Maintaining Windows XP System Performance? 159
jerud wonders: "I assume that most people on Slashdot are forced to, at some point, touch Windows. Further, I assume that many of them are forced to administer Windows boxes. I am in the unfortunate situation of using Windows for about 90% of my tasks, due to the nature of my job. As a firm believer in 'if it isn't broke don't fix it', I've delayed moving to XP for just about as long as possible, holding onto my Windows 2000 installation, while my brother spent a lot of time complaining about the XP issues he dealt with, at work. Finally, I made the transition and, low and behold, it didn't seem to bad. In fact, there were a few things that I really liked. Now, a few years later I have quite a few XP machines and they all share the same problem: over time they have slowed so noticeably that they have made even the most solid configurations run like they were made in 1999. Is there any regular treatment out there that can minimize this kind of system degradation?"
"Solid practices are in use on most of these machines, or at least the ones that are completely under my control. Even with that, I know these machines are much slower now then when I bought them. I really don't want to spend two weekends every year starting over from scratch, simply because thats the only way to reclaim performance."
Services (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Services (Score:1)
start > run: regedit and navigate to a couple of entries and subkeys:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/Curre ntVersion/Run (and RunOnce)
and
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/Software/Microsoft/Windows/Curr entVersion/Run (and RunOnce etc..)
You may also check for Windows NT subkeys instead of Windows.
Any time you do a repair by remo
Re:Services (Score:2)
Hijack This [spywareinfo.com]
Lists everything that is autostarted, and removes the autostart entry with a simple check box and button. If you're comfortable with editing the registry, then by all means feel free to do it manually. But if you're not a hard core geek (or you want something to recommend to your non-geek friends and loved ones), then
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Services (Score:2)
Re:Services (Score:2)
http://www.theeldergeek.com/services_guide.htm [theeldergeek.com]
defrag the registry. (Score:5, Informative)
The obvious solution? (Score:2)
If you're very lucky, the worst that will happen over a period of months with Windows is a bit of clutter in the registry and startup menu caused by programs that are generally considered benign [iTunes sneaking in with quickTime, iPod Manager etc. comes to mind]. That's the best-case scenario.
If you're not lucky, you'll get hit by some spyware that creeps in through IE, or worse, a serious exploit like the one mentioned [slashdot.org] earlier. Most
Start up monitor (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Start up monitor (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Start up monitor (Score:2)
My solution was to install Windows 2000 SP4 instead. That sucker is the Rock of Gibraltar,
as long as you don't do anything stupid.
Re:Start up monitor (Score:2)
I just don't agree with that at all. I've been running this WinXP install since 2002, with no problems. Throughout that time I've swapped a lot of the hardware out and, oh yeah, this has been my daily machine all that time. Running 24/7, with 10+ hours of work/play active use a day.
I've done pretty minimal maint
Self-destruction is a "feature". (Score:5, Insightful)
However, it's a losing battle. The problem is that Microsoft makes more money if its operating systems self-destruct. What you call "vulnerabilities" billionaires call "maximizing shareholder value".
If rich people sold good operating systems, poor people would not buy the next upgrade.
Using an operating system is like having a partner in your business. If it is a Microsoft OS, your "partners" want some things that are bad for you. If you use Linux or BSD, you can breathe a huge sigh of relief; your partners want what you want.
It's absurd that governments of countries use Microsoft products. It's even absurd that state governments in the U.S. use Microsoft products. The U.S. federal government spends more money on world-wide surveillance than any country in the history of the world. Exploiting computer systems is now one of the biggest new frontiers in surveillance.
The U.S. government's Echelon [echelonwatch.org] surveillance [fas.org] system [hiwaay.net] watches everyone all the time. (Echelon quote: "Since the close of World War II, the US intelligence agencies have developed a consistent record of trampling the rights and liberties of the American people.")
The biggest discretionary expense of the U.S. government is the cost [nationalpriorities.org] of war [informatio...house.info]. The president and the vice-president of the U.S. are people who themselves and their families and friends made their money through oil and weapons. Is it any wonder that the price of oil is so high and we have war?
When a country uses Microsoft operating systems, it effectively has the U.S. government as one of its partners. Given the present climate of corruption and conflict of interest and adversarial behavior and using war as a justification for anything, why do countries want the U.S. government and U.S. billionaires as partners?
