SOLVED Windows 7 SO SLOW (suddenly)

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Last week our brand new Dell workstation laptop (Precision M6500), became nearly unusable - very long lags when typing, rolling mouse over menu options, waiting for programs to load, waiting for menu options to activate, etc. There are moments of clarity, where the computer will behave normally, but these don't last more than a few minutes.

The problem corresponds with some hard crashes that we experienced -- we had been running some fairly intense renderings that day. Just to note, our old XP workstations with slower graphics cards, less RAM and slower processors, cannot run these renderings. We are not sure if the problem is related to these crashes, because it is possible that there was a "boiling of the frog" here, where perhaps the computer was gradually slowing down, finally reaching a tipping point where we just noticed last week.

I discovered the "Resource Monitor" and from that I think the problem is Disk Related because the disk is writing all the time (blue LED on front also goes solid quite frequently when computer is idle.) Also, the graph that shows disk queue length scales up to 5, 10, and 50 regularly. This is true even when running in Safe Mode with networking off. Both the blue and green lines on all disk graphs spike all over the place, again, while idle and while in use.

Here are the things that we have tried:
Clean reload of Nvidea graphics card driver
Updated and ran full scans with our Norton Anti-Virus
Used the "optimize performance" option in Norton
Defragged
Turned off automatic defragging
Ran Disk Check (no problem.)
Turned off Prefetch, ReadyBoot and Superfetch
Uninstalled unnecessary software
Uninstalled some necessary software, such as Norton and Adobe Suite 5.0
Called Dell, and ran their hardware diagnostics while on the phone (again no problem)

Next I am going to run a check of the operating system with the install disk, and if that doesn't work, I'll reload Windows 7. Before I do that, thought, I was wondering if anyone here had any other ideas? One thing I read somewhere was that someone had found their computer was writing millions of errors somewhere in an infinite loop. Once they found that and reset the program that writes the error message, problem solved. That sounds like a potential culprit, where our hard crashes maybe could have set something like that off. I don't know how to look for that, though.

One other note - when we ran the Norton optimize option, I had the performance monitor going, and the graphs started to look "normal" to my eye. The computer seemed fixed after, but it only lasted about 5 or 10 minutes.

Thanks for any help!
Wendie
 

zigzag3143

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Can we get your system specs so we know what hardware we are dealing with?
 
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Specs:

Can we get your system specs so we know what hardware we are dealing with?
Thanks!

Here are specs:

Dell Precision M6500 preloaded with Windows 7 Professional, 64-bit
Intel Core i7 CPU Q740 1.73 Ghz
4GB RAM
Toshiba MK5056GYF HD (500GB SATA/300 7200RPM 16MB according to google)
HD configured as RAID
NVIDIA Quadro FX3800M

Addendum: Another thing we tried was to restore operating system one week. When that didn't work we went 2 weeks back.
 

zigzag3143

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Thanks!

Here are specs:

Dell Precision M6500 preloaded with Windows 7 Professional, 64-bit
Intel Core i7 CPU Q740 1.73 Ghz
4GB RAM
Toshiba MK5056GYF HD (500GB SATA/300 7200RPM 16MB according to google)
HD configured as RAID

NVIDIA Quadro FX3800M

Addendum: Another thing we tried was to restore operating system one week. When that didn't work we went 2 weeks back.

I would re-install the RAID driver as this does sound HD related
. Go to the mfr's web site and get the most recent driver available. If there are no win 7 drivers you can use an earlier driver by installing it in "compatibility" mode.
(to install in compat mode>>right click the installer>properties>compatibility>chose correct OS)
 
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Sounds good, but...


I would re-install the RAID driver as this does sound HD related
. Go to the mfr's web site and get the most recent driver available. If there are no win 7 drivers you can use an earlier driver by installing it in "compatibility" mode.
(to install in compat mode>>right click the installer>properties>compatibility>chose correct OS)
I searched Toshiba's US, Australian and European sites, and could find no drivers. The driver currently installed is Microsoft's 6.1.7600.16385, dated 6/21/2006. I tried to update by selecting the drive in devices and picking "update driver." I let it search for latest driver, but Windows said I had the latest. So then I uninstalled the driver and rebooted, forcing it to reinstall. Problem not fixed. Then I tried to reinstall the driver by inserting the OS disk I got with the computer, and searching the disk to find driver. It wouldn't let me install (if there is a driver file on the cd) saying "Windows has determined that the latest driver is already installed."

