:Laptop is taking on avg 10 mins to boot up

the Guru

MY Lappy is taking on avg about 10 minutes to boot up also its is giving me a warning box that my virtual memory is too low

Any one know what this could be caused by

also In my task manager I have noticed that there is a lot of stuff running more than usual Im using w2k

also Im having problems downloading windows Service pack 4 as Im sick of getting hit with virues.

Any solutions

Cheers Dec

raphaelS

Are you running out of space on your hard disk? The virtual memory is the memory on the hard disk.
What are the specs of your computer, memory, hard disk?
My guess is that you don't have enough...

Also after a while, it's a good idea to reinstall Windows (from scratch) to clean it!

Raphael

Sleipnir

I wouldn't reintall Windows just yet although it is a good idea to clear out the gunk files that build up.
Certainly, depending on the amount of RAM you have installed, the number of progs running in task manager will have a huge bearing on the performance. Many of them are not important but you need to find out what they are, and where they start from before you get rid of them. Often they will have an Icon in the taskbar that will show you what it is.

Most start from the registry these days
go here to find out the progs that start on boot.

Start - Run - Regedit
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
SOFTWARE
MICROSOFT
WINDOWS
CURRENT VERSION
and then click on the Run folder.

Listed in the right-hand pane is all the progs that start automatically.
Decide which which ones you need to start at boot (obviously you want Antivirus etc to)
To disable, doubleclick on one and put a ' . ' at the beginning of the line e.g.
."C:\Program Files\QuickTime\qttask.exe" -atboottime

moridin

Another way to check what programs are running on startup is to install the win98 version of msconfig... it'll read it directly from the registry for you. Complains about the lack of win.ini etc but it still works perfectly.

Tivoli

are you getting the 3 clicks of death???

although i am not sure if you can hear them in a laptop, there very obvious on a pc, it will make 3 quick clicks then stop for about 5 seconds then 3 clicks again,then 5 secs......, it times out after about 5 mins, if this is whats happening you need a new drive,and i bet the old one has IBM written on it

Placebo

go to run > and type

msconfig

and uncheck most boxs(thing u dont want at start up)
press Apply

Capt'n Midnight

VM - sounds like out of space
restart notebook (safe mode if ya can)
then empty the c:\temp folder
(or type SET in a command prompt to see where temp is)
uninstall unneeded apps
find all files larger than 999KB - so you can see what to clean up
run scandisk (right click drive -scan for errors)

treesize (can't remember the site) is great - lists folders by size so you can do a focused tidy up.

Other slow downs
autoruns on www.sysinternals.com - lists startup stuff

what Antivirus do you have ?
many AV's scan all files in root folder on startup - so move files to a subfolder (if you don't know what it is leave it alone - it could be a startup file)

check the bios settings for speed - esp. compatabile.

also malware - spybots etc.. - check forums..

PS. Which OS ? / how much free space on drive..

(VM error can also be caused by having too many apps open)

BoB_BoT

Originally posted by Placebo
go to run > and type

msconfig

and uncheck most boxs(thing u dont want at start up)
press Apply

that works on win 98 not 2000

Capt'n Midnight

Ah - SP4 so it's 2K ..
do restart in VGA mode.
SHIFT-CTRL-ESC to see get a rough guide to whats running and how much cpu time it takes.

ColinM

Originally posted by moridin
Another way to check what programs are running on startup is to install the win98 version of msconfig... it'll read it directly from the registry for you. Complains about the lack of win.ini etc but it still works perfectly.

You can copy the XP version of msconfig which works fine with 2k.

Originally posted by Kananga
Start - Run - Regedit
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
SOFTWARE
MICROSOFT
WINDOWS
CURRENT VERSION

and then click on the Run folder.

If you want to use the registry method, look in HKEY_CURRENT_USER [etc...] \RUN as well as HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE [etc...] \RUN. Have a look in the "All Users" and specific user's Start Menu\Programs\Startup folder too.
MSconfig just makes this process easier.

moridin

Originally posted by BoB_BoT
that works on win 98 not 2000

... which is why I said to install the win98 version of msconfig from a website