Computer slowed to a crawl

[calista]

I have a 98 machine that suddenly slowed to a crawl. When you click on something it takes 5 - 10 minutes for it to come up. I tried running a defrag, but it was so slow it didn't work. It is networked with two other computers, and I can access files on the slow computer from either of the other computers with no trouble at all, so I don't think it's the hard drive.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

Calista :-X
Jedi Knight,
Champion of the Force

 

[jimp56]

first thought would be malware (viruses, spyware, etc) -- i would (if you can) take the hard drive out of the slow pc and add it as a secondary on a working computer (you can connect it where the cdrom is).

Then, you can run disk checks, defragments, as well as virus scanning. report back if you are unfamiliar with which websites to use for easy web-based scanning.

any tell-tale events prior to the slowdown? blue screens, pop-ups, etc?

 

[karlisi]

If you have McAfee antivirus on this computer, this can be your problem.

===
Karlis
ECDL; MCSA

 

[calista]

I'm not really confident about taking out the hard drive, although I can probably manage that. I'm not clear on what you meant by connecting the hard drive to another computer where the CD ROM drive is.

I didn't get any strange screens or windows prior to it slowing down.

What anti-virus would you recommend? I don't have McAffee, BTW. At the moment, I have a trial version on Windows Live One Care on an XP machine, which is the one that is connected to the internet. The 98 machine is networked into the XP machine.

Calista :-X
Jedi Knight,
Champion of the Force

 

[jimp56]

sorry - lets stick to the easy stuff first. Is the slow computer on the internet? If it is, start by trying to get this web scanner to run:

http://www.trendmicro.com/hc_intro/default.asp

just click the "scan now" - and accept the activex control it wants to download. then have it scan the C: drive. it will tell you if anything bad is on there, for the most part. If its not on the internet, thats where it gets complicated....

let me know.

 

[jimp56]

just saw this part: "on an XP machine, which is the one that is connected to the internet. The 98 machine is networked into the XP machine."

which probably means its not on the internet. I would, just for the moment, connect the internet to the slow pc so you can run teh scan I mentioned above.

Also, as far as antivirus, I like TrendMicro's fully installed product (above link is for web scanner only) - but thats a personal preference only.