[otieatkins]

Hi!
I recently read somewhere (darned if I can remember where) that when you have a lot of icons on your desktop, your computer runs much, much slower. Currently I use the program Fences to help keep my icons organized, but, I have over 900 on my desktop. My computer is Alienware Lightspeed, 4 gb ram, 3.61 ghertz, windows XP pro, either Foxfire 3.6 or IE8.
If that is one of my major problems, have you any hints on how I can keep them without slowing me down so much?
When I say slow, I mean sssllllllooooooowwwwwww......

Thanks for your help,

Dianne

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I have over 900 on my desktop

WOW! 900 is the most I've ever heard, why so many?

that when you have a lot of icons on your desktop, your computer runs much, much slower

Icons on your desktop take up very little space on your hard drive, however, for each icon you have that means you probably have a program installed for each one which can take up a lot of space considering you have 900. Or do you create shortcut Icons to pictures, documents, etc?

Is your hard drive full?

• Click Start
• Click My Computer
• Right Click C Drive
• Select Properties

How much used space is there? i.e. 55gb
What it the capacity of the drive? i.e. 160gb

Also, if you are seeking to speed up your computer. Read and complete this guide: Maintaining Your Machine by Artellos. This guide covers eliminating unnecessary programs from running at startup, cleaning all the temporary files, defragmenting your hard drive, and more.

[Ferrari]

I have over 900 on my desktop

WOW! 900 is the most I've ever heard, why so many?

that when you have a lot of icons on your desktop, your computer runs much, much slower

Icons on your desktop take up very little space on your hard drive, however, for each icon you have that means you probably have a program installed for each one which can take up a lot of space considering you have 900. Or do you create shortcut Icons to pictures, documents, etc?

Is your hard drive full?

• Click Start
• Click My Computer
• Right Click C Drive
• Select Properties

How much used space is there? i.e. 55gb
What it the capacity of the drive? i.e. 160gb

Also, if you are seeking to speed up your computer. Read and complete this guide: Maintaining Your Machine by Artellos. This guide covers eliminating unnecessary programs from running at startup, cleaning all the temporary files, defragmenting your hard drive, and more.

[otieatkins]

Hi Ferrari,
Thanks you so much for getting back to me so soon. I guess you would call me a software hoarder. I see what looks to be a great program so download it and install it because I never know when I'll be needing it. Must sound kind of sick?
My primary hard drive is partitioned into 2 segments - C (Used 43.6 gb, Free 39.0 gb) H (Used 15.0 gb, Free 51.2 gb)
Then I have another drive , also partitioned, - S (Used 149 gb, Free 192 gb) T (Used 1000.98 gb, Free 46.9 gb).
I am going to do the Maintenance book now, I'll let you know what happens. Also, just for your FYI, this reply has taken me about 15 minutes because the system is so slow!

[Ferrari]

Complete the maintenance manual, and let me know how your computer is running after that. Then we can go from there.

[rshaffer61]

I can bet you that your Autoruns and Startups is a lot of your problems.
Download Autoruns from the link in my signature below:
1: Extract the Autoruns Zip file contents to a folder.
2: Double-click the "Autoruns.exe".
3: Click on the "Everything" tab
4: Remove any entries that mention "File Not Found" by right-clicking the entry and select Delete.
5: Go to File then to Export As or Save in some versions.
6: Save AutoRuns.txt file to known location like your Desktop.
7: Attach to your next reply.


Lets see what you have in your startup
Please click on
Start and then on Run
Type in msconfig and then press Enter
Now click on Startup
Next click on your Print Screen on your keyboard. It is normally the key above your number pad between the F12 key and the Scroll Lock key
Now go to Start
All Programs
Accessories
Paint
In the empty white area click and hold the CTRL key and then click the V
Go to the File option at the top and click on Save As
Save as file type JPEG and save it to your desktop

In your next reply attach the screenshot.

[otieatkins]

Hi Rshaffer61,
Thanks for the response but I'm having a problem with both tasks. The start cannot be sent to paint (I've actually started a new topic for that problem) and I could not find any link in your signature for the autorun program. Is it possible to send that to me?
Thanks so much!

