How to reduce HDD access when the computer is idle?

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Guest

Hi

I mean these short, single HDD accesses which are done every few seconds
even when nothing is done with the computer. Is it possible to get rid of
them? Till now I've stopped the indexing service, the task scheduler service,
I even tried to remove the swap file (untill it stopped a game to warn me
that with 1GB of RAM I'm running out of virtual memory (like I need it...) )
but the accesses continue.
And as much as I can remember, I think I've used computers in the past which
do not access the HDD on idle every 3-5 seconds.
Any ideas are welcome.

The configuration is:Asus A6 laptop: Centrino 1733 Mhz/2 Mb cache; 1 GB RAM;
80 GB/4200 rpm Windows XP Pro
 
do an internet search for windows registry tips and tweeks, there is a file
date stamp that accesses the drive all the time and a few other things, also
try moving your page file to 4096 mb, and if poss put it on a secondary
drive, also what is running down in the system tray?
 
Your on the right track, items like that help but it is a registry tweak
this is the site that i like the best (been looking for it for awhile, glad
ya made me look more)
http://www.pctools.com/guides/registry/ "this is the site"
this is what i was thinking about in particular
"this is the main page of what i am talking about
http://www.pctools.com/guides/registry/id/55/
and here are 2 in particular
http://www.pctools.com/guides/registry/detail/1015/
http://www.pctools.com/guides/registry/detail/987/

i can help you with this, i dont know how advanced a user you are, but you
need to first start off with a backup of the registry and harddrive before
you ever do anything to the registry, you could kill the instalation, there
is also a program you can dload from the site that has a trial period then
you buy it that can do the changes for you, but these are the types of things
i would look at, also

1)have you installed any new hard/software that may have caused this?
2)new drivers?
3)spoken to tech support of the maker of your laptop first?
please, please consider all of this and do your homework!!!!!
the registry is very very important, understand?
 
Thank you ric926, you helped me a lot. I did what I could, I removed the auto
optimal layout service for the HDD, put the OS core and drivers to stay in
memory all the time instead of paging them but touching the settings for the
CPU seems too risky for me + the laptop has its own program to tweak the CPU
(the Battery Life) and I already got some errors on shutdown due to changing
the registry which I fixed quite hard. I also changed some services to manual
like the ones described here:http://www.freepctech.com/pc/xp/xp00008.shtml
All this is not really a "problem" it's more that I just want to reduce the
HDD operation to minimum so that it stays quiet and warms less. I guess theat
the antivirus program (NOD32) might be also responsible, am I right? And yes
I'll speak to Asus for tips as well
 
yes it could be anything running in the backround (system tray) although
there is not always an icon, meaning yes it could be your antiV, if your
behind a firewall you may only want to scan when you boot or run it when your
online, i send all my dloads to a single dir and scan before i open anything.
i should have told you to only make 1 registry change at a time, then reboot
(cuts down on startup err) also you can always use the "last known good
config" from the f8 boot menu, sounds like your on your way. if you have more
questions let me know by posting a reply and i will get an email , otherwise
good luck. ps pick up a book on the windows registry (one of those registry
for dummies kinda things), its the heart and soul of your computer
r
 
Also, with Tune Up Utilities I found options for scanning the network for
shares and to save the last file access date and ticked them off and now the
disk activity is really less
 
great, there is also a tweak to put windows in mem so it does not page the
disk all the time and also you can adjust the disk i/o paging and if you want
i can send you a link other than that are you squared away?
 
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