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22 minutes to boot up

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rhyno2k

IS-IT--Management
Jun 9, 2001
222
US
For the last week or so, my Win2k SP2 machine has been taking about 20-25 minutes to boot -- every step in the process is sllllow from the Windows Loading (F8 menu) screen, to the initial GUI load (I stare at my wallpaper for 4 minutes alone!), to the tray control programs marching in...

And my whole system (Athlon 800/384M RAM) is DOGGIN' it. Programs take anywhere from 20 seconds to 90 seconds to boot. I just saw a right-click menu take 15 seconds!! And heav'n forbid I'd want to do something like switch between programs! LOL

Here's what I've tried:

I ran defrag on my system partition (w/20% free).
Did a checkdisk on my boot drive (25 Gig Maxtor 7200RPM) - came out fine ... , however copying files to/from this drive, again, is taking about 10x longer than usual. I tried the Recovery Console, doing a fixboot. I tried the ERD, ran System File Checker, replaced all Windown system files with their originals.

I've scanned the event log, no viruses lurkin' around - Norton AV 2k1 w/08.15 defs (although Code Red was nippin' me for a few days) I didn't install any new programs since then. No configuration changes (other than setting up a few new websites).

I'm thinking it may be the drive (I hear clicking sounds every few minutes that I didn't hear before) - am ready to send to Maxtor for replacement tomorrow (once I backup everything) But could it be something else?

Ideas are appreciated!


Thanks in advance,
--RHYNO
 
Get your harddrive replaced! That is your problem. James Collins
Systems Support Engineer
A+, MCP

email: butchrecon@skyenet.net

Please let us (Tek-tips members) know if the solutions we provide are helpful to you. Not only do they help you but they may help others.
 
Did you check your DMA settings ? If they are set to non-DMA that could possibly make the drive go slllow..
 
Thats true but he stated he is hearing clicking sounds that he has not herd before. Good sign of a failing drive. Backup what you can then replace. James Collins
Systems Support Engineer
A+, MCP

email: butchrecon@skyenet.net

Please let us (Tek-tips members) know if the solutions we provide are helpful to you. Not only do they help you but they may help others.
 
Clicking in the drive is a bad sign indeed. Another thing to look at would be cache settings in the bios- I've seen the same behavior (minus the clicking, of course) when internal and external cache was inadvertently disabled. If you have done any mucking about at all in the bios it would be worth checking.
 
You could check USB devices as well a failed USB device has been known to slow down a computers boot and run.I had it happen with a web cam the memory count would take ten minutes and when it finally booted everything was really slow.
 
Hey guys,


Thanks for the responses. Yes clicking is bad (my HD clicks, and my 5-year old Zip drive doesn't! Yet... lol).

I didn't mess around in the BIOS lately (Compaq hardly lets you!). I actually did already unplug all USB thingies... thx shovel...

Gave Maxtor the scoop and got the RMA for an "Advanced" return (You send me new drive, I send you old one if I remember haha) - didn't even ask if I ran "powerdiag" or whatever. Don't have time for that crap!

My next question is, I have a data drive (Maxtor 20 Gig) hooked up, that USED to be the primary boot, THEN it became the new Maxtor, and now it's going to be THIS one again! (While I hook up this clunker as a slave to snag the data)

I've ran into snafus before trying to run two bootable drives off Win2K... any advice on this procedure? May do it tonight after I return from bowling.


Thanks guys!
--RHYNO
 
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