[otieatkins]

Hi Ferrari,
I did everything the instructions told me to do and it's still as slow as a snail. And, now I have a worse problem - see my new post.
Any other suggestions?
Thanks so much!

[rshaffer61]

Autoruns..second line on the far right last link in Red.

[otieatkins]

Hi RShaffer61,
Well, your not going to believe this... When I tried to run the Autorun program, I got the same error (windows cannot access....)!!

So, now I have some questions:
1). Can I make a clone of just the C drive when it's partitioned to C and H?
2). If I can, when I clean the C drive, can I put back the clone without the windows portion, then install windows nice and clean?
3). I have windows 7 - is this a good time to install it? If it doesn't install okay, can I install windows XP again?
4). Any other suggestions to get out of this mess?

[rshaffer61]

If you clone the partition then you won't be able to clone it back if you put Windows 7 on it.
Your problem seems to be the amount of icons you have loading and what is running in the background.
If you load Windows 7 we need to know if this is a full version or a upgrade?
Is it a 32 or 64 bit version you intend to load?

[123Runner]

Icons may slow your computer down a little bit ... but only while it's booting up ... once it's started Icons on your desktop have no effect on performance because they are already loaded.

When was the last time you cleaned the computer of the temp files and cache?

Please download ATF Cleaner by Atribune.
Double-click ATF-Cleaner.exe to run the program.
Under Main choose: Select All
Click the Empty Selected button.
If you use Firefox browserClick Firefox at the top and choose: Select All
Click the Empty Selected button.
NOTE: If you would like to keep your saved passwords, please click No at the prompt.
If you use Opera browserClick Opera at the top and choose: Select All
Click the Empty Selected button.
NOTE: If you would like to keep your saved passwords, please click No at the prompt.
Click Exit on the Main menu to close the program.
For Technical Support, double-click the e-mail address located at the bottom of each menu.

Then you should try defragging the drives.

Download Auslogics Defrag from the link below. Auslogics Defrag in my opinion is better because:

It does a more comprehensive job at Defragging
It will actually show you what it is doing
At the end of working it will show you how much speed you picked up
You can view a online log of the files that Auslogics defragged

http://auslogics.com...defrag/download

Maybe then we can see about the autoruns.

123runner

[otieatkins]

Hi 123Runner, welcome to the party!
Funny, I was able to download and run the ATF Cleaner and it worked great giving me an extra 4.5 MB, but, I was unable to download Auslogics Defrag because of my permissions problem (on my other active post). Any other suggestions?
And, thank you for your help!

[otieatkins]

Hi Everyone! I've got new information. Don't know why I didn't do this earlier, but, I went into my events log. Looks like it started on 2/10 with a "The following boot-start or system-start driver(s) failed to load:
HWiNFO32" error. Then came the "The ScRegSetValueExW call failed for Start with the following error:
Access is denied." The "Then SQL Server VSS Writer service failed to start due to the following error:
The system cannot find the file specified. " Then "The HTTP service failed to start due to the following error:
Access is denied." Then "The SSDP Discovery Service service depends on the HTTP service which failed to start because of the following error: Access is denied.
Those are just a few of the errors. I bet someone will know exactly what it is and how to fix it.
Thanks so much for your interest!

[rshaffer61]

• Please download the Event Viewer Tool by Vino Rosso VEW and save it to your Desktop:
• Double-click VEW.exe
• Under 'Select log to query', select (as appropriate):
  
  • Application
  • System
• Under 'Select type to list', select (as appropriate):
  
  • Error
  • Information
  • Warning

Then use the 'Date of events' or 'Number of events' as follows:

Either:

• Click the radio button for 'Number of events'
  Type 3 in the 1 to 20 box (or any number from 1 to 20)
  Then click the Run button.
  Notepad will open with the output log.
  
  
• Click the radio button for 'Date of events'
  In the From: boxes type today's date (presuming the crash happened today) 13 07 2009
  In the To: boxes type today's date (presuming the crash happened today) 13 07 2009
  Then click the Run button.
  Notepad will open with the output log.

Please post the Output log in your next reply

[otieatkins]

Hi RShaffer61,

Bad news... I can download the VEW file but I can't run it - same no permission error message. Do you know of anyway I can "redo" the service stuff?