Win XP startup (WinXP)

**Tira** · 2005-09-30 01:16

Hello, This has happened to me a couple of times now and I hope that someone can help me. When I turned on my laptop it starts up slow but ok, gets to the desktop and shows all the icons on the desktop but then it seems to stop loading. I do have the MSOffice Shortcut bar that starts up in the beginning and I know that slows things down but I do like to have it. In any rate, for some reason it seems that after all the icons are on the desktop nothing happens anymore, I can't click on any of the icons nor the start button nor can I use Ctrl+Alt+Del to shut down. I have to push the start button on the laptop for a while for it to turn off. When I turn it back on it is still slow but it does eventually come all up incl. the shortcut bar. It seems to happen if I don't turn it on for a couple of days - would that be an option even though I don't thnk that should happen. I have run my Norton anti virus, nothing was found, ran spybot search and destroy and Adaware, nothing. Could someone tell me what the problem could be and what I should do please? Thank you for your help, Tira

**officespacer** · 2005-09-30 15:43

what model laptop? and what are the general specs? how many MHz & how much memory?

sounds to me to be a hardware problem... but I need more info about the laptop.

**bigaldoc** · 2005-10-01 10:56

I agree with John that it would help if you tell us more about this laptop and even OTHER things that have been going on where it's concerned. What causes me to say this is <!post=your post here,502,666>your post here<!/post> of about a week ago. Might there be other "squigglies" around that are involved as well? Come on back...

**Tira** · 2005-10-02 03:18

Thank you both for getting back to me. Here is the information. I have a Sharp laptop, Pentium 4, 2.20 Ghz, 496 RAM. The msg I posted back in July "Disk Monitor - Integer overflow and then a second Window: Indicator - Can not find NEODIO Card Reader!" has never come up again. When I started the laptop today everything was fine, the fact that it wouldn't let me do anything happened "only" twice so far. Please let me know if you need any more information. Thanks much for your help. Tira

**bigaldoc** · 2005-10-02 09:06

So the missing card reader event that happened almost three months ago stopped and you didn't do anything, like remove it or update it? Now, the machine has only had this delay twice and otherwise operates OK? I'd say you either don't have a problem, or you have something lying deep down that needs some attention, but I have no idea what to suggest. It's possible that you have a setting on some piece of software that's "doing something" every once in awhile, or a Windows setting that's kicking in, or any number of possible events causing you to experience intermittent delay. OR, there might really be something wrong that might take a lot more back-and-forth questions here to decide. There are lots of routine things you should do to keep tabs on the "health" of your machine, such as running CHKDSK, a good antivirus program, spyware detection periodic scanning, and so on. Trying to investigate "slowness" starts with determining what's running or trying to run at the time of the slowness and the possible first place to look is in the Task Manager, under Processes. The next time your machine hits you with this delay, press Ctrl-Alt-Del, click on the Processes tab, then click twice on the CPU column to see what's using the most resource.

**Duchess843** · 2005-10-03 23:23

Hi Doc.
I ran CHKDSK just now and it found numerous errors which were deleted. At the end there was a error message that said: Errors found. Chkdsk cannot continue in read-only mode.

I'm mystified regarding what I should do next. I presume some files are in read-only mode, but which ones? How can I complete the scan?

Thanks in advance.

Gloria

**kaplinb** · 2005-10-04 00:24

To fix errors on your hard drive, click Start | Run, type
chkdsk /f
or, better (but it takes much longer time)
chkdsk /r
confirm your choice and restart your computer.

To check and fix problems with your hardware, open Device Manager (Start | Run, type
devmgmt.msc
and hit Enter) and look for all devices marked with yellow question mark or red X sign. Disable or uninstall problem devices (right-click each of them and from pop-up menu make your choice). Rule of thumb: if the device is not physically present anymore, choose Uininstall, if the device is physically present but generates errors, disable it.

**Duchess843** · 2005-10-04 14:38

Thank you so much. I'll try it this afternoon. I really appreciate your answering so soon.

**Tira** · 2005-10-20 16:04

Hi Big Al, I waited for a while with a response as I wanted to see what my laptop was up to. I do hope that I don't have a problem and it is not as you write, deep down hidden somewhere. It hasn't happened again, so far and I hope it will stay like this. Also, the msg about the missing card reader has never come up again. Really who understands computers, I certainly don't. I do what you have suggested, CHKDSK, Norton, Spyboot I believe it's called from Microsoft and AdAware on a regular basis but I have never had anything coming up as threat. In any rate, thanks for all your help and feedback, I really do appreciate it much. Tira

Thread: Win XP startup (WinXP)

Thread Tools