Why does my PC take so long to shut down? How to fix it?

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Hard drive housekeeping suggestions

by loreefg Aug 23, 2008 5:40AM PDT

Some program is not letting shutting down on its own quickly enough to speed the shutdown process on its way.
Three suggestions:
1. Run your virus scan program to make certain you have no trojans or virus programs that need to be cleaned up.
2. Run the system defrag. I'm a chronic hard drive house cleaner and I do this at least once-per-week.
3. Run the system error-check. You can do this after running the virus scan and defrag. You'll shut your computer down and restart it before the error check can happen.

If you don't know where the defrag and error check programs are, do the following:
1. Double click on my computer
2. Right click on local disk (C
3. Click on Properties
4. Click on Tools
5. Click on Check Now and put a check mark in both boxes in the next dialogue box
6. Click on Defragment Now
7. Click on Defragment

When the defrag program is complete, close it and shut your computer down. If you're through using it for the day, the error check program will occur the next time you start your computer.

I use these steps pretty frequently whenever some piece of memory or remnant of a program gets hung up.

Good luck with yours.

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Faster Shut-down

by LinuxOne Aug 23, 2008 7:03AM PDT

If you have many background apps running, such as skype, google talk,and others, you might consider not running all of those all of the time.

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Why Shutdown is slow

by Ancient-One Aug 23, 2008 7:11AM PDT

Victoria:
I don't clasify myself as a super computer nerd. But have been computing since 1985 - so I know the keyboard from the monitor.
I can't believe what I have been reading - and read darn near all those posted so far. From what I saw, it looks like most -- before they can repair a flat tire on their car, first -- they have to build the car. Yee Gads! Many wanted to expound on things that were not related to your question. Suspect many were just ego trips to show off their computer skills. Though "NOT ALL" -- there were some very good suggestions, and some I forgot to mention in my first mail.
So, never mind nuking your computer and starting all over again... What a drastic and dumb idea. You want to fix it -- not build a new one.
You will note several mails recommended CCCleaner. THAT is darn good advice. Once you use it, you will never change. Just make sure yodon't have any of the boxes on the left side checked other than "COOKIES" - "TEMP FILES" AND "INTERNET FILES".
And YES! adding 2 or 3 gigs of RAM WILL speed up your computer --- but will do only a little for your shutdown time (Which was your question)
And also YES! If you are running Norton, and it runs a scan when you shut down, THAT is a BIG slow down. BIG TIME. Some suggested your getting rid of Norton. They are correct. However, you really don't have to be that drastic. You can change your scan time to run in the MIDDLE OF THE DAY -- OR a time you are not on your computer -- maybe every two or three days. NOT when every time you shut down. THAT's a No-No!
Next, they were correct when they suggested defraging. This is VERY important in keeping your computer running fast. You should check your fragmentation at least once a week, or even sooner is OK. Again, you don't have to build a computer in order to repair it. K.I.S.S. Have a good firewall (PC Worlds highest recommendation "Best free Firewall" awhile back) was ZONE ALARM Though I run their "Pro" edition-- And have for years and would not have anything else. - do your home work, Google it, and the other programs I have mentioned here -- Z/A will stop all those malwares - worms, viruses, etc, that other replies mentioned - you might have)
And trying to make the salution to your problem simple -- (Again)
I again say, use the free CCCleaner - and also FREE "Advanced Windows Care V2 Personal" and you can forget about all the other stuff. Both are 100% great programs and the two will keep your computer running good as new. Promise! -- Scout's Honor! (grin) I use them daily - and swear by them both. Would not be without them. And also stop your Norton or any other Virus program from running on shut down.
Nuff said,
Good Luck,
Ancient-One

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THANKS

by robby_lorider Sep 5, 2008 2:16PM PDT

THANK YOU FOR THE TIP, I BEEN PAYING THROUGH MY NOSE FOR VIRUSES,SLOW DOWN PC, FOR MONTHS NOW, I LL TRY CCLEANER NOW, AT LEAST I DONT HAVE TO PAY $300.OO BUCKS TO HAVE MY PC AGAIN, I BEEN WORKING ON PCS SINCE1990

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Long Shutdown

by redhead5839 Sep 5, 2008 9:29PM PDT

Ancient One,
I also have a problem with a long shutdown. Thank you so much for all the information in your reply. I am going to get rid of the programs I am using to clean my PC and put in CCCleaner and the V2 program you wrote about. Could you suggest a registry cleaner? I am currently using Wise Registry Cleaner and everything seems to be going slower.
Thank you again for all your help.
Redhead5839

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Could you suggest a registry cleaner?

by MReed58 Sep 7, 2008 10:34AM PDT

CCleaner & V2 do registry cleaning, & more.