If volunteers can make a secure operating system [openbsd.org] ("Only one remote hole in the default install, in more than 8 years!") is it difficult to believe that the amazing number of vulnerabilities we've seen in Windows are deliberately allowed?
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Self-destruction is a "feature". (Score:2)
Come to think of it, liquidating anyone who ever mentioned such an organisation would be (if you'll excuse the pun) something of a dead giveaway. Letting them continue more or less unmolested whilst encouraging people to dismiss anything they say would be a much more effective of cloaking its existence.
I have the same feeling (Score:5, Interesting)
So I wiped the hardrive and re-installed XP plus all the packages that I knew I needed. After I got it all running again, it seemed as repsonsive as when I first got it.
But that was 10 months ago. Now it is back to the same feeling of molasses at times with the inexplicable behaviour. So obviously I have installed something that has slowed things down. But what? There is no way to tell what it is. So it looks like I am headed for the yearly rebuild again.
[Note 1 that in all of this, I have been using virus protection, adware protection, software firewalls, and up-todate patches]
[Note 2 To all you people who will say wipe XP and put *nix on. I can't as I have custom software development tools that *only* run on windows. And no, it is not possible to rewrite them from scratch - and anybody who thinks so hasn't been out in the world of PLC programming and heavy industries]
Re:I have the same feeling (Score:4, Insightful)
Ditto. I've basically gotten in the habit of reinstalling every 6 months to a year or so. I don't have problems with Windows stability, but the 'spring cleaning' bit is something I am not thrilled with at all. I have done a few things to minimize the down time, though:
The added benefit of my approach here is that I can mirror this setup to my laptop or to a new computer just by getting things hooked up to the network. Plus it simplifies backups by a considerable margin.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:I have the same feeling (Score:2)
To all you people who will say wipe XP and put *nix on.
I wouldn't tell you that. Use what makes sense. However, I can't resist gloating just a little... the Debian installation I'm using to type this was initially installed in 1999. That was a couple major releases of the OS and three computers ago. I upgrade every couple of weeks (this is Debian unstable, so it changes frequently) and whenever I get a new laptop I just 'dd' the image to the new hard drive. It still runs great, without all those ti
Re:I have the same feeling (Score:2)
VMWare might be a solution. Or it might not, depending.
Although I can't imagine it not being ideal, unless performance is absolutely critical (in which case you're already using a multiprocessor box and/or constantly showing CPU loads of 99%, right?). I run (among many other virtual machines) Oracle on Solaris--hardly a light load--on an ancient AMD Duron and it's perfectly acceptable
Re:I have the same feeling (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I have the same feeling (Score:2)
I have never infected a machine myself with a virus. I have had numerous machines infected on me though. Laptops, desktops and servers.
You are only as safe as your weakest link. You may be a _very_ strong link in the chain, but if you aren't the ONLY link, you will likely eat those words one day.
Re:I have the same feeling (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I have the same feeling (Score:2)
I don't believe you have to install anything or even run XP to experience this.
This has been a common complaint that I have heard since Windows 95.
Disk defrag doesn't help and I've seen it happen with computer that have had nothing installed for 4 years. I suspect that this has been a problem all along and is far more ubiquitous than imagined. But when you consider that Microsoft OS timelines require you to get a new computer and new software almost every 3 years, it's harder to identify. Now that hard
Re:I have the same feeling (Score:2)
Re:I have the same feeling (Score:2)
I'm sure your sick of hearing this, but too bad.
My PowerBook gets faster and more responsive over time without hardware upgrades.
I have heard even better results on older hardware, where performance is more noticeable.
Oh,
Re-install from scratch (Score:4, Insightful)
And that includes re-formatting the partition.
Re:Re-install from scratch (Score:4, Informative)
I'd recommend reinsatlling Windows, installing all your apps and patches. Then get a copy of Norton Ghost and take an image of your machine. Save that to a jillion CD's or a couple of DVD's and shelve them. When your box gets trashed again, slap the image back on and apply any updates from there. Saves some time.
-m
Re:Re-install from scratch (Score:1)
I've heard the same.
Except one in particular said he did it about every 6 months.
