Just wondering something about PCs

[Lt ReiStark]

I defrag my PC bi-monthly, run antivirus scans of my whole computer every other day, clean up old files and games that I don't need, and still my PC slows down and even crashes. . . Does anyone have some magical thing I need to do that has escaped me to this point? I'm running a CPU usage of 10-20 just running firefox, and a physical memory usage of 980mb. also for some reason I have two copies of Rundll32 running at all times, which is not normal as far as I know.

[Sasha]

Have you run a SMART (Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) test on your harddisk to check for performance/error count/health? There are quite a few free softwares out there. Harddisks have defects that reduce life span.

Depending on the antivirus it may not specialise in malware, giving malwarebytes (free version) a try may reveal something at least on most computers.

Have you much more than 1G of RAM (2.5+)? 980 sounds not too out of the ordinary for Windows, if it is nearing its maximum, it may swap out unimportant processes to harddisk which is slower.

Firefox is not the best browser for resources, certainly if you have any plugins you should look at disabling and testing. It often takes up 1G+ of RAM and a solid 20% on my laptop, although that is dependent on many factors.  Chrome is an option, although Firefox is reasonable lately if you update it often.

Rundll32 may be something that your system had started up, you can go to the run box (Win key + R, or start menu -> run) and type msconfig, there should be a tab for startup entries, there may be some program trying to do something foolish every startup or malware/needlessware that is lingering each startup. Those were XP instructions, I am sure msconfig is there, at least a quick online search for startup program entries should be revealing. It is just a way to schedule a module to be run, some softwares have a single module to load in to memory that is taken care of at startup rather than a program. It's not the best way though, however finding the path of the module being loaded can be revealing.

Sometimes operating systems become unstable at times (when you said it crashes). Checking the windows error log (tells you why it crashes! should if non-fatal problem at least), video card and motherboard drivers are up to date may help. Sometimes operating systems slowly are added incompatible drivers or updates and become unstable and require reinstall.

If it crashes (without warning) it could be hardware at fault, especially if no error entries left in windows error log. Even fair name brand motherboards I've owned have had capacitors ruined and degrade stability or power supply run its usual rated 10k hours life too short. If the computer is more than three-four years old it may be the cause. If you've used the computer for a long period and it crashes, it could be accessing bad RAM. there are RAM checks, but probably not that unless it is repeatable often, and usually you get a windows error entry from it.


Random late night thoughts, meow, need to go to bed..

[Alloud]

Rundll32 is a normal windows process, and 64-bit versions of window have two copies: one in the System32 folder and another in SysWOW64. It's also possible for there to be more, but if you'd still like to check you can right click on the process in the Task Manager and hit "Open File Location" to see where it's running from. :V

Also as TigerKindred mentioned it would be a good idea to go to msconfig. If you're on Windows 7 just hit the Windows key -> Type "msconfig"  -> Hit enter. I had some nasty software conflicts once that completely destroyed my performance so what I did was open up MSconfig.exe, disabled all startup service, went to the Services tab and ticked the "hide all Microsoft Services" box, and disabled all of those too. After restarting, if you don't have any more problems you can start re-enabling services with a pattern or just turning one more on each time.

It would also help to know the specs. and the age of the hardware. d:

[kohl]

How 'bout reformatting? Still continues, your bios could be infected.

[Lt ReiStark]

My PC is about 4-5 years old, with two gigs of ram and an 800gig hard drive. I'm thinking I'll just ask for a new one soon, because this one is having trouble running certain games even after a reformat, my Assassin's Creed II lags like crazy, same with GTA4. I think though that I'll killdisk my hard drive and reinstall windows 7 again, that normally works to prevent crashing and slowing on most programs, though I hate having to reinstall all my programs and put all my files on a proxy drive.

[Phyr]

Do you physically clean the inside of your computer could be overheating? too much dust. or you have too many programs running in the background. msconfig?

[Lt ReiStark]

Do you physically clean the inside of your computer could be overheating? too much dust. or you have too many programs running in the background. msconfig?

I need to do a clean, but my buddy who know all about that moved to Alberta, so I don't know how to, or have anyone to help

[Phyr]

Just go on youtube and type in what you would like to do and you probably can pull a video up and do it yourself.

[EmoFox]

Throwing in my own $0.02, SMART-scanning is a big no-no. Its a hack program; that is to say, its been hacked. It was installed on my computer under the radar, and it completely messed up my hard drive.

I would suggest swapping the hard drive out for a new one. Is it a laptop? Sounds like you might have some bad sectors. Especially if reformatting doesn't do anything.
Oh and if it's a desktop, cleaning isn't too hard. Just open/remove the casing and blow some canned air in the hard to reach places. Large dust matts can be pulled out. wipe down the fan and heatsink with a microfiber cloth (like the ones you use to clean glasses lenses). but if it *is* a laptop, i can't help you; havent done a lot of hardware work on laptops, save for hard drive swapping.

[Sasha]

Throwing in my own $0.02, SMART-scanning is a big no-no. Its a hack program; that is to say, its been hacked. It was installed on my computer under the radar, and it completely messed up my hard drive.

You've installed malicious software, it would be very hard to manage server racks with no way to gauge performance, error counts, temperature or fitness of the drive other than your own tests, which may require exclusive access. It is available without any specific third party software.

Speedfan has a simple SMART check.

[kayfox]

Throwing in my own $0.02, SMART-scanning is a big no-no. Its a hack program; that is to say, its been hacked. It was installed on my computer under the radar, and it completely messed up my hard drive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.M.A.R.T.

I prefer smartctl.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smartmontools

[kohl]

Defragging is pretty much useless unless you need the extra storage capacity. I've actually find my computers running slower after a defrag.

Just reformat the drive.

[Sasha]

Defragging is pretty much useless unless you need the extra storage capacity. I've actually find my computers running slower after a defrag.

Just reformat the drive.

Windows will often write files sequentially with little room before or after on the physical medium. If files become written or modified, they could wind up in chunks all over the physical medium. Defragmenting will attempt to move chunks close together as to reduce lookup overhead if they were to be accessed. It moves free space in to a larger chunk but does not increase capacity (how would it?)

It is not designed to make things slower. Defragmenting startup libraries or resources could speed it up. Unwanted conditions could impede the process, however that can be said for anything.

[Tonk]

If you want i can just take a look at it for you when im back on the island.