Really slow reboot times?

[drfsupercenter]

OK, I seriously don't know why my computer takes like 5 minutes to do a complete restart. It seems like the time keeps getting longer and longer.

First off, I just scanned for malware a day or two ago... so that's not the problem. (And I used various scanners, not just one)

When I do a shut down, it says "Saving your settings" for two or more minutes! Then takes another minute or so to "Shut down your PC".

Then for starting up, the Windows XP thing is quick enough, but my screen just goes black and takes about 30 seconds for the desktop icons to appear. At which point it's an hourglass for another 2-3 minutes.

I just went through my startup and disabled a TON of crap I didn't need. But it didn't seem to affect the times at all. Here's a list of what does boot with Windows:

Ad Muncher, Apache, AutoSizer, AVG (a couple processes there), Bluetooth Service, Bluetooth.lnk (not sure if either of those is NEEDED for my Bluetooth dongle to work), cftmon.exe, EM_EXEC, HDD Information Service/HDInspector (that shows the temperatures of my drives), LogMeIn/LogMeInGUI/LogMeIn Maintenance Service, Monitor Apache Servers.lnk, NvCplDaemon/NVIDIA Display Driver Service/NvMediaCenter/nwiz (NVIDIA processes for my video card - I don't know if they're needed in order to make it work but I'd rather not risk it), PMCRemote (remote IR sensor for my TV tuner), ProcessExplorer.lnk, Registry Management Service, USB2Check (also for my TV tuner), 4 programs related to VMWare, VNC Server, zBrowser Launcher (the thing that enables hotkeys on my keyboard), Zune Launcher

Seems like a lot but none of those are extraneous programs... Weirdly, though, Google Updater keeps finding a way to run despite me removing it from the run list... Is it being malware now? Or does Firefox trigger it somehow?

The number of desktop icons doesn't affect startup speed, does it? Mine's almost full with files and icons... but I think I remember reading that the myth about desktop icons wasn't true.

[copyless]

I figure this is a dumb question, but you know me, I will ask it anyway. You have ran CCleaner and a defrag recently correct? How full is the HDD.

And myth or not, any graphics and short cuts that windows has to load during start up does consume time, not a lot, but that would depend on several factors on how much time.

[MilesAhead]

First step I would advise is run msconfig.exe and check the Boot Log option.
After rebooting look in the Windows directory for a file named "ntbootlog.txt"
and view it in notepad.

You'll probably see a bunch of lines with
failed to load ??c:\xxx\xxx\xxx.sys some device driver

esp if it has the question marks could be you cleaned off some stuff but the windows still thinks it's installed so it's going to load the driver for it.

If you had Norton anything try using the Norton Removal Tool.

Other than that, google on anything that failed to load and try to find out what it's for.

[drfsupercenter]

I use CCleaner all the time... it's only one click "Run CCleaner" to empty my recycle bin that way, rather than having to click "yes I want to empty it"

As for defragging... I haven't done it in quite some time. I don't even remember how anymore. I thought to myself that could be a problem, but I can try it out for sure.

I never had Norton anything... I hate Norton and all their products.

As for my hard drives, they're all pretty full. The one Windows runs off of is constantly filling up and I have to keep moving stuff around to prevent it from running out of space. But I didn't think it was a bad thing to have a 99% full hard drive.

[Dialysis1]

As far as the slow shutdown, have you looked at User Profile Hive Cleanup Service?

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=1b286e6d-8912-4e18-b570-42470e2f3582&displaylang=en

[Abuilder]

Drf
1% free space is not enough no matter what. I would invest in a bigger drive ASAP while yours is still booting so you can clone the drive over to a new one without loosing everything.
Or if you have that drive partitioned and have room to lose on the second partition, resize the primary to make it bigger. Linux's gparted works good for this type of thing if you don't have partition magic installed.

[MilesAhead]

In any case it's better to look at the log instead of guessing. In my case I had slow rebooting due to Norton. I ran the Removal Tool but it sort of got into a loop where the hd just ran on so I had to power down. Turns out it didn't remove all the entries from the registry and the system was trying to load drivers that were no longer on the drive. I ran the removal tool again and it cleared it right up. But I woudn't have been sure to go that way if I didn't look at the log.

Use the tools Windows gives you. Otherwise you can guess for a long time before getting a hit. Kind of like the guy who dropped his car keys on the street at night. He's looking and looking and can't find them. A guy passing by says "approximately where did you drop them?" and the guy points across the street. The passerby says "then why are you looking on this side of the street?" and the guy says "because the light is better over here!"

[Chewy]

Keep 20% free on any drive you want to defrag and keep running for long

[drfsupercenter]

Well, I have plenty of drive space (about 1.8TB total with all my externals), but my main drive is partitioned into a 30GB for Windows and 120GB or so for storage. Can those partitions be moved around without reformatting either?