Re:Re-install from scratch (Score:2)
Re:Re-install from scratch (Score:2)
Also, have another, seperate CD or DVD with all the Microsoft patches and updates on them. Major, MAJOR timesavers, especially as a relatively upatched windows XP box can be compromised within minutes of connecting to the net if you don't alter it's startup services first. Best to simply patch it while unconnected first. (An external USB harddrive is an even better way, almost as portable)
Also make sure to do regular backups - create a saved project for them with a scheduler reminder to open
Just wanted to mention. (Score:2)
Re:Re-install from scratch (Score:2)
Re:Re-install from scratch (Score:2)
Partitions for Win XP system, Win 2000 system, Linux, and Data.
XP system is assigned to C: and has Windows, Netware, Office, plus misc applications. I save an image of C: using ntfsclone with --save-image option from the ntfstools package in the latest knoppix. The bzipped image file is 1.9GB, and is scp'ed to a server drive. A dvd-rom or 4 cdroms would work too. It took a while to get Windows just the way I wanted it for the image, but I c
Re:Re-install from scratch (Score:2)
Re:Re-install from scratch (Score:2)
nonsense.
no registry on linux.
RPM or APT or whatever handle packages cleanly.
Sourceinstall or the Kde source installer tool compiles/installs packages automatically, and they are cleaned up perfectly.
not to mention running with the
A problem I had recently (Score:2, Informative)
Ask around, do dependancy checks run spy+ no great insight
Then a friend says "What anti-virus you use?"
"AVG, you know the free one"
"ARGHH dumpit, replace it with something else"
Turns out AVG puts some drivers into the pipeline so it can scan ethernet,USB and FireWire, so everytime the scanner sent a
Re:A problem I had recently (Score:3, Insightful)
To me the biggest way to put the brakes on a new system is to install Anti-Virus software. Also programs that install new associations or things in the right-click context menu don't help much either.
Tim
Re:A problem I had recently (Score:1)
Re:A problem I had recently (Score:2)
few things I've found (Score:3, Informative)
2)Disk Cleanup, Chkdsk, and Defragment the hard drive at least once a month. a lot of speed can be gained just by doing this regularly.
3)Protect windows like the plague. Patch to the latest revisions of Service packs, critical, and recommended updates. also use third party protection to protect against malware. Spywareblaster, Microsoft Antispyware and Grisoft AVG free edition are my personal favorites.
4)Keep system restore on and always make a restore point before you install anything. That way, if it screws up the machine after you installed it, you can uninstall it and roll the computer back to ensure that the system is totally clean of it.
5) If you got Norton ghost lying around, use it to make an image of your machine after you set it all up, that way you can roll back to that image just in case something really hoses windows.
So far, I've kept this mantra going with my machine. It's been a good 1 to 2 years since I reinstalled windows either from scratch or by ghost and I've haven't noticed any slowdown to date that I couldn't attribute to the machine getting more obsolete by the day.
nLiteOS? (Score:3, Informative)
Also, remember to have a sane partitioning scheme, in case you need to reinstall. You might want to use FAT for your data partition; that way, you can read it via a Knoppix CD in a real emergency.
Re:nLiteOS? (Score:2)
The Ultimate Boot CD and the UBCD 4 Windows (Basicially PEBuilder with a lot of diagnostic utilities) are also something you should keep around just in case.
Re:few things I've found (Score:2)
It's understandable that since I stopped repairing their PCs, lots of my neighbourhood just gave up on computing.
Re:few things I've found (Score:2)
Run as a Non-admin User (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Run as a Non-admin User (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Run as a Non-admin User (Score:2)
Re:Run as a Non-admin User (Score:2)
If you need absolute control, why are you running Windows in the first place?
Re:Run as a Non-admin User (Score:4, Insightful)
I ripped this quote from somewhere...
START
Q. Why is Windows so insecure?
A. Because everyone runs as Administrator.
Q. Why does everyone run as Administrator (even when they know better)?
A. Because they don't understand security and are afraid they will be prevented from doing things.
Q. Why don't they understand security?
A. Because they run as Administrator, bypassing all security.
LOOP TO START
This [msdn.com] microsoftie blog has lots of good info about running as non-admin. It can be painful to switch, but once you do, you won't regret it.
Re:Run as a Non-admin User (Score:2)
START
Q. Why is Windows so insecure?
A. Because everyone runs as Administrator.
I'm sorry to say it to you, but mail attachements (which is insecure by nature) that run apps on your system when you
Re:Run as a Non-admin User (Score:2, Informative)
A couple of tips, in case someone might not be familiar with these...
