Re: SYSTEM SLOW

On Tue, 31 Jul 2007 09:10:03 -0700, debzee
<debzee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Why is my laptop so slow. Does anyone else have this problem with XP? Is
there anyway to overcome this? I have done the usual: ie compacting drives,
various registry cleaners etc. but nothing helped so I am beginning to wonder
if it is XP rather than anything else. All help or comments would be greatly
appreciated.



Since *many* people run Windows XP without performance problems, the
problem is clearly not Windows XP, but something specific to your
system.

You've given us very little information to go on. How slow is "so
slow"? Has it always been this, or is it a recent phenomenon?

What speed processor do you have? How much RAM do you have?

What do you mean by "compacting the drive"? If you mean defragging,
that's fine.

But "various registry cleaners" is not fine. Not even a single one is
fine. I strongly suggest you avoid using any registry cleaning
program. Cleaning of the registry isn't needed and is dangerous. Leave
the registry alone and don't use any registry cleaner. Despite what
many people think, and what vendors of registry cleaning software try
to convince you of, having unused registry entries doesn't really hurt
you.

The risk of a serious problem caused by a registry cleaner erroneously
removing an entry you need is far greater than any potential benefit
it may have.

Assuming that your problem isn't caused by inadequate hardware (and it
certainly could be) and further assuming that you haven't made things
much worse with your "various registry cleaners" (and that too is
certainly possible), the two most likely culprits are

1. Performance-robbing background programs starting automatically with
Windows.

2. Spyware infestation. These days, spyware infestation is rampant,
and that would be my guess. The most common reason for such problems
these days is malware infestation. I recommend that you go to Malke's
Malware Removal site at
http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Removing_Malware and
follow the instructions there.

--



--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP Windows - Shell/User
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