Win 98 system lag

[ETID]

Hi,

I'm looking for a clue as to where to start troubleshooting this annoying problem.

I've got Win 98SE (all updates installed), running Zone alarm, norton AV (updated weekly), Inno 3d GeForce Video..agp, dual 3com nic cards, 4 port USB hub, Analogx proxy server, MS optical mouse, IE 6.x, Athlon 750 processor on an Asus k7v Mainboard w/onboard sound, cable modem.

System will begin to lag after a period of inactivity...
eaxample mouse movement will respond with a few second delay, IE will freeze momentarily when loading web pages.
moving images will look as though they are in stop action.

(I have no screen savers or power management activated) with the exeption of hard drive shut down.



If started in safe mode,..system will not "lag out"


I know this is a crap shoot,..but I,m looking to get a plan of attack.


Thanks

 

[jclinansmith]

how much ram do you have installed on this machine...and even at that..sounds like a memory issue to me. if you have have more than 128 you should be fine. but if you have a stick thats going south.....
do you have more than one stick of ram in the system...remove one...try and see if problem replicates. do the same for the other if problem replicated. at least you will know its not your memory if this still happens. again, assuming you have enough ram to begin with.

 

[ETID]

I got a half gig o ram....but I'll certainly try swapping the modules. thanks

 

[terryISO]

Hi.

If the memory is OK, you might also want to try uninstalling Norton A/V then seeing if the problem goes away. Then try reinstalling it. You may find that all is OK afterwards.

I believe that sometimes the combination of Zone Alarm and Norton A/V can cause odd problems like yours.

This may not be the cause, but it is fairly quick and easy to test it.

 

[drdebit]

I guess I don't know enough to know if it's hardware or software, but if you've not tried any system cleanup you ought to take a look at cdogg's faq (faq615-3144) and see if that would help.