[Cabranth]

Hi.

I'm trying to find out if getting a newer/better modem than the one I have will have any effect on my PC's performance online. I have some pretty slow load times when connecting to/opening pages I surf to, and I didn't know if any performance could be added with a modem upgrade.

To start with, I have an Ethernet capable PC, and a Cable/Broadband internet connection. My current modem is a LINKSYS Cable Modem BEFCMU10(ver.4).

What little I've been able to find so far about modems talks about something called DOCSIS. My current modem is DOCSIS1. Is a modem with DOCSIS 2 faster than DOCSIS1?

Any info would be appreciated.

Thanks.

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Heres something i found on this subject.

http://www.commsdesi...EG20020617S0011

I really think it is more that if your cable provider can implement the changes to their system the cable will be faster.

SRX660

[SRX660]

Heres something i found on this subject.

http://www.commsdesi...EG20020617S0011

I really think it is more that if your cable provider can implement the changes to their system the cable will be faster.

SRX660

[Cabranth]

Hi.

Thanks for the reply SRX660.

Unless I'm missing something I don't think my DOCSIS version has anything to do with my problem. I'm downloading/uploading at the speeds that I should be. I just downloaded a HUGE patch for one of my games and my speed was blazing, so no problem there.

I'm just having slow performance when I go online to my internet homepage or when I go from website to website. Sometimes the progress bar on the bottom of the page takes FOREVER to get to 100%. And this is even though I've got twice the RAM (1024), twice the processor (3ghz Dual-Core), almost twice the graphics RAM (225), and went from a USB connection to Ethernet.

Does the fact that I have Integrated Graphics have anything to do with how my PC performs when I'm surfing? I'm thinking hard about getting a EVGA e-GeForce 7600 GS. Will getting that card make my PC surf faster?

Thanks.

[Samm]

I doubt very much that the video card is having any affect on internet surfing.

What I would suggest however is this...
Firstly, try emptying the temporary Internet cache. If you use IE, then you'll find this in Tools->Internet Options->Temporary Internet Files -> delete files. Tick the 'delete offline content' box before emptying.

You may find that initially your homepage etc may be a bit slower loading because it is no longer cached. But as soon as you've loaded it once, it will speed up the next time.

Next thing to check would be for malware. I suggest you install & run something like Ewido or Spybot if you haven't already done so.

Let me know how you get on

[Cabranth]

Hello.

Thank you Samm for the reply.

I did the Internet Options delete thing like you said. It made my processor use go up to 90%+, and it's never gone above 40% on this new PC. Then my PC totally locked. I even tried Ctrl+Alt+Delete, but it was frozen. Waited about 5 minutes, and then just cut the power manually. After I rebooted I did the Internet Options delete thing again, and I guess it worked fine this time, since my PC didn't lock up again.

By the way, thanks for telling me I was going to loose my auto-login function. I had to dig under a pile of notebooks to find my Username/Password list I keep. Good thing I write that stuff down or else I'd be screwed, 'cause I use multiple names and a different Password at every site. You might want to mention that particular side-effect beforehand in the future. Just a fair warning for us ignoramuses.

As for Malware, I can't believe that's my problem. I've had surfing performance issues with this new PC right out of the box. One of the first things I did was to put AVG and Ewido on this new PC. I run both every night before I shut down for the day. I did have a nasty Malware bug recently, but it's gone now, and I've been certified Clean by the Malware dept. here.

Anyway, I don't see any improvement in performance. Every page I've jumped to since I came back online is taking just as long as before to come up, or load, or whatever you call it.

Thanks.

[Samm]

Hello.

By the way, thanks for telling me I was going to loose my auto-login function. I had to dig under a pile of notebooks to find my Username/Password list I keep. Good thing I write that stuff down or else I'd be screwed, 'cause I use multiple names and a different Password at every site. You might want to mention that particular side-effect beforehand in the future. Just a fair warning for us ignoramuses.

Lol, apologies for that! I generally assume that everyone keeps a list of usernames & passwords on paper anyway, for exactly that reason. Thanks for reminding me though!

I've been looking back through your recent topics & noticed that you are actually running XP Media Center, not XP Home. You may want to change your OS setting under your avatar otherwise you may be given advice based on the wrong OS.

I also read your topic in the malware section. You said then that your browsing speed had improved after you cleaned the malware off your system 10 days ago. Am I right in thinking that your browsing speed has deteriorated in the last 10 days then?

[Cabranth]

Hi Samm.

Yes I lucked out on that keeping records part. Good thing I'm that anal!

Thanks for the heads-up on my personal info. I never even thought of that, mea culpa.

