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I just got an assembled pc with this specs
P4 1.5Ghz, 256 RAM, 40GB HDD, Windows XP PRO.
Despite the specs, I find the PC very slow, even when doing simple tasks like copying files from CD to Hard disk.
When I copy files while the music is playing the music starts dragging.
The CPU usage gets to 100% even when there isnt much process going on.
where could the problem be?
The first thing I would do is to upgrade your ram since xp is such a memory hog.
Clear out your start up of unneeded start up programs.
Also you could try defraging your hard drive everyonce in awhile to.
I'd go with Athorn. 256 for xp pro is just not enough if you want it to be a usable pc. I have 1gb and even that can slow down when using photoshop and other heavydute apps. Invest in memory
I've got almost the exact same specs, only actually even worse (It's a P4 1.6GHz Mobile, which usually runs at 1.2GHz).
It isn't at all sluggish for me. I don't think RAM is your problem, because I also have 256MB RAM.
Is this a fresh install of WinXP Pro?
Please elaborate on the exact specs (e.g. graphic card, hdd space used/free, size of pagefile !, new install/old install, driver versions, etc.)...
Cause with those specs, win xp should run just fine...!
Maybe you should do the following first:
1.) restart your compi
2.) login to windows and don't start any additional apps
3.) enter task-manager and look out for apps using loads of memory and/or cpu-time...-> try to identify what they are (if anything is suspicious there), cause it could be that some weird task is running all the time that is eating up your ram and cpu-time...
Ingo
Also, what type of RAM do you have? I have a friend who does fine with 256MB and XP, but she has RDRAM. I find my system a bit sluggish mainly because of SDRAM (and low hard disk space, but that's my own fault).
No way, 256mb ram on an xp pro system you gotta be nuts. as soon as you get more than one app open your crawling. Anyone building or selling PC's with xp pro and 256 ram should know better( Including Dell who I've seen selling them with 128. Anyone who works with xp pro ( And I manage 250 of the bugers ) knows that this is just impracticle in the real world.
I remember when win95 came out and Microsoft said it will run happily on 4mb Ram , in your dreams only if you swtiched it on and dident use it...
3 rules of thumb
get the biggest hard drive
the fastest proccessor
and as much Ram as you can afford
AndyD
BS. 256 is enough for average use -- until recently that's the amount I had -- I only bought more because Crucial's prices dropped $70.00. I could run Eclipse, Photoshop, Winamp streaming from our network server drive, all without any slowdown. Ingoal and redemption's methods are the tickets -- you probably have some process sucking up extra CPU processes.
If your harddrive's badly fragmented, a couple of defragmentations can do wonders -- my drive was at 60% fragmentation last week and IT WAS noticeable, the slow performance.
-Colin
Colin Anderson
Ambition is a poor excuse for those without
sense enough to be lazy.
I'm even more confused - are you speaking from experience (maybe as a builder or seller of PCs)? Because it seems you've had a really unlucky experience. I'd be the first to put MS Operating Systems down because of the bloat and intensive memory requirements, but in no way have I seen that 256MB of RAM (at least DDR RAM, which is what most current P4 and Athlon mobos support) is insufficient for normal uses.Originally Posted by AndyD
Like I said before, 128MB is not enough - more than 1 app often leaves the system crawling. But 256MB considerably improves the situation - I haven't had any problems having multiple apps open (like Word, Acrobat, IE, OE, and even CM4 running in the background).
Maybe you're dealing with slower machines or lower bandwidth mobos?
I'd have to second the fact that 256MB on those kind of specs should run fine. i've got that in one of my machines that serves up web,ftp, AND mail - meanwhile i regularly use Photoshop 7, Outlook 2003 beta, macromedia homesite 5, topstyle 2.5, trillian, and several instances of IE 6 open and it runs just fine. with those kind of specs yours should run just fine.... if not - you've got some config issues somewhere.
I am speaking from experince of building them and managing them. Your lucky I'm not employing you .If I aksd you for a spec for a workable pc in the workplace and you came up with 256 ram on an xp pro PC you'de be out the door pronto.
Enough said on this subject
AndyD
I agree, we are lucky you're not employing us
Not intending to be sarcastic or anything (the above statement was
In any case, we'll let qshikuku get back to us.
sarcastic?Moi!
How you feel at any given time depends on how you perceive whats going on around, not the events themselves.
You're not doing anything that the thousands of other people on this board do every day. I've been in this industry for 14 years, and one constant I've learned is that the people that tout those 'three rules of thumb' are, in general, not listening to their customers needs... but rather to their own pocketbooks.
I'm using XP Pro with only 256 megs of SDRAM, and most of the time it's more than enough, since I rarely run resource-extensive programs (such as Photoshop).I agree, we are lucky you're not employing us
Not intending to be sarcastic or anything (the above statement was
In any case, we'll let qshikuku get back to us.
