Can't defrag C: drive and sound all broken....

  • Thread starter Thread starter geronimo
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geronimo

My main PC is Athlon XP 3000 with 1 gig ram, WD120 HDD for C: (plus
four other HDD), and an Audigy USB sound card. Running XP Pro SP2. Has
always been fast, and with great audio. Lately the PC has been very
sluggish, and when any music is played, it is all distorted/broken up.
Trying to play a video is impossible, it is so broken up with pauses.
We have scanned for spyware with Ewido, and checked for viruses with
AVG, and also have had the on-line (Trend Micro?) AV website scan the
whole PC....four high-risk spywares were deleted by Ewido, but no
virus has been found. No help. I think it may be that the C: drive is
too fragmented. There is 23% file fragmentation, I think 11%
overall/total. I have done a defrag three times, but the fragmentation
does not decrease. Why can't we get it defragged? It is not telling us
that there are errors on the drive that have to be corrected.
There is about 20 % free space available. Problem is why would this
severely break up the sound, as 1Gig RAM should handle the auido data
shouldn't it ,without having to use virtual memory?

When I check the performance utility in task manager, this is what it
shows:
CPU usage 90-100%, mostly 100% when PC is just idling
PF usage: 320 mb steady. SOmetimes will go down to
lower levels for a few minutes before maxing out again.
physical memory: abt. 60% available

And even when the PC is sitting idle, not doing ANYTHING, just running
Windows, the HDD activity light is on just about constantly.

Even when I shut down every process except for Media player and
Explorer, you still have the same chopped-up audio. It sure seems
like some TSR is running! Ideas how to track down what is running
constantly and tieing up all the resources?
 
geronimo said:
My main PC is Athlon XP 3000 with 1 gig ram, WD120 HDD for C: (plus
four other HDD), and an Audigy USB sound card. Running XP Pro SP2. Has
always been fast, and with great audio. Lately the PC has been very
sluggish, and when any music is played, it is all distorted/broken up.
Trying to play a video is impossible, it is so broken up with pauses.
We have scanned for spyware with Ewido, and checked for viruses with
AVG, and also have had the on-line (Trend Micro?) AV website scan the
whole PC....four high-risk spywares were deleted by Ewido, but no
virus has been found. No help. I think it may be that the C: drive is
too fragmented. There is 23% file fragmentation, I think 11%
overall/total. I have done a defrag three times, but the fragmentation
does not decrease. Why can't we get it defragged? It is not telling us
that there are errors on the drive that have to be corrected.
There is about 20 % free space available. Problem is why would this
severely break up the sound, as 1Gig RAM should handle the auido data
shouldn't it ,without having to use virtual memory?

When I check the performance utility in task manager, this is what it
shows:
CPU usage 90-100%, mostly 100% when PC is just idling
PF usage: 320 mb steady. SOmetimes will go down to
lower levels for a few minutes before maxing out again.
physical memory: abt. 60% available
Click to expand...


theres the problem...something is running in the background and using CPU
time, kill all things in the background until the CPU usage drops to 5% or
so at idle.
 
I got a prog called Process Explorer and it showed that AVGW.exe (my
AVG antivirus) was using up a lot of resources. SO I hit the kill
button for this, and the problem was gone, everything normal! But I
have been using AVG for a year or so, and this process usually runs in
the background (checking email and all downloads) all the time...never
was aprroblem until now! Thanks Geronimo
 
geronimo stunned us with this revelation on 10/26/2006 :

My main PC is Athlon XP 3000 with 1 gig ram, WD120 HDD for C: (plus
four other HDD), and an Audigy USB sound card. Running XP Pro SP2. Has
always been fast, and with great audio. Lately the PC has been very
sluggish, and when any music is played, it is all distorted/broken up.
Trying to play a video is impossible, it is so broken up with pauses.
We have scanned for spyware with Ewido, and checked for viruses with
AVG, and also have had the on-line (Trend Micro?) AV website scan the
whole PC....four high-risk spywares were deleted by Ewido, but no
virus has been found. No help. I think it may be that the C: drive is
too fragmented. There is 23% file fragmentation, I think 11%
overall/total. I have done a defrag three times, but the fragmentation
does not decrease. Why can't we get it defragged? It is not telling us
that there are errors on the drive that have to be corrected.
There is about 20 % free space available. Problem is why would this
severely break up the sound, as 1Gig RAM should handle the auido data
shouldn't it ,without having to use virtual memory?