Running as a plain old User privileges may be good for some situations, but I run my XP box with Power User privileges for a bit more power. This option is not presented by the Control Panel applet, but is available through Computer Management, opened by right-clicking My Computer and selecting Manage. Once there, go to System Tools -> Local Users and Groups -> Groups. Double-click Power Users on the right-side window and add your
Re:Run as a Non-admin User (Score:2)
That way even if IE gets taken over, it's a fair bit harder for it to mess up data owned by your main nonadmin user. Maybe you lose bookmarks you didn't backup and some recently downloaded files.
It'll take extra effort for someone to take over your syst
You probably won't hear this elsewhere... (Score:3, Interesting)
Example Log Entry:
The description for Event ID ( 20158 ) in Source ( RemoteAccess ) cannot be found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be able to use the
So do I, BUT (Score:2)
Re:You probably won't hear this elsewhere... (Score:2)
Performance without reboot (Score:2)
I absolutely hate rebooting, but after a while of playing hibernate/standby/wake up with my laptop the system becomes more and more unresponsive, and some weird bug keeps cropping up that prevents the opening of new windows (even dialog boxes) until I close some of the old ones.
And how does linux handle this kind of thing for you? On my few tries I had even less luck with Linux and hibernate than with windows.
Re:Performance without reboot (Score:1)
Bruised registry (Score:4, Informative)
clean the crap out (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't install any applications... (Score:2)
Use sensible applications wherever you can (like Firefox; it stores its config info in flat files).
Also, Microsoft products are the worst offenders - Visual Studio, Office, etc.. all become bloated pigs.
Re:Don't install any applications... (Score:2)
Config files have always seemed like a smarter idea than a registry
Re:Don't install any applications... (Score:2)
CCleaner (Score:4, Informative)
Re:CCleaner (Score:2)
CCleaner, while it won't solve all of your problems, will certainly improve things. I keep a copy on my ThumbDrive and I use it on any Windows XP PC I can.
Combine this with Spybot-Search & Destroy [spybot.info] with it's TeaTimer app running in the background to warn you of Registry updates, and you have an excellent defense against crap accumulation.
-Jim
GmailTips.com [gmailtips.com]
Windows XP Tune-Up Guide (Score:5, Informative)
It's a comprehensive step-by-step of what any aunt or uncle should be able to follow in order to free system resources and make for a better (faster!) desktop experience.
What about (Score:1)
Stop installing crap. (Score:2)
Install windows.
Set your pagefile to the size you want it (max and min the same or put the whole thing on a separate drive to avoid fragmentation).
Install the programs you want.
Patch everything.
Defrag the whole thing (just to be sure)
Make a drive image you can keep for emergencies.
Then use it. (Log in as a limited user so that others don't install crap either.)
If you insist on
Re:Stop installing crap. (Score:2)
Re:Stop installing crap. (Score:2)
> administrative rights just to run?
Far too many, but you can still survive as a normal user.
It's a pain having to type in the admin password every time I want to synch my Palm Pilot, etc. but at least my email client/web browser/other well behaved apps are running with sensible permissions.
I've been known to download cracks for games that require admin access to the CDROM for copy protection checks etc.
I Detect A Conspiracy... (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:I Detect A Conspiracy... (Score:2)
I mean, completely aside from the fact that they’re buy
Keep it clean, Keep it safe (Score:3, Interesting)
1. Run CCleaner. Both to find useless files AND to weed out unneeded registry entries.
2. Run Microsoft's Antispyware program.
Additionally you can run MS's antispyware program to look for unwanted apps that start at runtime.
As others have mentioned shutting down extra services you don't need may be a good idea. But in my experience those services don't effect a computer nearly as much as runaway Hard drive consumption by IE and unchecked spyware.
The three "re"s (Score:2)
Reformat and reinstall every six months.
In the meantime don't install anything you don't really need.
This is a good question. I'll be watching this thread!
Billybob
Windows(TM) Auto-Fragmenter(TM) (Score:2, Interesting)
So, YMMV, I've done no
How? (Score:2)
The usual speedups (Score:5, Informative)
Other small speedups:
Switch to the classic win2k theme.
If your wallpaper is a gif or jpeg, replace it with a bmp and disable active desktop. For anything other than bmps, it uses Internet Explorer to render your desktop.
Get more ram.
If less than about 20% disk free, delete stuff you don't need and then defrag.
Disable window animations and other eye candy.
