Another Boot Up Issue

I returned from vacation and found my Dell B110 with XP Home Edition takes almost 4 min to boot up. Every step takes longer than normal. Once it is up, everything is fine. Where do I start?

 

Hello Ken,

With Safe Mode. Does that take long to boot?

Then with normal bootup with your startups disabled.

If with the minimal startups it's ok, then re enable them one at time.

If it's not - then a problem with XP's services or drivers.

Have you been in Task Manager - anything taking an unusual amount of RAM?

Regards - Charles

 

I can not get into anything while it is booting to monitor the ram usage. After it is up, the CPU is running 98% idle.
How do I view and manage startups?

 

Hi Ken,

With msconfig.

Start > run.

Type msconfig > ok

Startup tab and uncheck all the entries.

If you have an always on web connection, pull the plug, and let us know whether you do have an always on connection. The problem may also be a process downloading right at that time.

Regards - Charles

 

Thanks,
I turned off the DSL modem and noted no difference.
I am too chicken to uncheck everything, but I did startup in diagnostic mode. It was much faster, but not as good as normal.
After that test, normal startup was faster, but it has a long way to go.
The hard drive light is on almost continuously during startup.
Everything is still fast and fine once it is running.

 

Hi Ken,

Have you tried safe mode? Tap the F8 key on bootup.

You seem to be saying that even when loading the basic OS/Services, bootup is still not as fast as you're used to? if that's the case, I'd as guess say that one of the device drivers is having a problem loading.

Do you have any peripheral equipment plugged in and on: printer - USB devices, and if so, have you tried turning them off or unplugging them?

Another possisibilty is an iffy HD sector(s), have you run defrag and chkdsk?

Run chkdsk w/o any parameters - just let it report on the status of the HD.

Regards - Charles

 

Thanks,
See below.

 

Hi Ken,

This thread is on the same problem, slow bootup. Advised the user to use the MS BootVS tool. So keeping in mind the admonishment on not using it fix anything - give it a go.

http://www.windowsbbs.com/showthread.php?t=65118

Regards - Charles

 

Thanks,
I downloaded and ran the bootvis once.
At the end I got a encountered a problem and have to close message.
It created a 130MB trace_boot file that I can't open.

 

Hi Ken,

Haven't used BootVS in long time - tommorrow I'll go thru the exercise and see if I can advise you on what the problem may be.

In the meantime, delete that trace file.

Regards - Charles

 

Hi Ken,

Went thru the process.

Under Edit/Save in the dialog box, uncheck everything other than Boot Activity.

That will reduce the size of the trace file and maybe avoid the error. Do you have SATA drives? That may be what the problem is - this is a old program.

It's the program that opens and diplays the trace file, not you. If it doesn't do it, that's it.

Regards - Charles

 

Thanks for all your efforts.
I ran it as directed and the bootvs window came up at the end. It only had a "processing" message displayed.
I waited 5 min for further action and then I shut it off.
It was not responding.

I don't know what the 1 hard drive is.
K

 

The situation has been improving on it's own. Bootup now takes 1.5 minutes, down from 4 min.
The desktop comes up normanally and then the hard drive churns on something for about a minute.

Do you know anything about the windows slow boot up ad at the beginning of this thread?

 

Do you have an AV or Anti-Spyware scanner that scans first thing? Windows Defender does that for example. What are you running in terms of security?

Another possibilty is XP's indexing Service. Test that by shutting off > click on the C drive in My Computer > right click > properties: uncheck Indexing Serivice. If not it, re check it.

When I get more time I'll look at it.

Regards - Charles

 

Running PC-cillin and it has a schedule that doesn't show running at startup.
Tried unchecking Indexing Serivice with no change, so I restored it.
K

 

Hi Ken,

After the bootup and while the HD is "churning ", see if you can get into Task Manager and use Tasklist.exe to post the processes here.

Open a cmd box: start > run > type cmd > ok and type or copy/paste:

tasklist /svc > c:\tasklist.txt

tasklist.exe is only on XP-pro, so if running Home you'll need to download it along with the instuctions from here: http://www.computerhope.com/download/winxp.htm Scroll and a bit - its the 2nd utility. Once downloaded, move tasklist.exe to C:\Windows\System32

A .txt file will be written to the C drive: tasklist.txt which can be opened with Notepad.

Regards - Charles

 

Thanks,
I made a shortcut on the Desktop to tasklist.exe and I can get it to run during churning. As soon as the list comes up, the window disappears before I can read anything. I did a search for tasklist.txt and found nothing.
K

 

Can't run it that way

Have to run it thru a command box and make sure you moved tasklist.exe to the \Windows\System32 folder before you try to run.

Open a cmd box: start > run > type cmd > ok and at the cursor type or copy/paste:

tasklist /svc > c:\tasklist.txt and hit the enter key.

No feedback and the window will disappear quickly.

Don't have to search, tasklist.text will be on the C drive by itself - no folder.

Regards - Charles

 

It is in the system32 folder.
When I try to run it, I get "\tasklist is not recognized as an internal or external command,operable program or batch file ".
I tried again thinking I may have mis-typed and got "The system cannot find the path specified ".
K

 

Hi Ken,

I'm assuming that you're getting this when trying to input

tasklist /svc > c:\tasklist.txt

into the command white on black window.

Copy and paste the command - tricky spacing.

Regards - Charles