with good results.

It appears that my Magic Jack may have been the culprit to a certain extent. It apparently modified the virtual memory to prioritize for background routines instead of programs. After I changed it back to programs, the speed is dramatically better. I agree that more RAM is probably my best solution, but since I only use this PC for e-mail and web access at home, I am not in a big hurry to do anything more at this time. The speed I'm getting now is easily ten times faster than it was.