When I check the performance utility in task manager, this is what it
shows:
CPU usage 90-100%, mostly 100% when PC is just idling
PF usage: 320 mb steady. SOmetimes will go down to
lower levels for a few minutes before maxing out again.
physical memory: abt. 60% available

And even when the PC is sitting idle, not doing ANYTHING, just running
Windows, the HDD activity light is on just about constantly.

Even when I shut down every process except for Media player and
Explorer, you still have the same chopped-up audio. It sure seems
like some TSR is running! Ideas how to track down what is running
constantly and tieing up all the resources?
Click to expand...


When you're performing a defrag, make sure that all applications and
unnecessary operations are suspended. Otherwise, you may run into some
very serious problems during the defrag process.
 
geronimo said:
I got a prog called Process Explorer and it showed that AVGW.exe (my
AVG antivirus) was using up a lot of resources. SO I hit the kill
button for this, and the problem was gone, everything normal! But I
have been using AVG for a year or so, and this process usually runs in
the background (checking email and all downloads) all the time...never
was aprroblem until now! Thanks Geronimo
Click to expand...



I use AVG primarily on many machines, never had this kind of problem. I
suggest uninstalling and reinstall AVG.
 
I read a review of Ewido recently that said the software does a very bad
job of removing the problem it finds. You may want to get SpyBot and/or
Ad Aware (I use both, myself) and rescan.


R.
 
geronimo said:
I got a prog called Process Explorer and it showed that AVGW.exe (my
AVG antivirus) was using up a lot of resources. SO I hit the kill
button for this, and the problem was gone, everything normal! But I
have been using AVG for a year or so, and this process usually runs in
the background (checking email and all downloads) all the time...never
was aprroblem until now! Thanks Geronimo
Click to expand...
<<snip>>

What if AVGW.exe was actually a virus, and not AVG ? It could be
just using the AVG name, as a disguise.

Paul
 
|
|
| geronimo wrote:
| >
| > I got a prog called Process Explorer and it showed that AVGW.exe (my
| > AVG antivirus) was using up a lot of resources. SO I hit the kill
| > button for this, and the problem was gone, everything normal! But I
| > have been using AVG for a year or so, and this process usually runs in
| > the background (checking email and all downloads) all the time...never
| > was aprroblem until now! Thanks Geronimo
| >
| <<snip>>
|
| What if AVGW.exe was actually a virus, and not AVG ? It could be
| just using the AVG name, as a disguise.

A similar thought crossed my mind as well. I'm running AVG, but the two files
showing under Processes in Task Manager are avgupsvc.exe and avgamsvr.exe. No
avgw.exe is running.

Larc



§§§ - Change planet to earth to reply by email - §§§
 
Larc said:
|
|
| geronimo wrote:
| >
| > I got a prog called Process Explorer and it showed that AVGW.exe (my
| > AVG antivirus) was using up a lot of resources. SO I hit the kill
| > button for this, and the problem was gone, everything normal! But I
| > have been using AVG for a year or so, and this process usually runs in
| > the background (checking email and all downloads) all the time...never
| > was aprroblem until now! Thanks Geronimo
| >
| <<snip>>
|
| What if AVGW.exe was actually a virus, and not AVG ? It could be
| just using the AVG name, as a disguise.

A similar thought crossed my mind as well. I'm running AVG, but the two files
showing under Processes in Task Manager are avgupsvc.exe and avgamsvr.exe. No
avgw.exe is running.

Larc
Click to expand...

avgw.exe = program exectable
avgupsvc.exe = avg update service

avgcc.exe
avgamsvr.exe = control panel (depending on windows version)

avgemc.exe = email checker

all or one of the above can be running, . Doesn't mean its not an infected
file,,,thus the suggestion to reinstall.
 
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