PC performance

[kojak]

Why all of a sudden the performance of my pc is 'very low'. When first switched on its 70%. As soon as i'm onto one site/chat...i'm down to zero. This has never been a problem until now. Help.

Its just been defragged.

Edited by kojak on Friday 18th August 16:17

[Momentofmadness]

Will give out the usual advice to try first

Start the PC in Safe mode then run Ad-aware or ccleaner (see forum FAQs for links) to clear all spyware and general clutter out of the system.

Do you run anti-virus software? Worth running a full system scan!

Let us know how you get on.

[julianhj]

I was about to post a related question: is there a piece of shareware I can download to guage my PC's performance before and after clearing it up?

[kojak]

I'll run 'search and destroy'. Did a scan yesterday. All ok.

[kojak]

Still no good. Its onlt happening in one particular chat room. Any ideas?

[Momentofmadness]

kojak said:

Still no good. Its onlt happening in one particular chat room. Any ideas?

Which one? The Lycos one is very memory hungry

[kojak]

Its another one, but i've never had probs before. Its always been fine...up till now. It happens within 1 minute of going on. All other chat/MSN is fine.

[Momentofmadness]

How much memory does your PC have?

[kojak]

Nearly 3gb left (from 40GB - 256 ram). This has not been an issue in the past.

[Momentofmadness]

I'd definately recommend you try this www.ccleaner.com/ which will clear the clutter and you can scan for 'issues' such as broken shortcuts etc - well worth it!

As software / websites get more advanced, your PC needs more 'workspace' to run well - this workspace is the RAM. Have a look here www.crucial.com/uk/ to find out what type of memory you have and then buy another 256MB cheaply off Fleabay

[thepassenger]

Off the top of my head and without knowing the chat site.
It could... COULD... be a Java issue. Windows and Java on my laptop decided to have the nasties fight ever and any Java app would litterally drag down to an utter standstill (100% cpu useage, memory didn't budge though).

If nothing else seems to work and it is a Java chat system go to Control Panel > Java and click 'Delete Files' let it wipe everything. See if that helps.

[ATG]

If you look in the Program Manager application you can check how much RAM is left, which process is hogging the processor, etc.

256MB or RAM is not a great deal and I'd certainly be looking to see how it is being used first.

to thepassenger's comment on Java. That's a good one to know.

Edited by ATG on Friday 18th August 22:03

[Momentofmadness]

thepassenger said:

Off the top of my head and without knowing the chat site.
It could... COULD... be a Java issue. Windows and Java on my laptop decided to have the nasties fight ever and any Java app would litterally drag down to an utter standstill (100% cpu useage, memory didn't budge though).

If nothing else seems to work and it is a Java chat system go to Control Panel > Java and click 'Delete Files' let it wipe everything. See if that helps.

I updated my java and it really did fcuk my (dated) PC as above - ended up restoring it to the pre-installation date

[thepassenger]

Momentofmadness said:

I updated my java and it really did fcuk my (dated) PC as above - ended up restoring it to the pre-installation date

I did say 'clear out the cache' rather than 'update to latest version of Sun's "I eat CPU for breakfast, lunch and dinner" Java'.

On the other hand, if you've updated Sun Java, then went to yee chat room and the PC made grindy 'help me daddy' motions... we might have found the problem in a round about sorta way.

[kojak]

Tried clearing the cache from java but no look.

Which of the 'adware' programs are free...in other words, I done have to give credit card details to 'try it for 30 days', to see if thats the problem. I've got 693 errors. Wow.

[Momentofmadness]

Have you run ccleaner yet?

Another freebie that works is www.lavasoft.com - Ad-aware personal and no you don't need to put any payment details in, it's free for personal home use.

[kojak]

Run Ad-aware, but need to try. Site down at moment. Not tried ccleaner as i've run evidence eliminator which I think is similar.

Will let you know.

Edited by kojak on Saturday 19th August 15:36

Edited by kojak on Saturday 19th August 15:37

[kojak]

Momentofmadness said:

thepassenger said:

Off the top of my head and without knowing the chat site.
It could... COULD... be a Java issue. Windows and Java on my laptop decided to have the nasties fight ever and any Java app would litterally drag down to an utter standstill (100% cpu useage, memory didn't budge though).

If nothing else seems to work and it is a Java chat system go to Control Panel > Java and click 'Delete Files' let it wipe everything. See if that helps.

I updated my java and it really did fcuk my (dated) PC as above - ended up restoring it to the pre-installation date

Was thinking of 'updating Java, but dont think i'll bother.

[kojak]

Still no bloody good.

[Momentofmadness]

kojak said:

Still no bloody good.

PS Just remembered I was thinking of the Yahoo chat - the ship thing! My PC wouldn't run that until I added more memory.

PPS Go on humour me and run ccleaner