SLOW...good grief, this thing is painfully slow

System...AMD 64, 3.2 with 1 gig Ram, 2 internal 250's and 1 external 250 HD's
Vista Ultimate 64
Office 2007
Cox High Speed Cable modem

I am so sick of watching that green chase circle EVERY time I want to do
something I am tempted to dump all these Vista installations and go back to
XP on all of my machines. Especially the Internet and Outlook... Sheesh!

I have turned protected mode off and it did not help. I have uninstalled
Norton and it did not help. Is there anything I can do to turn off the
infernal checking that slows everything down so badly. I click on a web site
(expecially MSN.com and go pour myself a cup of coffee while waiting for it
to get there). This is insane.

I could really love Vista if it just wasn't so d... slow.

What can I do to fix this problem? The main box shown above is hotter than
anything else I have it on including my new laptop and an older 1.2 celeron
at work and they all perform about the same...well, the laptop is a little
quicker.

XP was MUCH faster. I still have it on two other machines at home running
side by side with my Vista box and there is no comparison. The old XP's will
finish a task in a fraction of the time while I am still watching the green
chase circle on Vista.

 

You could try ReadyBoost. I've read that with one gig of system ram
ReadyBoost helps a lot.

 

I suspect something else is the culprit. I have 3 machines with similar
configs and 1 GB of RAM and they all run faster than my old XP installs. I
am running Vista 32 bit though. I don't know if that makes a difference.

2 of them I use as media servers with integrated video running Aero and no
hiccups. What kind of video do you have on these machines? Is Aero
enabled?

FYI - My three:

ASRock 754 AMD Mainboard
Athlon 64 3200+
1 GB Corsair Value Select DDR RAM
Integrated NVidia 6100 Graphics
80 GB Western Digital IDE drive
(Video Server)

Gigabyte AM2 Mainboard
Athlon 64 2800+
1 GB OCZ DDR2 RAM
Integrated NVidia 6100 Graphics
120 GB Maxtor SATA drive
(5 year old's gaming machine)

Abit AM2 Mainboard
Athlon 64 X2 3600
1 GB Corsair Value Select DDR2 RAM
Integrated NVidia 6100 Graphics
120 GB Maxtor SATA drive
(Video Server)

Daughter's machine is running ReadyBoost but frankly none of them chase the
circle all that much. The daughter's when loading Disney's Cars game a
little but not much.

Can you run task manager and list all the processes running and their CPU
usage? Perhaps something snuck into startup that's eating your RAM?

Art

Art

 

Vista runs with "1Gb ram" but runs as your seeing it run.....to have a sweet
smooth experience one should use at least a Higher end Processor ( Dual Core
Technology), 2GB Ram and a 256mb video graphics card....I personally like
the ATIx1300

Jim

 

I disagree with your assessment. I'm running Ultimate RTM on a system that
is almost 5 years old, 1GB PC 800 RAM, 2.53 GHz P4 processor. No such slow
downs. I'm also using a 2GB SanDisk Micro Cruzer USB flash drive for
ReadyBoost.

To the OP there is something wrong with the installation, hardware and/or
drivers for the slowness you're seeing.

 

But here in lies the Big Difference!>>>>> I'm also using a 2GB SanDisk Micro
Cruzer USB flash drive for
ReadyBoost.

Jim

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Also...Your running a P4 - 2.53Ghz !! He's running a AMD 64 ..... One could
argue the difference depending only of course personal preferences....And
then of course depending on the types of prgms he's trying to operate / run
( Ie: games, multitasking.....) with an AMD vs Pentium
He's also not using a 2GB Ready Boast either to boost the overall
performance...

Jim

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Readyboost does help but it's not a huge difference. Even without it I
wasn't seeing those slow downs. What I was disagreeing with was your
statement about what's needed to have a "sweet, smooth, experience" with
Vista.

 

I can only comment on the multiple experiences I have had since selling Dell
systems at a Kiosk since last November.....Numerous customers coming up to
me to tell me after the fact that my suggestions helped / are helping them
have just that sweet experience with not seeing delays, slow downs, lagging,
smooth running apps, vista Aero experience's.....As well as though customers
who "opted" at the time of purchase to not "opt" for those options only to
come back after the fact to "upgrade" their Video cards, System RAM stating
that they had listened to my suggestion when they were building there
original systems........
Me personally since the Beta started I have ran my Celeron processor with
1Gb ram and a 128mb Video graphics card and its painfully slow at
times......But then I expected it to be so I am not disappointed in Vista at
all.....

Jim

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