A professional graphics artist would definitely need more RAM.
qshikuku: I defrag my harddrive on a regular basis, and I also run JV16PowerTools (http://www.vtoy.fi/jv16/shtml/jv16powertools.shtml) to keep the Registry free of clutter. It definitely helps.
Make sure DMA is enabled on those drives.
I am going to have to agree with the others that 256 MB of RAM should be sufficient. All three of my computers run Windows XP and all three have 256 MB of RAM.
With them, we run Word, Outlook, and many other programs. On two of them there is at least one web browser (I use Mozilla and my wife uses Internet Explorer), Outlook 2000, Trillian and a myriad of other applications open at all times. We also use Paintshop Pro (7 and 8), Homesite 4.01, Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0 and other applications on a regular basis.
My wife's computer was last rebooted 3 months ago. My current computer has been up and down all weekend but I only got it on Friday.
Now, both my current PC and my previous one had the following in common: AMD Athlon 1700 XP+ and 256 MB of RAM. However my current computer is twice as fast as my previous one. And here is why:
Code:New Computer Old Computer ------------ ------------ Processor 1700XP+ 13m 1700XP+ 18m Memory 256 MB 333 DDR 256 MB 133 SDRAM Hard Drive 30 GB 7200 RPM 40 GB 5400 RPM Video GEFORCE 4 MX 32 MB ATI RAGE XL 8 MB AGP 3.0 (8x) 2.0 (4x) FSB 133 MHZ 100 MHZ IDE ATA-133 ATA-100
Sure, I can "speed" the older computer up with more RAM. However, it is limited to 133 SDRAM and that is its crutch. It will never truly get faster. If your computer is sluggish, more than a lack of RAM, look at your other components and make sure they are working up to par. If you can't upgrade components, look at what you are loading. Turn off those applications and features that you don't need.
Some things that can save you processor power include:
- Switch on the Classic Interface or disable some of the eye candy if you want to keep Luna.
- Remove startup applications such as ICQ's Netdetect, MS-Office Quicklaunch, Corel's Dad, Norton System Doctor.
- Utilize built in taskbars instead of a third party utility.
- Eliminate unneeded services from starting.
- Turn of Disk Indexing.
A close friend has P4 1.7GHZ, 256RAM which is doing very fine on XP pro.
My machine is hadly a week old, so there isnt much to defrag. I have also disabled most of the catchy stuff.
Currently the loaded software is office 2000 and Norton Anti Virus. I noticed yesterday that its taking almost 30-45 seconds to load winword.
Even with nothing running in the background the CPU usage is almost 30%. I noticed 4 files called svchost.exe running and using some good mem.
Here are more specs
OS XP version is 5.1 build 2600 (NTFS)
motherboard is Shuttle, model MV42 VERSION 1.3
Bios AMI 07.001 Release date 4/2/2001
Total MEM= 256MB (DDR)
Available physical MEM= 120.65MB
Total Virtual MEM= 854.41MB
Available Virtual MEM= 614.38MB
Page File Space= 606.93MB
Sound device is VIA AC'97
Graphics-S3 gRAPHICS Pro SavageDDR with 8MB adapter RAM
HDD SPACE: dRIVE c: 14GB free space= 8.6GB
dRIVE E: 13GB free space= 10.9GB
dRIVE F: 10GB free space= 9 GB
Can't tell anything wrong from the specs. Should be working fine with those kind of specs I think, only Norton Antivirus may cause it to startup slowly (but not so much that's it's THAT noticeable).
svchost.ext is not the problem -> http://www.ntfaq.com/Articles/Index.cfm?ArticleID=20609 I also have 4 copies running.
One question: was it like this the moment it came? Or did it deteriorate to this sad state?
From the word go, it has been slow, I did run a Processor Benchmark test on it, using the freshdiagnose
tool
one of the tests , DhryStone ALU rated it at only "156 MDIPS", that suprised me, in comparison to the following machines
1.Intel 700 MHZ = 1943 MDIPS
2.AMD DURON 800 MHZ = 2248 MDIPS
3.AMD THUNDERBIRD 850 =2394 MDIPS
4. INTEL IV 1.6 GHZ = 3083 MDIPS
However the "Whetstone FPU" rated it at "891 MWIPS"
1.Intel 700 MHZ = 315 MWIPS
2.AMD DURON 800 MHZ = 831 MWIPS
3.AMD THUNDERBIRD 850 =945 MWIPS
4. INTEL IV 1.6 GHZ = 1059 MDIPS
While the speed was correct at 1502 MHZ.
That's strange.
Is it possible for you to do a reformat and install everything from scratch? Could be your PC maker not doing the install cleanly, or they could have loaded something extra.
If it's under warranty give the manufacturer a ring
Sean
Harry Potter
-- You lived inside my world so softly
-- Protected only by the kindness of your nature
If it's under warranty give the manufacturer a ring
Sean
Somehow the same processor worked well in another PC we tested on, I think it had not been locked firmly in my PC, cant think of a better reason.
Thanks all for your input
Wow you're fortunate to get it fixed so quickly. Who's the dealer?
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