Slowdown - Help?

[Replikant]

Ever since the power surge, my PC (98SE) has been a bit slow. Is there anything i can do about this? I defragged, which it needed, but didn't seem to make a difference. (Non-technical language answers, please!)

 

[Replikant]

No help?

 

[Meithan]

How many RAM modules do you have? If you have more than one, maybe one got fried with the power surge.

 

[Replikant]

Are RAM modules memory cards? Two were added to whatever the standard # is.

 

[Meithan]

Sorry for not replying sooner. Yes, RAM modules are "memory cards". Here's a picture of the two most common types.

Check inside your case. If you have more than one, then it could be as I suggested, that the surge fried one of the modules. It'd make your computer slower.

 

[Replikant]

Thanks. I believe there are 4 or 5. The slowdown is only slight however so i may live with it for now, as money is tight. I already just spent $65 to find out that to recover from the surge all i needed to do was turn the monitor back on. (I had never used that switch, the monitor switch has always been on.)

 

[Meithan]

Most likely four modules (I've not seen motherboards with 5 memory sockets).

If you wanna know if the RAM is the problem, you have to know how much total memory is installed through the four modules, and compare that number to what Windows is reporting.

Example: if the four RAM modules are 128MB each, then your total memory should be 128MB * 4 = 512MB. Now, if Windows only reports 384MB, then it's probable one of the modules is fried.

 

[Replikant]

Thanks. I went to System Properties but did not see anything about RAM modules or memory...

 

[Replikant]

Any help?

 

[macdawg]

we don't really have any info to help you, such as your specs, whether your ran anti-malware or diagnostic tools like memtest, what programs are running slow, etc.

take a look at www.tweakguides.com for an easy guide to go over your pc.

this could be hardware, software, who knows.