Hiyo everyone! Recently i've started to get confused... very confused. A couple of months ago I got a brand new computer... and now it runs really slowly. Now I know you probably get tons of these but continue reading:

My specs are:
Asus MotherBoard P4S8x-x
P4 2.66 Ghz
Windows XP
256 RAM
nVidia GeForee4 MX440

i dunno about you but for me a pc like this should run pretty damn fast... well it doesn't! I hence did a lot of research and tried to elimiate all possible factors of this slownes...

I got ad-aware 6 Pro, SpyBot S&D, and Spyware blaster, all of them updated with the newest updates and ran.... no more Ad/Spyware here...

Also got Norton Antivirus and ran scans fully updated, no virus (ended up taking off NAV cause it was taking up lots of resources) Changed to ZoneAlarm Security Suite.

Now even after this it was slow so I got TuneUp Utilites 2004 and run it quite frequently to keep everything clean, I also use the StartUp Manager and you can see what I have allowed here:

http://www.fanbb.com/Uploading/uploads/post-10-1091141647.jpg

Anything I should add/take off?

also with TuneUp i'm running the Ram optimiser and this is confusing me because it is always saying I have more than 100 megs of ram free even when my computer is slow as hell? Unreliable? Not worth having on?

Now this is my question.... what the hell can be causing all this slowing down... now to give you an idea, having WMP, FireFox and a couple of msn messenger windows is almost impossible.... i can't even THINK about going from one window to another... unless I want half of WMP mixed with a quarter of FireFix and a quarter of an msn window...

I'm starting to think my only option is to purchase more RAM.... but with 256mg RAM it shouldn't be THIS slow, so before I do that I just wanted to seek some help...

Edit: I decided to post a screen of the task manager before someone asked :p

http://www.fanbb.com/Uploading/uploads/post-10-1091141822.jpg
http://www.fanbb.com/Uploading/uploads/post-10-1091142010.jpg

Right now it's starting to become slow (It's fine when I reboot then become unbarable)

512 ram with that set up would be my first thing to do. but do online scan at housecall anti virus.
when was system defraged last?
lots of free disk space?
any problems showing in device manager?

i,m not famillure with your tune up program.

Last defrag was this morning 40 Gigs free 80 gigs Total

What's device manager?

And what exactly is housecall antivirus?

http://housecall.trendmicro.com/housecall/start_corp.asp

the device manager goto my computer and right click it choose properties,click hardware,click on device manager.

Device Manager looks normal...

And does that online scan need high connection speed? Cause my internet is really slow...

i used to do it on dial up. it would take a while to load. but want to get to the bottom of your problem. this wll elimanat viruses from the mix.

Alright I did the scan and like i told you, no viruses

So what's the cause?

this is strange i looked at the amount of ram being used it shows over 300 megs and you say you only have 256. but i don,t read french i,m only asumeing that the things are in the same place as the english task manager.
i cannot see any normale reason for your slowness.
d/l hijackthis and run it post its log in the hijack this forum.

not in this thread or forum.

Hmmm.... well i never knew what that bottom bar was for.... dunno if it's RAM, anyways, I have Hijackthis sitting in my computer i'll do that and see.

Edit: ok i have my log in this thread /p259051-HJT_Log_as_requested.html#259051.

hello
you have mesanger plus instald that is spyware and causes problems for many . leave it to the experts to look at the rest. but you should have copy pasted the log right in the post as most helpers are run off there fingers and may not see the link to your log.
but there is a definate problem on your system with a program useing ecessive ram.thats not registering as running in task manager.
you might want to d/l a2 trojin scanner and update it and run it.
d/l a2 free
http://download.emsisoft.com/a2freesetup.exe

About msn plus having spyware, don't worry about that, it is actually optional to install them, i know it sounds weird, but it's not msn plus, i'm even a big memeber of the plus forums, so definatly not plus, ill try that link though

edit: that didn't find anything either

Here is a good alternative to windows Task Manager:
http://www.neuber.com/taskmanager/download.html

It allows you to see everything that is running. It also shows the rating% of the programs, to help you find the ones that shouldn't be there. Now remember this is just a guide and some programs can be fine and have a high rating%.

i would suggest getting more then 256 ram. i would suggest atleast 512 but if you want to be able to open a lot of stuff and no hangups get 1gig of ram. There is also a big difference in the type of ram and the speeds.


Types of Computer Memory and Common Uses
RAM commonly known as "memory" is an acronym for Random Access Memory.

People sometimes confuse "memory" with the "Hard Disk" (a magnetic disk used for storing the operating system, programs, data etc.)-- current hard disks store information known as gigabytes GB.

The amount of memory in the computer is crucial in that it determines how many programs can be running, and how much data is available for each program. Memory is generally available as megabytes or MB. A personal computer with a minimal amount of memory (16MB), Windows 98, and an Internet browser will perform very slow.

A simple distinction of RAM vs. Hard Disk.
RAM doesn't retain information when the power to your personal computer is turned off. Where as, the Hard Disk does retain information when the power to your personal computer is turned off.

Basically, there are two types of memory available:
DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory) is a type of memory that is constantly refreshed or will loose its contents.
SRAM (Static Random Access Memory) is faster than DRAM and less volatile, but it requires more power and is a little more expensive.
You may also hear memory described as:
SIMM (Single In-line Memory Module) is a small circuit board that holds a group of memory chips. SIMMs are easier to install than a single memory chip.
DIMM (Dual In-line Memory Module) is a newer technology and used for Pentium microprocessors.


you can learn a lot more about ram here

http://www.rose-hulman.edu/Class/ee/yoder/ece332/Papers/RAM%20Technologies.pdf