Does Windows' built-in defragmenter do a good enough job of it? Or is there some third party one that's better?

[Chewy]

Move data manually off the 30 gig system partition, set up programs to put data on your data partition

[drfsupercenter]

That's what I've been doing.

The problem is I like having files on my desktop and that still eats up drive C:. I was able to move My Documents to the data partition, so that's not consuming space - but can the desktop location be moved as well? (Yes I know I can use shortcuts... I just create/download files faster than I can organize, LOL)
And typically now I install programs to the other partition. They both have a Program Files folder and so far stuff works off either. I just don't know where most of the data is coming from - my desktop is only maybe 5GB at the most and all I have is program data. (Is there a way to do a "detailed view" and see exactly how much space a folder is taking up? I can right-click on each and view "properties" but sorting by size ordinarily does not include folders and there are far too many to do it by hand...)

[blutach]

It's probably a driver or a prog which takes over and runs its startup routines. My PC used to drive me mad at boot times, too.

Here's what you can do:

1. Get Autoruns from sysinternals. In the options, tick "Hide M$ and Windows entries". Run it and then Untick everything that is login. Reboot and see how that goes. Now, add the bits back, one by one to see if that affects anything.

2. Get Bootvis and run it. It shows graphically what is taking what time.

I know it's a pain in the rear, but if you isolate a bad driver or program, it can make your startup real quick. In my case, AVAST AntiVirus was holding the PC up while it did an initial scan at startup. This took about 2 minutes - sometimes more! Solution - I changed AV product. I now get control of the PC (clicking on an icon actually does something after about 1 minute of seeing the shell).

Regards

[drfsupercenter]

I'll try that after school...

[MilesAhead]

If you do set up a scheme where you put the OS in its own partition it's a good idea to allocate quite a bit more space than you expect unless you know how much to use from experience. Even though you may install programs on another partition, some of them like to install some components on C: or wherever the OS is. Visual Studio 6 was famous for that. I just installed it on my H: partition in XP and it still wanted to put some stuff on C:.

The space can get used up sneaky like.

[rcubed]

That's what I've been doing.

The problem is I like having files on my desktop and that still eats up drive C:. I was able to move My Documents to the data partition, so that's not consuming space - but can the desktop location be moved as well? (Yes I know I can use shortcuts... I just create/download files faster than I can organize, LOL)
And typically now I install programs to the other partition. They both have a Program Files folder and so far stuff works off either. I just don't know where most of the data is coming from - my desktop is only maybe 5GB at the most and all I have is program data. (Is there a way to do a "detailed view" and see exactly how much space a folder is taking up? I can right-click on each and view "properties" but sorting by size ordinarily does not include folders and there are far too many to do it by hand...)

If you have a lots of e-mail data that is stored under the Documents and Setting/(folder named your user ID)/Application Data/.... I don't use IE very much and haven't found where it stores stuff, but Foxfire and Thunderbird store your emails sent/received in folders in that directory. Depending on what you have received or sent the files can get pretty large. Even though you install programs to a logical drive that is not the OS partition they still sometimes create temp folders etc. under the Application Data folder. Some programs allow you to manually select another destination for that folder That said and done, I have to increase the size of my OS partition from time to time. Creating a special partition for the OS swap file may also help. By default it is created in the same logical partition as the OS. To see some of these files you may have to enable view hidden system files. (see help for how to do some of this stuff).

A program like Partition Magic can allow you to take free space from one logical partition and allocate it to another. Similar programs can accomplish the same.

It could also be there is a physical problem with the connection to the hard drive(s). I had one SATA cable that was giving me fits. The drive would work most of the time, but operations to/from the drive were very slow. Computer Mangaement/Event Viewer/System folder was showing lots of errors with the drive. They were not severe enough to completely kill the drive but were causing a lot of read/write retries. Replacing the cable solved that problem.

You all ready mentioned it, but you can create a short cut to another folder in another partition and have that short cut on your desktop. One dbl click gets you to the folder. Rather than having to work through My Computer or Explorer. The short cut takes very little space in the OS partition.

I am familiar with the can't remember where I put it syndrome happens to me all the time. I have my system spread across three hard drives with multiple partitions on them. To save space on the desktop screen I have folders with shortcuts to programs grouped by function. That helps limit desktop clutter.

BTW keeping as much data as possible in another partition than the OS can simplify matters if you have to do a clean install of the OS.

I agree with Blutach that programs like virus checkers and trojan hunters, fire wall may be doing scans on start up. Usually the configuration options in those programs can be set to control that. Also a program like WinPatrol allows control of start up programs, although killing some is like trying to drive a stake though a vampire.

rcubed