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Say What??

by majorcobra Sep 5, 2008 10:47PM PDT

Dude .. it''s Ccleaner, NOT CCCCCCCCCCcleaner!!

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Ancient-One 's reply

by Quiglyalso Sep 6, 2008 12:43AM PDT

Hi, I just want to endorse Ancient-One,s reply he seams to have reached similar conclusions about many of the posters on internet forums that I have.
If they don't know the answer they should not interject. Good luck all D.D. (Probably a much more Ancient-One)

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Ancient-One.: Can't find the "Free"recommended downloads

by pat mrucz Sep 6, 2008 4:06AM PDT

I pasted the 2 recommendations you suggested.I got Google and the free downloads I chose were wanting money to fix the problems.How do I find the right "FREE" downloads?This is to the Ancient one

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To get downloads

by injunjim Sep 6, 2008 9:13AM PDT

Go to Download.com and search "Ccleaner" and "Advanced Windows Care Personal". These are free downloads.

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I would agree with much of what ancient one has to say......

by gbswales Sep 7, 2008 6:25PM PDT

...however it depends very much on how you use your computer. If, like me, you load every freebie programme that comes your way then eventually there will come a time when no amount of "cleaning" will cut it. I usually reckon on a complete wipe and re-install about once a year - I accept that if I did regular housekeeping and spent a bit of time sorting things out I could fix it - but some time ago I created an image of my hard drive which I keep on an external drive - this image has Windows XP, all my drivers and core programmes like Microsoft office and some much used utilities. Using this it takes me approximately an hour to completely rebuild a clean system - then another 10 minutes to restore my data from the external back up drive - though most of the larger stuff is on another external drive anyway so doesnt need restoring. Of course over time I will reinstall the several hundred other programmes but only as I need them (which often proves to be never) plus all the new ones I come across in Cnet, ZDnet - anything as long as it is free.

The only two programmes I pay for are Acronis back up which handles all the image and back up files and an online back up service - which means I have an offsite backup as a last resort

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Ccleaner

by mslywa Sep 9, 2008 9:33AM PDT

Hi, I notice that the Ancient One recommends only having 3 boxes ticked when running Ccleaner ..those being cookies, internet files and temp files. I have been using Ccleaner for a while and have all boxes ticked except last downlond location and autocomplete form history. All has seemed ok when I run Ccleaner.
What's so wrong in getting all the other stuff cleaned up? I figure Ccleaner wouldn't put it in as an option if it wasn't safe to clean up.
Marko

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PC Slow Shutdown

by William Grimsley Sep 23, 2008 4:17AM PDT

I have visited a lot of forums and I have a question that I have never seen the answer to. How long is a normal shutdown, (if there is such a thing) Lets say you have a Pentium 4 3GHz CPU with only the Windows Vista Home Premium OS installed (Just to make everything equal) How long should it take to start up and to shut down? For information my computer with my programs installed will normally shut down between 11 and 15 seconds. I have a second hard drive and I use Seagate Disc Wizard to back up my "C" drive to my second hard drive. This process takes less than 5 minutes. To restore the "C" drive takes less than ten minutes. This way I always have a "clean" copy. After I have downloaded a bunch of free programs to try I just restore the "C" drive rather than trying to uninstall the programs.
That gets rid of all that stray "stuff"

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HOW LONG SHOULD IT TAKE

by GEO2003 Sep 23, 2008 5:17AM PDT

William,
this is a very hard question to answer because it all depends on how many applications load at starup for a particular user.

But I would like to share some experiences with you, even though for your configuration you are getting very good timings.

I had AVG 7.5 for xp and ZoneAlarm installed on every family member's pc.

I alwasy noticed a slow down, but since I have used and trusted this two applications for a long time I kept them around.

My Vista laptop is 3 years old, Originally I was running xp.
I have 2mz cpu, 2gb of mem, 256 mem nvidia graphics, and a 7200 rmp drive.

I year ago I decided to install vista, and was amazed at how slow it would start up.
But my trust on those two applications, kept them in my computer.

I am not saying that the programs re-programed for Vista are bad.

But one day my computer was chrashed by using a drive partion utility.

I reloaded a totally clean install with all updates and noticed the speed increase, I have not yet install the antivirus and firewall.
While doing the updates I left the Win firewall do the work.

When I finished, I reinstall AVG and Zonealar, be hold the slow down again.

So I uninstall them and the speed increase returned.

Temporarily I installed them again to protect my self and starting testing a lot of different Antivirus/Antispyware and Firewall programs.

Once I learn how to used them and what they offer, I settle on two.
Avast Home Free Edition and Comodo's Firewall

I uninstalled AVG and ZoneAlarm, and installed one of my new choices at a time.

I experience no degradation in starup.
Then I installed Comodo,
Both combined did not created any problems on start up.

