why is my computer slow?

Question

since the first day i bought it i have had an anti virus and i've done a full scan on it like every day. it's sort of wierd it happened very suddenly. how do i check for spyware. or that kind of thing. some one onve told me i should "defrag" my computer but i have no clue what that is. help please

Answer 1

Defrag is defragmenting your hard drive. When you delete files on your hard drive, it leaves spaces and gaps between files. Defragging reorganizes your hard to where the files are closer together and it takes the hard drive less time to find them. This will help increase speed. To defrag your drive from Windows XP follow the directions below.

Start
All Programs
Accessories
System Tools
Disk Defragmenter

or

Start
Control Panel
Performance and Maintenance
Rearrange Items on your hard disk


Spyware/Adware may be slowing you down as well. Spybot Search and Destroy, Adaware 6.0 and Microsoft AntiSpy are really good free programs to search and remove spyware.

Answer 2

A hard drive can be defragmented periodically to move bits of files close to each other and make the drive run more efficiently (and quickly). But it is unlikely that a brand new drive has to be defragmented, and more unlikely that a problem that occurred suddenly has anything to do with fragmentation. Still, if you want to try a defrag (it can never hurt), go to Start>All programs>Accessories>System tools>Disk defragmenter. This might take a while.....

Spyware is a more likely culprit, especially if the problem happened suddenly, and if your computer does not have a spyware blocker of some sort. Antivirus programs will not do this job. A good program to download is "Spybot - Search and Destroy". Download it, run the update right away, and then have the program scan your computer. Very easy to use. You should do this once a week.

Good luck

Answer 3

There is a possibility that if you have an older machine and you are running Windows XP, that you may be running into a memory issue. If you notice that your hard drive is "thrashing" or running all the time, especially when starting up a program, the chances are you don't have enough available RAM and the system is writing out to the pagefile as a temporary holding area for information it can't write into your overloaded RAM. In that case, your pagefile will be huge. To see how big this file is, go to Start -> Control Panel -> System and then open the Advanced Tab. Click on Settings under the Performance section and then click on the Advanced Tab again and the file size will be listed under Virtual Memory. I am running 640Meg of RAM and my pagefile is 1.5 gig, which is about 1/2 of the maximum (click the Change button to see the max). In my case, this file is fairly large because I do a lot of photo editing that is memory intensive. I have also taken to doing audio work, which might also be a RAM hog. In any case, even at 1.5 gig, my old Duron 850 megahertz machine is running fine. If your file is close to the max, you probably have a RAM problem. You will have to buy more RAM. Windows XP has been patched numerous times and if you have it, you likely have received these patches automatically. I have found that the patches have caused XP to hog memory and I was forced to expand my RAM as a result. Alternately, if your pagefile is not too big and your machine is not thrashing, you should defrag the hard drive. Also, you should check to see how much hard drive space you have left, as that could also cause a slowdown if you are running out of room. Another possibility is that you are talking about slowness in connecting and navigating the internet, as opposed to running programs on your machine. In that case, you should contact your internet service provider and complain that you are slow. In many instances, they can diagnose the problem over the phone.

Answer 4

Check what kind of programs are running at the background without your knowing it.

You can download spyware program from download.cnet.com. There are some free programs and there are some free trial. Try spybots, and adaware.


I have notice very little in performance when you defrag you HD. But it won't hurt it either. Login as a administrator, then go to the accessory and admin tools, then select the defragment.


Is your HD space enough ?

An ultimate technique I use is to create another account. I found it very helpful when I do that. Everything seems to be return to normal.

Well you have to move some of your files around but it worths it.

Answer 5

Install spybot to check for spyware and defragment your computer occassionally if you download a lot of stuff. To defrag, go to My Comp, right click on C Drive and go to Properties, then click the Tools Tab and you will find Defragment now. Choose your Drive, probably it would be C Drive, and defragment it.

Answer 6

Fist scan ur computer for viruses. Then to defragment, clik on 'start' go to 'programs' then in programs, got to 'accessories' in accesories got to 'system tools' u'll find 'disk defragmenter' there. open it and start defragmenting (it sorts out files and analyzes the free space and clutter in the computer and arranges them as per index which will increase speed).
To check for spyware, get a 'yahoo'(toolbar.yahoo.com) or (toolbar.google.com)'google' toolbar, they have spyware detector. I guess ur good to go then... If u have further problems lemme know...

Answer 7

Chances are that your computer is infected with spyware and adware, and not a virus or things of that sort. I find a much higher percentage of slow-downs due to advertisements and such There are several programs you can use to clean this problem up.

Answer 8

Start
All Programs
Accessories
System Tools
Disk Defragmenter

Answer 9

go to download.com and download adaware se. That will take care of all your spyware. You should defrag your computer as often as you can, just go to start> all programs> Accesorries> system tools> disk defrag.

Answer 10

defrag? It depends on what system you have. I have Windows XP home. To defrag, I go to start>all programs>accessories>system tools. It just rearranges your files and gets rid of junk fragments.