Check for malware.
Install and run ShellExView. Some programs install shell extensions which can (but not usually) cause slowdowns and pauses in Windows Explorer. It should color code items depending on if they come with windows, if they are known, if they are known to be bad, or if they are unknown. I encountered a system where a Eudora shellexecute hook was causing the system to freeze for 2 minutes whenever you tried to start a program.
Disable the indexing service.
Disable/uninstall your virus scanner, if you're the type who never installs viruses.
16bit color is sometimes faster. You'll have to test for yourself.
Sometimes I get lucky with this one: In control panel->hardware->device manager, open the properties for the "Primary IDE Channel" and see whether it's in DMA or PIO mode. If it's in PIO mode, right click the "Primary IDE Channel" and click remove/uninstall, and reboot. I've encountered several systems where this was the cause of major slowdown. Windows occasionally encounters timeouts reading from the hard drive, and sometimes mistakingly assumes that stepping down to a slower transfer mode will solve the problem. I see it happen most on systems that go to sleep a lot. Microsoft's website says it's fixed, and shouldn't happen much at all in the future, but you'll still need to do the fix I described on systems that already have the problem.
Some people suggest removing System Restore. I've had occasions where it helped out a lot, like when a Microsoft Windows Update badly broke my system, so I can't recommend disabling it unless you don't mind the occasional reinstall.
I'm typing this on Linux, so some of the above instructions might be slightly off, but are generally correct.
Re:The usual speedups (Score:2)
The bottom line is this: nothing will slow your system down more than installing (and uninstalling) lots of programs, shell extensions, API hooks, unneccessary device drivers, applets, and COM objects. There are two rules of Windows Zen you must learn.
1. Install only what you need.
2. See rule number 1.
Avoid virus scanners and spyware programs. You won't need them if you are not downloading and running lots of programs. Find a stable set of s
Re:The usual speedups (Score:2)
You can't always disable everything safely (Score:2)
Re:You can't always disable everything safely (Score:2)
Re:The usual speedups (Score:2)
People who run virus scanners tend to develop a false sense of security, and will catch more viruses in the end than someone who simply knows better than to take ri
Wndows and Linux KVMing (Score:2)
But when my Windows machine starts boggin' down I just fire up X on my debian box and the speed difference is inCREDIBLE. The pointer just moves so fast on that GUI that I c
Re-install regularly (Score:2)
The only solid practice for maintaining Windows, if it can be said to be one, is to re-install on a regular basis. Set a schedule for yourself, somewhere between every 1-6 months. Keep a list of all the things you need to do (settings, software to re-install, etc).
Create a partition for an image (Score:2)
Some registry tweaks (Score:3, Informative)
IoPageLockLimit: increases the amount of pages that can be locked into memory. Changing this setting can improve performance although there is some controversy over this setting's effectiveness. Make sure that you have at least 256MB of RAM. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CONTROL\CURRENTCONTROLS
LargeSystemCache: This setting is primarily used for servers but can help improve performance. Again, it's effectiveness may be controversial. It is located at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CONTROL\CURRENTCONTROLS
DisablePageExecutive: Again this is a controversial setting. You may or may not notice a difference in performance and it is driver sensitive so be forewarned about using it. It too has the potential to cause crashes after being enabled. This setting prevents kernel memory from being paged. It is located at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CONTROL\CURRENTCONTROLS
Note: Any problems encountered from changing these settings will be noticed on next boot. They are a "either it's fine or it isn't" settings.
To reduce boot time, you can disable autodetection of devices on IDE controllers that have no devices connected to them. This can be done from the device manager. Also, adjust Windows for best performance and turn off the themes service.
Lastly, there's XPlite [litepc.com] which can help cut down on some of the fat. Also, be sure to check out TweakXP.com [tweakxp.com] for more XP performance tweaks. And there's nLite [nliteos.com]. Unlike XPlite, nLite allows you to remove Windows components before installation. It also has service pack integration.
Maintenance Installation (Score:3, Informative)
The main advantage of doing this is that you'll have full access to your XP installation without having any system files blocked. What I did was take a fresh install of XP (with all of my base drivers and applications installed) and make a copy of the Windows, Program Files, and Documents and Settings directories. Now, if I feel that my XP installation is getting bloated to the point where I can't fix it anymore, I can "reinstall" XP by booting into my maintenance partition and replacing those directories. As long as you are booted into another partition when you do it, Windows is completely oblivious to the fact that you've just replaced your primary OS.