So in my experience with Vista , AVG, ZoneAlarm my startup time was 2 and a half minutes.
On a 3 year old hardware and single core cpu.

With Avast and Comodo, my starup timing is 55 seconds.

As you can see it also has to do with the way applications are programmed.

pctools Antivirus, pctools threatfire, created delays.

So now i am happy with a start up time of 55 seconds, if I add about another 5 self starting applications the timing will increase to one minute five seconds.

On the shut down side, on my old laptop it takes about 29 seconds averaged out.
sometimes is 25, 28, 29, 30 but no longer then this.

Glad to share this with you.
Geo

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Computer Shutdown

by William Grimsley Sep 23, 2008 6:48AM PDT

GEO
Thanks for the reply.
Here is my computer setup.
Dell Dimension 4700 P4 3HGz 2gb Ram 200gb Maxtor ?C? drive 300gb Seagate ?D? drive(Slave)
NVIDIA GeForce 8400GS Graphics Card Pioneer DVD Writer and the original CD Writer.
I also have Comodo Firewall Pro, Comodo BO Clean and BitDefender Antivirus, CCleaner (all free stuff)
Other programs include MS Works, Quicken, Nero 7, Seagate Disc Wizard, Tax Software, Kodak Easy Share, ArcSoft Photo Studio, and Family Tree. I also keep Start-up to the bare minimum.
My start up time averages between 40 and 45 seconds. Seems like everyone is in a hurry.
Also I am very satisfied with my computer.

William Grimsley

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Will - Comodo BO

by GEO2003 Sep 23, 2008 7:31AM PDT

I know Comodo comes with a very light antivirus which is part of Defense +, but never heard of Comodo BO,
What is it and what does it do.

As far as Bitdefender, this one I never tested.

Just remember Ccleaner, I use it too, but make sure that it does not erase your Thumbs Cache, as Windows has to recreat it on startup somewhat slowing down you pictures program and your music folders.
I noticed this in particulr with my Music Folders using Windows Media Player, once I uncheck the clear Thumbs Cashe on Ccleaner Windows Media Player display all my album art very quickly.

I use MS MONEY, but don't allow it to start automatically because it has a database of transactions dating back to about 2001.
So since windows tries to load the necessary info for that program from the superfetch, I prefer to launch MS MONEY manually but it still loads withing 5 seconds.

Geo

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Comodo BOClean

by William Grimsley Sep 24, 2008 12:20AM PDT

GEO

Comcdo BOClean 4.27 is an Anti-Malware Program

William

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Comodo Bo by Geo

by GEO2003 Sep 24, 2008 2:39AM PDT

Thanks I look into it.

Since I started using Comodo Firewall, I haven't been to their web site.

Thanks.
Will

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How long is a normal shutdown!

by frescar_11 Sep 23, 2008 6:59PM PDT

Your recorded time is correct. but we knew that time of shutdown is basically defend on the load of your system and the kind of program you installed in it. The most important is you have a very convenient computer system that let you enjoy every time you use it.
May i recomend also that just let your main hard drive for your computer system and program use only. Let your second hard drive as your data and other doccument use purposely not to affect your peresent speed. Thanks!

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Computer Slow Shutdown

by William Grimsley Sep 24, 2008 12:40AM PDT

frescar_11

Thanks for the suggestion, but I have always used my second hard drive for storage. I also have some programs on the second hard drive.
For instance Microsoft Streets and Trips is installed on second hard drive with an icon on the desktop to open it. First I installed it normally and then copied the program files to the second hard drive and then I restored my computer using the backup I had previously made with Seagate Disc Wizard. It took a little work to find out what entries to put in the registry to make it work. I did a search of of Microsoft Streets and Trips in the registry and exported them. There were 21 entries. Through the process of trial and error I found only 2 of them were necessary to make the program work.

William

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ccleaner

by Nancyjeane Sep 27, 2008 2:27AM PDT

I have tried to download the free ccleaner, but RegCure keeps popping up and that is not free. can you help me out here?

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Here

by thebug Sep 27, 2008 3:00AM PDT

uninstall RegCure. I've used it and have had problems with it!

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Nancy - RegCure

by GEO2003 Sep 27, 2008 3:33AM PDT

If it is not free uninstall it.
Download Revo Uninstaller so that it does a good job of getting rid of every entry by RegCure.
If there is an icon your TaskBar near the clock, Right Click on it, there should be an option to Exit, Disable or something similar.
Select the appropriate option and then uninstall it with Revo, get Revo from Cnet.

Or Lauch the application and look under the menu for Options, Settings, and look around to see if there is a setting that is checked which states - Start Automatically with Windows or something similar, uncheck that box, reboot the pc and the application should not start automatically.

Then uninstall it with Revo and download CCleaner.

Regards,
Geo