O.K. Regarding that "Lop" Malware I had. It slowed down my surfing even worse than normal. I'm assuming (since I'm pretty clueless here) that it slowed me down because it was opening multiple Internet Explorers and draining my resources (it ran up both my processor % and my RAM usage). After it was expunged, my processor and RAM usages went back down to the levels they were at when I first booted up this new PC.

Side Note- I tried asking elsewhere about paring down the RAM usage on this PC(like I did on my old one). I noticed right away that I'm using between 100-200mb(it varies) more RAM than on my old PC, and that there are about twice as many processes running when I looked in the Task Manager/Processes(most I have never heard of or seen before). I wanted to find out which processes I could disable (and cut down RAM usage), and what was necessary for operations. I never got any specific answers.

[Samm]

Hi

OK, can you download Everest from this link please :
http://www.majorgeek...wnload4181.html

Run it & in the left pane, locate the branch called 'Software'. Click once on the 'software' heading to highlight it. With Software highlighted on the left, click on the Report menu->Quick Report->html

This will generate & display a report. You then need to save it to your drive (eg. myreport.htm). Then email the file to me as an attachment please.

[email protected]

[Cabranth]

Hi Samm.

I downloaded and Ran that Everest thing. In the left panel, I couldn't find "Software" anywhere at all. I looked in all the sub-directories too. Is it possible that you meant something else?

Also, when I first opened Everest, it said something about my system being different in some way and do I want to run a report and sent it to so-and-so, in order for me to better use this thing? But at the site where I downloaded it, it said Everest is no longer "supported", so that message no longer means anything right? Or what?

I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I'm lost here.

[Samm]

Hi
Sorry about that. Lavalys no longer supply Everest for free so the older version which is free, is no longer supported. It does still work fine but I realised afterwards that the one in the link I gave you is a different version to the one I use & hence the layout etc may well be different.

Simple solution - download Aida32 instead from here..
http://www.majorgeek...ation_d181.html

The instructions I gave you last time for Everest will work for Aida (I've checked!) as the two are essentially the same program, so you can create the report I asked for & email it over!

Cheers

[Samm]

Hi
Had chance to read your software report properly now. I can make the following suggestions re. the startup programs :

Basically the following programs are ones which do not need to be loaded at start up. Disabling them from starting does not uninstall them obviously so you can re-enable them at any time. Most can also be started manually after Windows has loaded if you require.

BgMonitor - part of Nero

DMAScheduler - HP archiver scheduler. Up to you if you feel you want this to run automatically

ehTray - Media Center panel - not sure what this does or how useful it is as I don't use Media Center

HP Software Update (HPwuSchd2.exe) - exactly what it says it is. However you can check for updates manually when you want to rather than have this loading everytime

Igfxhkcmd (hkcmd.exe) - Intel Hotkey utility. Can be disabled if you don't use it

igfxpers + igfxtray - Intel graphics command user interface. Again non-essential so up to you

isuspm startup (isuspm.exe -startup) Automatically checks for software updates. Again, up to you if you want it to do this.

pcdrprofiler - part of PC Doctor. If you don't use PC Doctor or don't find it useful then disable this

Any of these programs can be easily disabled/re-enabled by running msconfig from the Run command. Look under the startup tab & clear the checkboxes for programs you want to disable.

Obviously if disabling any of these programs from startup causes any problems or loss of functionality, then simply reverse the process


Another thing I noticed...

You seem to have several antivirus programs potentially running or installed. i.e AVG, Cox Security Suite (which contains an AV component), Command AV, Panda Active Scan

I am assuming that the last two aren't normally running as they don't appear in the startup list. I also realise that you may not have the AV part of Cox installed or enabled, but if you do, you should pick which one you want to use (AVG or Cox) & uninstall or disable the other.

Also check on the number of firewalls you have running. Again Cox contains a firewall so make sure that Windows firewall is disabled.

[Cabranth]

Hi Samm.

Thanks for the info. I will attempt to disable those progs and see how my PC runs afterwards.

Regarding Antivirus progs: Untill now I wasn't completely sure how to keep all of them from starting up when I turned on my PC, and I just turned them off afterwards. I usually run AVG for real-time antivirus protection, because it uses the least RAM of all my options. I scan with AVG and Ewido at night before I shut down my PC. I also run the spyware and antivirus scans (there's one for each) in the Cox Security Suite about once every week. I scan with all three because each seems to find some things that the other two don't.

Also, my Windows Firewall is enabled, my Cox firewall is disabled (since I only use it once a week or so for scans).

Thanks again.