??
 
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I searched Toshiba's US, Australian and European sites, and could find no drivers. The driver currently installed is Microsoft's 6.1.7600.16385, dated 6/21/2006. I tried to update by selecting the drive in devices and picking "update driver." I let it search for latest driver, but Windows said I had the latest. So then I uninstalled the driver and rebooted, forcing it to reinstall. Problem not fixed. Then I tried to reinstall the driver by inserting the OS disk I got with the computer, and searching the disk to find driver. It wouldn't let me install (if there is a driver file on the cd) saying "Windows has determined that the latest driver is already installed."

??

Also, I tried to download the current driver from Microsoft's web site, in case the driver file I have is corrupt, but I couldn't find anywhere to download it.
 

Nibiru2012

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Default setting in the BIOS for the hard drive is RAID, but that really doesn't make any sense if you only have one hard drive. The better setting would be to change it to AHCI setting which WILL improve the hard drive's response times.

MS has a default driver for the AHCI setting but it's best to use the INTEL drivers for that setup. You'll need to install the INTEL RST drivers for the Intel PM55 Chipset.

Go here to download the RST Drivers: http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=20215⟨=eng&wapkw=pm55%20chipset
 
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Thanks! One question:

Default setting in the BIOS for the hard drive is RAID, but that really doesn't make any sense if you only have one hard drive. The better setting would be to change it to AHCI setting which WILL improve the hard drive's response times.

MS has a default driver for the AHCI setting but it's best to use the INTEL drivers for that setup. You'll need to install the INTEL RST drivers for the Intel PM55 Chipset.

Go here to download the RST Drivers: http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=20215⟨=eng&wapkw=pm55%20chipset
Is that something I can do without reloading the operating system/all current files? or will it format the drive? (I am trying to limit what I try to non-catastrophic things as I need it running, even limping like this, while I finish up some stuff this week.)

Thank you!
Wendie
 

Nibiru2012

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If you want to change 7 from RAID to AHCI, all you need to do before you change the BIOS setting is look in the registry at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\msahci and change the 'Start' key to 0. (If an AHCI driver has never run on this machine it's probably 3.) The first time the machine boots in an AHCI controller mode it should load the default AHCI driver properly and prompt for a reboot.
 

Nibiru2012

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Digerati is correct, if your DELL is less than a year old you really should be dealing with DELL'S Support Team. It's not the greatest but better than nothing for sure.

If Norton is installed on there, I would recommend getting rid of it - if you haven't paid for it yet and try another AV software. Norton is notorious for slowing the system down, especially if the "trial period" is over. It chews up a LOT of RAM unnecessarily.
 
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Update on trying this

If you want to change 7 from RAID to AHCI, all you need to do before you change the BIOS setting is look in the registry at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\msahci and change the 'Start' key to 0. (If an AHCI driver has never run on this machine it's probably 3.) The first time the machine boots in an AHCI controller mode it should load the default AHCI driver properly and prompt for a reboot.
Tried to change to AHCI, but Windows wouldn't load, and I was prompted for the installation disk. I did this a few times, going back to make sure I had properly changed the registry key. I noticed that after a failure, when I would go back to BIOS to change back to RAID, that the hard drive was listed just as "hard drive" rather than by name/part number as before.

We had an interesting good ten/twenty minutes of normalcy yesterday; graphs looked normal, disk queue dropped back down to .01. I don't know if this has anything to do with that or not, but earlier in the day, I had plugged in/installed a new external hard drive I am going to use to back everything up before I reload the operating system. But then it went back to crap.
 
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Did talk to Dell

Digerati is correct, if your DELL is less than a year old you really should be dealing with DELL'S Support Team. It's not the greatest but better than nothing for sure.

If Norton is installed on there, I would recommend getting rid of it - if you haven't paid for it yet and try another AV software. Norton is notorious for slowing the system down, especially if the "trial period" is over. It chews up a LOT of RAM unnecessarily.
I called Dell, and their best guess is that it is the operating system. They suggested trying a check disk with the OS installation disk, and if that doesn't work, reinstalling the OS. I was hoping to avoid doing that. Can't try any of that until next week anyway because I need this computer this week.

I did try uninstalling Norton - it was the same before and after.
 

JMH

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WendiesS,

Re Norton uninstall.

