BleepingComputer.com: Slow 10-13 Min Start Time With Choppy Sounds And Cpu Spikes

Hi there, I was asked to post in this forum. My PC takes 10-13 min. to load up, when it is loaded and running, it will have random spikes in the cpu usage. This causes windows media player to skip and become choppy. Also, takes a little time to open new programs, and this causes high cpu usage as well. My computer was working fine and about a week ago this all started. I have run counter-spy, AVG, panda, bitdefender, and a few other virus and malware programs. I have had my hijackthis log analized, and am told it is clean. Does anyone have a guess or help for me. I am near the end of my teather, and thinking to format whole drive. Oh, and diskdefrag won't get passed 1% compression, in normal mode or safe mode. Thanks

Have you tried winsock XP?

http://www.snapfiles.com/get/winsockxpfix.html

Thanks for the advice. Still doesn't help with the problems, but programs are running a bit faster. defrag still not getting past 1% and long load time still continues. What do you think?

Try using AWC.

http://www.majorgeeks.com/Advanced_Windows...onal_d4991.html

and Iobit defrag.

http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=5318

Merry Christmas

Thanks for the help! AVW has helped system performance a bit, but still get random spikes that last for a minute or more with cpu usage, and music is still choppy when this happens. Startup is still quite slow. Haven't checked out the defrag you told me about, will do later today or tomorrow. Thanks again, and if you have any more suggestions, I'll happily take them.

Merry Christmas

Open up Task Manager (Ctrl-Alt-Del) and click on the Processes tab. Double click on the CPU heading (to sort it by usage). Then run the Media Player. Look for the process that's consuming the CPU cycles and let us know which it is.

Looked at the processes running, come up with several that pop up during media player working, and they are svchost, guard, WINWORD, taskmgr, explorer, wuauclt, Isass, SpySweeper, and ati2evxx

I also want to say that I have noticed that the skipping occurs when the system goes into about 1 minute of spiky usage between 80%-95%. I noticed this yesterday when listening to music with friends and the computer only job was to play music. Thanks

Isass.exe or Lsass.exe? What level of service pack do you have on your Windows XP?

This can also be caused by scans going off while the music is playing (such as your Spysweeper or antivirus programs).

It looks like a lower case L, so lsass.exe.
As far as I know, I'm running SP2 on XP.

Sometimes it is a scan that causes it, but most of the time it is not, unless there is a scan that I am unaware of going on in its inerds!

Please let us know the specs of your system. If you don't know them, you can download this free app to list them: http://www.gtopala.com/index.html

Hello there,

would love to give you the specs, but forgive me, there is a lot that program brings up. What exactly are you looking for? If I leave something out, please let me know.

hp pavilion dv5000
amd turion 64 mobile processor
windows xp professional sp2
65 GB total space
895 MB physical memory

I imagine there is a lot more you need, please, like I said, need to know what you are looking for, or is it the whole log?

But, I do want to say that I've been able to run the scandisk and defrag, which both took somewheres around 8 hours each, and the startup time is down to 7 min, and the computer seems to be handling multi-tasking a bit better, but still would like to continue to speed this up to what it should be!

Thanks for the help.

If this problem started only one or two weeks ago instead of going through what might be an almost endless diagnostic process use Windows System Restore to restore your system state to a previous working condition.

It will not delete data but will require that you re-download any updates that occurred during the period between the restore point date and now.

To invoke Windows System Restore (which was designed by Microsoft for this very type of problem), click start/programs/accessories/system tools/system restore.

Choose a date that preceeds the onset of the problem.
Follow the directions on-screen.

By the way, do not alter or use any program that alters the Winsock. The winsock has to do with internet connectivity and nothing to do with the problem as you have described it.

Thank you, I have thought of it and tried it earlier. Problem was, the computer couldn't launch any of the restore points, and somewhere along the way of my fiddling, I believe I erased all the past ones. Don't think it matters, seeing how the PC didn't seem to like them either. But thank you for the words of advice

The next step to diagnose the cause of the problem would be to prevent all unnecessary programs from starting when Windows starts and then running in the background.

The only aps that you need running in the Windows startup menu are your av ap and your firewall.

I recommend Startup Inspector to manage your startup menu as it is much easier to use than msconfig, the Windows utility.

Startup Inspector (manages startup menu – helps you identify aps in the startup menu so you can disable unnecessary programs from running in the background when they are not needed)

And

Startup Monitor (a small freeware ap available on the same page to notify you and require your permission for any program to add itself to your startup menu)

http://www.windowsstartup.com/download.php


Disable all unnecessary program entries

Clicking on an entry will highlight it and inform you what it is connected with in the lower right pane.

After disabling unnecessary aps reboot, and if the time it takes for the computer to boot is back to normal, reopen Startup Inspector and enable one item you unchecked at a time and reboot continuing until you find the one causing the problem.

I have downloaded the two programs and have them running, but no programs fromwhat it tells me launch at startup. A few days ago, I shut down all the programs that I could, must have been all of them, that started up with windows, trying to save time. Didn't work. But seems I did successfully shut them all down.

I have noticed over the last day or two that media player is less choppy, only getting bad when opening a new program, and that the spikes seem to have vanished fairly well. But the startup now seems to be the major problem.

I am also running process explorer, and it reads a process vmiprvse.exe running twice under the same svchost on startup, and it comes up in brown. One goes away within a minute of the system being up, the other disappears within the next ten. I don't know what brown means, could make a guess, but I don't know why they disappear either. Don't know if this is important information, but figured since I noticed it, I'd pass it along.

Thanks again for all the help you guys are providing!