Windows XP SLOW / HDD / BSODS

[martianX10]

Alright, I would REALLY appreciate some help on this:

Let's start from the beginning. About a week ago my friend started complaining that he couldn't get into some games. It started out with just 1, Half-Life 2 Deathmatch, and then spread to include EVERY game on his system. He said when you opened it, within 6 seconds it would just lock up and freeze. So, he brought it over to my house and we took a look.

When he tried to open games now, not only did it freeze, but we got nice 'MACHINE_CHECK_EXCEPTION' bsods. There was also an equally nice 'KERNEL_PAGE_ERROR' or (something to that effect). After much difficulty, tweaking, and frusteration, it just seemed to keep getting worse.

Now Windows wouldn't even boot. It would just go to the blue thingy and then restart, repeat. So we reinstalled windows. Now we could access the OS, and all the files, but not before a 10-20 minute boot time, and EXTREMELY slow computer performance.

SO, we just decided to transplant his HDD into my computer, back up the files, and reformat. Little did we know that 'Documents and Settings' folder locks itself. Anyway we finally got the files on my computer (after much turmoil) and reformatted the entire harddrive (his that is).

Formatted, Reinstalled Windows, normal boot time it seemed. Pretty nice performance. Everything was going great. Install his mobo drivers (Nvidia Nforce3 LanParty) and his Video drivers. Restart it, only to be followed by a 10 minute boot, and SUPER slow performance.

AND, to top things off, after we took his HDD out of my computer, now MINE is booting super slow (I used to get about 30 second XP boot time now its around 3 mins, WtF?!).
If ANYONE has ANY ideas on what could POSSIBLY be wrong or has ANY suggestions at all, PLEASE help. Sorry for the long read but if you are still with me now, thanks, again, it MUCH MUCH appreciated.

His system -
AMD Athlon 3200+
Seagate Barracuda 120gb HDD
512 / 1024 mb RAM
Lanparty Nvidia Nforce3
Radeon 9800 Pro

My System -
AMD Athlon 2600+
Western Digital 'Caviar' 120gb HDD
512MB Ram
Nvidia Nforce 2
Radeon 9600 Pro

-Thanks!

 

[Osiris]

First thing is first with his computer. Rebuild it, take everything out, clean it, etc. Then run on the absolute minimum hardware, like if you have 2 sticks of ram, use one, you have a video card and on board video, use one or the other. Now boot up and see what happens. When you instal XP, use sp1 first. I have heard there are issues with sp2 on some AMD. The only way to find out, is to do it. On your system, see what you have running in msconfig, if you have a lot, disable it all except your AV.

 

[KSoD]

Run spyware and virus scans to start. One of the files is bound to be corrupt.

 

[PhillipBelcher]

Run spyware and virus scans to start. One of the files is bound to be corrupt.

I don't think this would help, he just re-installed Windows.

 

[martianX10]

Alright, we are running with 1 stick of ram already, for that same reason. And, since we formatted, we haven't even been able to connect to the internet, for the reason that the network adapter doesnt seem to want to install. Great.

We can try running with no video card, but other than that, theres nothing much left to strip down.

The windows installation he has is Windows XP Home Edition, SP2, so is there any way to downgrade? Or should we find someone with a SP1 disc?
Also, I see no reason to Spyware and Virus scan on a computer which has JUST been COMPLETELY reformatted, and hasn't been able to get on the internet yet.

So thanks so far, but anything else to add to that, and what about my awesome slow boot?

 

[KSoD]

I meant for his system. Sorry. Just woke up kinda dizzy. On his system to find out why it slowed down he should do this that way he can find out what it was of his friends that transfered on to his system that slowed it down. Going from 30 sec boot to 3 min on his system after his friends files were transfered tells me that there is something wrong with one or more files that were transfered to his system.

 

[martianX10]

Ohhhhh sorry lol no sleep

I got it, I guess I was too hasty to jump to conclusions. Yes I was gonna do that and Defrag, but I thought there may have been some surefire explanation that had to do with Slow boot + HDD swap .

Can-Do though.

 

[Osiris]

Bootsector virus is possible but I doubt that

Try the SP1 if you can get it.

Dont bother trying to remove SP2, your asking for trouble, I dont even think you can do it if its built in already.

Did you try to install the network card throught device manager? Did you try uninstalling it?

 

[KSoD]

Well if nothing on your system has changed then the only thing would be the files transfered. As for you buddy's system you could try without the Video card but i dont think that will do anything different. Have you installed the network drivers or is it that Windows doesnt have them? What i mean is after you installed Windows you didnt have a Network card right? Now were you able to get it to work after installing the drivers yourself or no? Just one question how old is the HDD and the system of your buddies? It might just be the HDD is dying. But that all depends on how old it is.
Back to your system. Now you removed the drive and the only change is the files. I know i said this above but bare with me. Have you tried to back them up to a CD/DVD and see if that will help your system speed up? If that is not possible what about a External HDD.

 

[PhillipBelcher]

hm.....
Try to reset the bios back to defualt. If that still dont work then maybe see if there is a bios update. Also as a last resort try another hard-drive. This one might be on its way out.