Having a maintenance partition is also advantageous when defragmenting your primary partition, since no system files will be locked. It's also handy if you suspect you've been infected with a rootkit, since that seems to be a trendy topic at the moment.
Its Explorer (Score:3, Informative)
Careful with defrag (Score:2)
And it's dangerous. If the hard drive has a flaw, defragmenting it risks propagating the fault or even breaking the drive itself. An extreme case: Once I was called out to fix a machine with problems. The owner thought it'd be nice of him to defrag the drive before I arrived
Re:Careful with defrag (Score:2)
Re:Careful with defrag (Score:2)
In a month, he was at 60% fragmentation. This is an NTFS drive.
_shrug_
The only effective way.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Set your Anti-virus program to scan at least weekly, and automatically update itself, Update and sca with Ad-Aware and Spybot weekly at a minimum, and update and protect with SpywareBlaster weekly at a minimum.
It is absolutely ridiculous that a person should have to do this to keep their computer running decently. We get so many Windows machines in the shop that it isn't even funny, but thusfar, whenever we have managed to convince someone to upgrade to a MacOS X [apple.com] machine (Typically when their Dell [dell.com], Compaq [compaq.com], HP [hp.com], E-Machines [emachines.com] has a motherboard failure). They have came back completely excited and astonished that they don't really have to worry about spyware and viruses so much.
My reccomendation on keeping your WIndows XP machine in top performance. Go buy a high-end Mac [apple.com] and run VirtualPC [microsoft.com] if it can run whatever program you NEED to run (Note: Games do not count), if you cannot run your Prorgram under VPC, buy a low-end PC and keep it off the network.
Keeping an XP install going (Score:2, Interesting)
Running "sfc
Emptying the folder "C:\windows\prefetch" to clean the prefecth buffer.
Defragging.
And the usual things like removing spyware etc.
Stop Installing Things! (Score:2)
You don't need that random app that someone said was cool. You sure don't need that cool new screensaver, or that "rad" game.
All you need to install are driver updates (when your
Automate System Rebuilds? (Score:2)
A freind of mine does just this on his home system about once a month (well, and at work...as he says, we're not in the business of installing an OS by hand anymore). I'm going to take the same plunge. Pick an automated system rebuild method, test it, build new systems with it and rebuild your systems on some sort of regular basis. There are lots of cavea
Re:Automate System Rebuilds? (Score:2)
My strategy (and I'll leave the debate on the relative merits of having an OS that you have to reinstall to clean to others) is based on my usage. I'm a technologist by nature, so lots of stuff gets loaded/unloaded on my various systems.
I've looked at most of the registry/system/startup cleaners available, and, for me, the choice to move to reinstalls was the simplest.
BUT...
Being the simplest solution is predicated on the fact that I build unattended installs for my job
XP and DMA mode auto-loss (Score:3, Informative)
This behaviour occurs with the following conditions:
Windows XP is the operating system
A CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, or sometimes even a HDD, which is known to support DMA mode now works only in PIO mode.
The drive controller is set to use "DMA if available" but reports to be only in PIO mode.
Following is the mechanism that has worked for me, please try it at your own risk, it involves hacking the registry:
Open RegEdit
Find the following KEY:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contr
The last four digits will be 0000, 0001, 0002, 0003, and so on.
Under each key, delete all occurences of the following values:
MasterIdDataChecksum
SlaveIdDataChecksum
Reboot the computer. Windows will now redetect DMA settings.
This happens if a device on the bus has been getting periodic errors either because of a hardware problem or because of scratched or copy-protected CDs. XP steps down the DMA to try and stop the errors because it assumes it is a hardware problem.
Reinstall, then back up the fresh system partition (Score:2)
Now the important step: As soon as everything is running correctly, do a backup of the C partition with Acronis TrueImage. The best program ever! Then you don't need to reinstall; your C partition
Consider installing older simpler apps (Score:2)
a question (Score:2)
i personally say they are these...
regular spyware scan (by adaware, spybot S&D, and MS antispy)
regular defrag (not with the windows defrag. i like diskeeper)
about the only way that is sure fire is to backup/wipe/reinstall. it helps if you make a disk image after a clean install once you install as the applications. i would say update the image about every other year or in the event of an OS upgrade (duh).