Computer Running Super Slow and System Restore Failure

Bob,

And may find you are looking for help beyond what kind help is offered here. I offer what I find most often and if a post shows up in a single paragraph I often miss a statement.

Let's hope you can accept what this forum is. A place for discussion about issues.

Now that we know there is no antivirus protection all bets are off about a damaged OS and since Microsoft does not supply tools beyond system restore to sniff out what has failed, you turn to folk like Mark at http://blogs.technet.com/b/markrussinovich/ to dive in and see what's happening.

I'm not Mark but that's the person you want to examine your machine next.
Bob

none of this has worked so far. I've scanned my computer using the proposed software and techniques. I've checked the processing, nothing has worked. keep in mind that I only run my computer in safe mode now because it is far to slow to run otherwise. Please help!!!

There are some odd things going on here and without the antivirus and more the OS is suspect now. Try the chkdsk and hope but without that protection, the OS can get dinged up quickly and then it takes a guru with hands on the machine to find it.

This is why most folk have to reload the OS today. (few gurus that will work on their machine.) Here we can't use the tools Mark R uses since we can't get to the machine. We can note Mark's fine work and read how he solved some stumpers but you would have to try what Mark does to see if you can find the issue.
Bob

While MBAM and SAS are great compliments to an anti-virus scanner, they do not do the work of anti-virus. However although you say you don't have Norton, perhaps you do have another anti-virus and that's why Kaspersky was mentioned, which also tampers with System Restore. Malware will also try to disable System Restore to prevent you from restoring back to before it was installed.

If none, then you do need an anti-virus scanner and there are many good free ones available.

Once you've done the scans suggested in Grif's post, if there is still no noticeable improvement, then let's look at other ways.

You say Safe Mode works fine, so that seems to suggest there is something, (or plural), running on your system that is slowing it down so try these steps;

1] Open MSCONFIG, (Start > Search for msconfig and select), and open it's Startup tab. Look down the list for any and all software that has set itself to run at startup. Ignore any Microsoft entries and any firewall and anti-virus entries, and also any utilities that came with the computer like keyboard or mouse, video entries. All others can be disabled as you can run those when Windows is fully loaded and when you specifically need them. Use Google to search for those you don't know. And a tip, the column headers can be expanded by dragging the borders on them, to enable you to see full entries. Reboot the computer to see if that helps.

These startup entries load their software into RAM Memory, and if your Acer doesn't have much memory then performance may suffer.

2] If there is no significant improvement, see what "Processes" are running. Right click the Taskbar and select the Task Manager. Open the Processes tab. There's a link at the bottom to "Show processes from all users". Click that to display them all.

There's no easy way to identify processes, but if any are eating up CPU Usage time, then they might be suspicious. Again, Google can help. Click the CPU column header once or twice to list them from bottom up, ie, bottom is heavier usage. If you don't see a CPU column, select CPU Usage from View > Columns.

See if those improve performance.

Also, since laptops need cleaning as well as Desktops, have a look atg Bob's advice about Laptop cleaning in the post below;
http://forums.cnet.com/7726-19681_102-3196452.html

As to batteries, there is no official guideline, but in general we think that 300 cycles or 2 years is about good for a battery. 300 cycles being fully charged to empty to fully charged again. All batteries degrade over time, so that's something you need to consider.

I hope that helps.

Mark

None of this has worked. I've run the srkill, MBAM, and SAS multiple times over the past couple days and seen no improvements. I've tried the killing proccesses, and none of the processes running are sketchy, I don't know what to do now. Please if anyone has any other suggestions? I'd like to add that the only way I can even stand to use this computer now is through Safe Mode, booting up normally only triggers the slowest speeds.

ChkDsk - Check the disk for errors.

You mentioned error messages about Bad Sectors in your top post. That might signify that the hard disk is failing, so you may want to backup all your personal files before moving on.

Rather than attempt to explain the procedure myself, follow the guidance given in the link below;
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/433-disk-check.html

Select all options available but since this is the C drive, ChkDsk will not run while the drive is in use and you will see the option to schedule it to run on next boot, so select that and then restart the system.

ChkDsk will then run before Windows loads. DO NOT INTERRUPT this procedure.

There is no guarantee that this will prevent a failing disk, but it may find bad sectors and that might improve performance.

Mark