Computer Slowness

I have a year old Gateway P4 2.4ghz system with Windows XP Home and now 1gb of RAM. I just recently upgraded it from 512mb and added two of the exact same Samsung sticks like what came from the factory.

With the 512mb, I was really experiencing slowness and lagging when I had more than one program open at one time. It was especially noticable when printing and trying to use other programs. I upgraded the RAM to 1gb thinking this would help the slowness but it actually seems to be even SLOWER now with the extra RAM! The system does recognize the extra 512mb and does read 1gb in the system tab.

I defrag weekly, clear my internet cache daily and do all the other regular required maintanence but it still is slow running!

Does anyone have any idea why or what I can do to try to get this to run more quickly with 1gb of RAM?

Thank you in advance!

Kenny

 

Try running each stick of RAM on its own and compare system performance with each. A difference may indicate a problem with one of the sticks.
I run 2x 512 sticks on a P4 2.8 and realistically the difference between running 512 and running 1gig is maybe a few percent. The advantage will be on some highend (new) games and if you run MANY applications at once. I usually don't for either so only gained a marginal performance increase.

A few other things to do regarding system maintenence... Delete all that windows will allow in your login user profile Temp folder I.E. C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Local Settings\Temp
Occasionally delete everything inside the Windows|prefetch folder and Temp folder.
Run a couple of registry cleaners such as the two I use below in my Sig. Use the Unecessary Files cleaner component in EasyCleaner to find some of these files. Leave these unecessary files in the recycle bin till you're happy that no apps. have been broken. Unlikely but very occasionally has happened.
After using both registry cleaners run the registry defragmenter (also below) to compact any free space in the registry. The normal windows defrag utility doesn't defrag the registry hives.

Note I don't recommend using the duplicate files cleaner functionality of EasyCleaner, or in any cleaning application for that matter.

Let us know how you go!

 

...And another thing.
You are running updated Antivirus and Spyware programmes?
SpyBot and Ad-Aware are two of the most recommended Spyware apps.

 

Sounds like something(s) running in the background. With nothing open, Try Ctrl + Alt + Del, choose Task Manager, then processes tab, scroll thru looking for any processes using more than 5% (System Idle, normal to show 90+%) if find any over, post their process names and percents here. Joe.

 

Thanks, fellas, I think I have this figured out. I'm not even going to try and explain either!

 

Now thats not fair, we have to guess!

I'll guess first: System speed set to "compatible" or similar in the BIOS.

Not that *I've* ever done that, no, especially not on a brand-new Dell D800 laptop my boss was kind enough to sign for so I could have a new toy, nope, I never ever... ok, ok, maybe I did, but only once.