Performance drop... Vista Related?

[Snickers]

Hi,

I had been experiencing extreme slowness by my computer for a couple of weeks now, and could not find the source of this, so I decided to reformat my computer. (Everything seemed fine one night, and the next morning, everything was very slow). Before reformatting, I ran every antivirus and antispyware I know of, and they all said everything was clean.

So as I said, I decided to reformat. However, my computer (core 2 duo @ 2.00 GHz with 2GB of RAM) is still extremely slow for a system that has just been whiped out cleanly. I doubt this is caused by Vista since the problem was there before I reformated (and I had XP Pro then) and it's probably a hardware problem, but I'm stuck!

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks!

[Allan]

How does the system respond in safe mode?

[Snickers]

Hi ADG,

I just started the system in safe mode, and it was a bit better, but still nowhere close to what you would expect. (Last night, my CPU usage was hovering around 50%... when it was idle!)

Thanks,

Nick

[Allan]

Okay - you should have told us that right off. Boot to normal mode and open Task Manager to the Processes tab. Sort on the cpu column with highest usage at the top (double-click the "cpu" title at the top of the column). When the system slows, see which process is eating the cycles and report back.

[Snickers]

Hi ADG,

Fact is, the computer is always slow; it took my 4 minutes for the Task Manager to open! Anyway, when all programs are closed (and the computer is still very slow), not one process is over 10 000 K, which I believe is normal. Before the sudden performance drop, I could have more and bigger processes running all at the same time and everything was fine.

Thanks!

[Allan]

I didn't say ram, I said cpu. You said the cpu is running at 50% and I asked which process is hogging the cpu. Please do as I asked.

[Snickers]

Oh, sorry I misunderstood you. Anyway, all of the processess are at 0. Sometimes, the Task Manager got up to 04 or 05, but it was the only one above 0.

Thanks!

[Allan]

Okay, just keep task manager open on your desktop and when the cpu spikes take a look and see which process it is.

[Snickers]

ADG,

Even when the CPU "spikes", all of the process indicate 00. If I have absolutely nothing running, it still takes me about 15-20 seconds to open My Computer or IE, but none of the process indicate anything besides the occasional 01 from Task Manager...

[Allan]

Impossible. If the cpu spikes then one of the running processes has to spike also. Did you sort the cpu column as I suggested?

[Quantos]

In the Task Manager make sure that you have checked the box for 'Show processes from all users'.

[Snickers]

So, I just come back from work 5 hours after my last post, and find my computer shut down. Thinking we may have had a power outage or whatever, I just turn it on but the monitor just won't respond. It insists on telling me "No signal"... so I guess this could be a video card problem?

[Broni]

It definitely looks like some hardware problem.
I doubt, it's the monitor, since the problems started before "no signal" message.

What brand and model of the computer is it?
On-board video, or separate video card?

[Centurion]

Are your fans clean? Check BIOS for M-Board and HDD temp.

[Snickers]

Thanks Broni and Centurion for your replies.

It is a computer I built myself 2 years ago. It has a seperate video card, an EVGA 8800 GTS.


And my fans are cery dusty... could this be the problem? I, however, cannot access the BIOS since my monitor stays blank!