WinXP Pro runs VERY slow after windowsupdate

[Stoemp]

Hi,

I have a problem with 3 of the computers here in the firm. I ran a liveupdate on monday to be protected against the newest virusses and suddenly 3 of the 4 computers I did the windowsupdate on started to run extremely slow. My computer seems to be the only one where the problem does not occur. I checked every computer for virusses and they are all virus-free. Anyone who had the same issue and solved it?

Thanks,
Steven

 

[bcastner]

Check all the services. It is possible you have stopped RPC, Workstation, DNS or another critical service.

 

[bcastner]

Also, what does Task Manager report? It should show a process taking an inordinate amount of resources.

 

[Stoemp]

I tried it, but that's not it. Thanks anyway for the help.

 

[Stoemp]

The task manager says nothing special. Non-active systems at about 98-99% and that's all I guess...

 

[bcastner]

Is the slowdown in general, or just IE, or just a specific program?

If IE, remove this Hotfix on one machine and test:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/downloads/critical/822925/default.asp

 

[Stoemp]

It seems to be the whole system that slows down.

 

[bcastner]

If the Task Manager display shows now errant processes consuming a lot of resources, then it may be wise not to attempt any fixes at the moment. I know DNS resolution is very slow on my WAN links at the moment, and overall internet response seems laggy for the last several days.

I am still seeing lots of port 135 traffic for example, and lots of UDP traffic from the sobig worm.

Remember that the Norton/Symantec live update service by itself is not going to do anything major to the settings of your machine. It possibly could have some effect as the number of things to scan has obviously increased during file opens.

 

[bcastner]

"now" should be "no" above. Sorry.

 

[Stoemp]

The problem did not show up after a liveupdate from symantec, but after a windows update on the microsoft website. It's weird that only 3 of the 4 computers have this problem. I don't see anything wrong with my machine which is on the same network...

 

[bcastner]

From what I have received the only real "wait and see" hotfix is the August Cumulative Update for IE. I have it applied and see as I said some DNS resolver issues I did not have before. The msblast hotfix, the Directx9 hotfix, and the HTML code elevation Hotfix seem benign on my systems so far. There are some newsgroup complains about the Directx Hotfix, but this is from heavy gamers and I have no interest in testing that scenario.

Right now is a simply awful time to make clean comparative judgements about the effects of any Hotfixes relating to the internet.

Take one troublesome machine and remove the three hotfixes mentioned above and test to see if it makes a difference. Turn off (as a test) the Norton active scan of your file activity, and see if it makes a difference.

My guess is that in the main the slowness is exogenous to the workstation and likely not a Hotfix issue.

 

[Stoemp]

Thank you very much for your help. I'll try to get rid of the hotfixes on one machine and we'll see after that. I hope it gets solved.

Greets,
Steven

 

[bcastner]

Let us know your testing results.

 

[Stoemp]

I tried everything that's been discussed here and nothing worked. Maybe the machines just need some maintenance. I think a format could do miracles after 2 years of working without any maintenance at all...

Thanks to y'all for the help. Too bad it didn't work out.

 

[hsotb]

I had the same problem on a machine. I did a system restore back 2 days and now the machine is running as usual. Im almost sure that the problem was the last Microsoft Update, but not sure which one.

Im going to do some research on this and will post my findings.

Take care

 

[Turkbear]

Hi,
If you are runing SP1 and have installed patch 811493,
uninstalling it should solve the problem.

 

[Tron2k3]

It seems that if u have a pirated copy and serial of Windows XP, if u install Service Pack 1, the machine runs crazy and becomes extremely slow.

The solution is only to do a restore point and bring up the configuration u have before u installed the service pack. if u have that option disabled only thing u can do is install windows xp again.

Probably u have a pirate serial number that is on their black list, it might be that serial from that pirate group Devils0wn.

hope that this helps u

Tron

 

[hsotb]

Well its not a pirate serial number , so that wouldnt be an issue here. Service Pack 1 was installed back awhile ago with no problems. Im going to check what Turkbear said and see if it works on one of the other machines that have developed this problem.

Later ,..,, :0)

 

[bcastner]

Hotfix 811493 is a dead issue. There were some problems with the original release, long since fixed.

There is nothing wrong with the current 811493, and if you have been using Windows Update you would have received this update months ago.