Did you use the appropriate Uninstall tool from Norton? {rather than via Control Panel >Programs > Uninstall a program
}
 
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WendiesS,

Re Norton uninstall.

Did you use the appropriate Uninstall tool from Norton? {rather than via Control Panel >Programs > Uninstall a program
}
I used uninstall from control panel. I assume from your query that there is a better way?
 

JMH

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FYI -
Removing AV software via Control Panel etc quite often leaves remnants behind that can cause conflict / glitches , slow down systems etc.
Far better to use the Manufacturer Removal / Uninstall tool.

See links below.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norton_Removal_Tool

http://www.nortoninternetsecurity.cc/2011/07/norton-removal-tool.html

http://us.norton.com/support/kb/web_view.jsp?wv_type=public_web&docurl=20080710133834EN&ln=en_US

On re reading through your thread I agree with what others have said....

A new computer should not be presenting with the problems you have listed - & we volunteers should not be putting at risk the rights,YOU, the consumer has under that warranty...
I strongly suggest that you should seek further advice asap.
Under Warranty terms a duty of care applies.

 
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davehc

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One week seems a really long time for it to be troubling you, but have you tried turning off the search and index facilities, only to test if these are the culprits?
Search:
Control panel - Programs - uninstall a program. and (Over on the left) Turn Windows features on or off. Then UNTick Windows search.
Ditto indexing.
 
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Update

With other work issues the past few weeks, we put these problems on the back-burner, and let this computer limp along. Oddly enough, we had several very long normalcy periods, where it was reasonably usable. But as soon as we thought maybe somehow through the magic of Microsoft things had repaired themselves, the problems would resurface.

I had this computer sitting on my desk all weekend with the intention of finally reloading Windows. I enjoyed my weekend instead, never even firing it up.

Thus, I was surprised when I fired it up today that it couldn't find Windows. I thought, well, this is it, let's just do it, and inserted the installation disk. "Repair Windows" is presented as an option, so I decide to try that first. Still can't find OS; I follow prompts to reload HD driver. AHCI drivers appear to load, but the other HD drivers error out. Change from RAID to AHCI in BIOS configuration, and reboot. Now, can't see HD. Reboot, still can't see hard drive; error message on screen suggests reseating HD. First try switching back to RAID just to make sure that isn't it. Not it. Power it down to reseat HD, flip open back, don't want to touch anything as it is still under warranty. Call Dell support. They helped me reseat, still can't see HD. Dell is going to send a new HD.

So, I am going to mark this issue as "solved." I am curious, though, if anyone else has any thoughts on this? As I mentioned in my original post, I ran Check Disk, I ran all the diagostics that Dell suggested, including the long version to check the disk, and no problems were flagged. In the 15 years I have been self employed, I've set-up/managed 4 HP XP workstations, 2 SGI unix workstations, 3 Sony laptops and 2 macs. I know Hard Drives are notorious for failing, but the only hardware problems we have experienced were a bad power supply on the SGI, RAM coming loose on an HP workstation and batteries going bad on the laptops. I guess we were due for something bigger. I am perplexed, however, that the diagnostics were, in this case, utterly useless.

Thank you everyone for all your advise!!!
Best regards,
Wendie
 
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TrainableMan

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Though it's possible the issue could have been caused by a failing HD I doubt you can ever be sure because with a new HD will be a new install and if it was software related the new install wipes that out.

If the problem persists after the new harddrive is in I would be curious to hear back at what Dell suggests then.
 
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Yes, so frustrating

Though it's possible the issue could have been caused by a failing HD I doubt you can ever be sure because with a new HD will be a new install and if it was software related the new install wipes that out.

If the problem persists after the new harddrive is in I would be curious to hear back at what Dell suggests then.
Yes, I want to understand what happened, so I can diagnose it sooner if it happens again or on another computer. Also, after having very few problems with our HP boxes running XP, not sure what I think of Win7, Dell, Toshiba or shoehorning all that power into a laptop.

Is it possible that something was causing the HD to r/w all the time, and that activity wore the thing out? That seems unlikely to me, given what a short time we have had this computer. Could there have been some very deep virus that the AV software couldn't see? We loaded a bit of older, pre-Win-7 CAD software on there, could that have screwed something up? Too many variables....

But I'll accept not knowing what went wrong if a clean slate means I never have this problem again.
 
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