WindowsXP tooooooo sloooowwww

**vagpap** · January 28th, 2003, 06:11 PM

Hi there

I have a Compaq Presario 731EA (MobileAthlon1200, 128MB Ram etc).
I know I don't have mucj RAM but....
WindowsXP (pre-installed) are waaaayyyyy tooooooo slooooowwwww.
It needs about a century to boot up and another one to open Word!!!!!
I'm not using any of the network capabilitites of my machine, expept only dial-up access to the internet. Is there any way i can disable any network related stuff? (I have already disabled my NIC card from device manager).
Which services are completely useless?

I don't have the option to install win98 because Compaq doesn't have drivers to support win98 (only XP)

Any help??????
I am desperate

Thank you
Vangelis

**Creatures** · January 28th, 2003, 06:25 PM

there's an anti spy which also disables this slow boot!
but i've got no link sorry!

try msconfig to disable some autostarts maybe it helps!

Creatures

**Dazbo666** · January 28th, 2003, 06:30 PM

Originally posted by vagpap
....I don't have the option to install win98 because Compaq doesn't have drivers to support win98 (only XP).....

I'd go with the msconfig solution?! Failing that, any chance you can try Win2000??
The only reason I suggested 2000, is that I know Compaq's can run with that (it's the OS I'm using at work.)

**ThePyro** · January 28th, 2003, 06:32 PM

Originally posted by vagpap
I have a Compaq Presario 731EA (MobileAthlon1200, 128MB Ram etc).
I know I don't have mucj RAM but....
WindowsXP (pre-installed) are waaaayyyyy tooooooo slooooowwwww.

I would guess that you have 128 mb of ram... lol, honestly though, i dont really know what to tell ya, sorry

**Dazbo666** · January 28th, 2003, 07:19 PM

More RAM would probably help.... but first off would be to make sure you don't have any unneccessary applications running in the background??
....and defrag your hard disk etc

**EndobioticChaos** · January 28th, 2003, 07:22 PM

Yep... you definitely need more RAM. I wouldn't even try running it with less than 256.

**Dazbo666** · January 28th, 2003, 07:30 PM

I believe 128mb is the minimum spec.... so obviously it would run that much better with some extra mb's

...Windows XP ..... the recommended minimum spec is 128MB RAM, 300Mhz processor and a hefty 1.5GB of hard disk space...

**watchtower7** · January 28th, 2003, 07:43 PM

I ran registry first aid about twenty times-the free downloadable version on this site only allows "up to 14 fixes" each time you run it-you must exit after each fix-it seemed to really help me.
One caveat-I did have to "redo" one removal/repair when some web pages began behaving rather oddly.
Also-spybot killls alot of stuff there as well.
I also ran all the xp fixes from this site-http://hardwarehq.orcon.net.nz/ and noticed tons of improvement

**Dazbo666** · January 28th, 2003, 07:51 PM

While you're at it, you might try "AdAware" too, just to make sure you get rid of any spyware?

**rekless** · January 28th, 2003, 07:53 PM

As for the services...............You should check out this site:

http://www.blkviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm

Pretty much breaks down all the services running in XP and will tell you which ones you can disable to streamline your system depending on what you are using it for.

I also would recommend the RAM upgrade to a min of 256.

rek

**Cody** · January 28th, 2003, 08:17 PM

I ran Xp on an Athlon 600MHz w/ 128MB and it ran beautifully... Use XP on a PIII 800 w/ 768MB RAM and it runs alright... I have a problem with slightly slow bootups too... my problem has more to do with my 3-minute login time. if I figure anything out I'll be sure to let you know, though!

Cody

**Dazbo666** · January 28th, 2003, 08:26 PM

I'm running XP Pro on a P3 at 650Mhz and 256mb of PC133 memory....
and everything runs smoothly - in fact it runs better than when I was running Win98 previously.....

and apart from background applications, spyware, or virus checking, the extra memory is all I could suggest on this one!!
(I'm beginning to feel sooooo inadequate

hahaha)

**GroundZero3** · January 28th, 2003, 08:39 PM

http://www.tweakxp.com/tweakxp/ look around there for some tweaks.

the best tweak i can think of that everyone love is right click on my computer. click properties, click advance, on the preformance area click settings, then click the button adjust for best preformance. turns most, close to all the stupid eye candy off

**vagpap** · January 29th, 2003, 09:42 AM

Thank you all

I will also try win2K...

and more RAM....

**kaziah** · February 2nd, 2003, 10:33 PM

I agree with a lot of the others... RAM is something I'd definately put on your list, even if it's not the problem =) XP is memory intensive, and the more the better =) A pc I have here at the house is an Athlon 700 w/ 384mb RAM and it runs beautifully.

Ad-aware would be a great idea. See if you can track down any spyware or similar crud that's cluttering up your machine.

Do you have Anti-virus? That's another very real possibility. If you do, make sure the virus definitions are up to date, and run a full virus scan of your system. Viruses are vicious, they come in many different flavors, and they can cause any number of problems on an infected machine.

See how fragmented your drives are. That's probably not a big issue, but every little bit you can do might help =) regular defraging in NTFS is arguably un-necessary, but a person should check every once in awhile anyway to see how bad your drive is, and defrag when necessary... especially if you're running on FAT.

In addition to ad-aware, use msconfig to thumb through the programs that load during startup, and to disable any you don't want ran when your system starts. You can spot the print of a virus here sometimes too =) Check in your system tray too. You can right click on many programs like ms messenger, word perfects DAD, winzip, winamp and so on, and then there should either be an option to disable the item on startup, or perhaps a link to a preferences or options section where you might have to search a bit, but should be able to find a spot to toggle the run on startup option to off or disable. Some programs aren't quite so friendly though and don't want you to remove them =) msconfig is a nice tool to use for those, but if you get confused in there, at least you can disable some of them this way.

If you do wipe your machine and re-install XP or maybe another OS, and you still have problems, it's possible you might have hardware problems like bad RAM or hard drive that's on it's way to going belly up.

Sorry, I'm rambling... I'll stop now =) I hope you figure it out!

Good luck,
Kaziah

**JayMan** · February 2nd, 2003, 11:03 PM

Has everyone here run BootVis on their XP installs???

Reduced my loading time from 42secs to 20secs. (from after winXP splash screen/blue scroll thingo)

Search the M$ webpage for "bootvis.exe", should bring up the download.

JayMan

**GroundZero3** · February 2nd, 2003, 11:07 PM

Bootvis.exe (im bored)

**Knothead** · February 2nd, 2003, 11:14 PM

There is a site with helpful suggestions for "trimming down" WinXP so that it runs better on a smaller machine...http://www.blkviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm

Hope this helps!

**hardyx9** · February 3rd, 2003, 05:26 AM

@vagpap

>I will also try win2K...

i would stay with XP. for me, used to win98se, xp is much more stable. Also, Dazbo666 is right.
get more ram !( i use 128 + additional 256 on my client: toshiba satellite 1800 364-E laptop, with wlan with wep encoding enabled, surfing dsl, zone alarm and antivir running, and the performance is ok) i think it is also a matter of

a) too many applications running in the background
b) defragmentation
c) use antispy
d) check for any virus
e) empty temporary files with the assistant regularly

cheers
hardyx9