Have you been keeping up with all Microsoft Critical Updates? Same for updates to Office and Real Player? I personally don't use Real Player, it always gave me problems. So I now use Real Alternative and QuickTime Alternative. They allow me to play Real and QuickTime files without the intrusiveness and bugginess of the "brand name" software.
Double check your system for malware. Update your anti-virus and other security software and run full system scans, just to be sure you don't have anything hiding away.
Start Task Manager by right clicking on any tool bar and choosing Task Manager.
Have a look at the "Processes" tab, and look at the "CPU" column - this tells you which application are using which percentage of power.
If if the computer is just sitting waiting, then System Idle should be taking the most percentage of power.
If there is any process which seems to be taking up more than its fair share of power, you may have your culprit and thus you should remove that program (as long as it is not essential for the running of the computer) and then check how the computer behaves with it out of the way.
If it behaves well, you may wish to re-install the program afresh, as sometimes installs simply go wrong, and see what happens then.
Remember though, this only tells you the *percentage of power* being used by the CPU so that if the computer is idling, it is only using, say 1% of its power, System idle will take up 98% but that equals 98% of 1%.
So, with Task Manager open, you need to open Word and look at the figures in Task Manager and repeat this with Real Player.
I would also recommend you download and run "Hijack This" and Ad-Aware (both free). (do a Google search for these programs) and post in the Virus/Spyware forum for someone to check the Hijack log (unless of course you are skilled in interpretation of results yourself.)
A further thought is that the memory might be faulty, there is a program called "Memtest" (also free) that will test the memory - you need a floppy for this, if my own memory serves - but I think you can run it just as well from a USB memory stick.
Message Edited by Delierious on 10-25-2006 04:10 AM
Thanks everybody for replying. My computer is fully updated. I've opened every program on my new computer and checked for updates. My antivirus program, firewall and ad-aware are all up-to-date and have found nothing worth mentioning. The task manager shows nothing worth mentioning either. Two nights ago Word got sluggish again, with only Internet Explorer, Outlook Express and MSN Messenger open (and anti-virus/firewall). I closed Outlook and Messenger and this fixed it! But this is dumb, as I should be able to run about a dozen more programs at the same time without slowing down Word.
Yesterday I chose to "Repair" Word, through the Add/Remove Programs function. I haven't been able to check if this has made a difference. Probably tonight. I'm concerned that the Windows Task Manager wasn't able to "End Task" when Realplayer and Word Dictionary froze. So far, I'm a bit disappointed in this almost-top-of-the-line Dell computer and/or Windows XP, whichever the culprit is.
I'll reply again if I still have this problem or if someone has further suggestions. (I'm not optimistic that repairing Word has fixed the problem).
I only have open several Word documents and Internet Explorer and yet Word was getting sluggish again. I opened the Windows Task Manager, clicked in the Performance tab and watched the CPU usage meter as I typed and copy and pasted text around. It kept spiking up to 50%, which coincided with the sluggishness I have noticed. :smileysurprised: I just copy-pasted text into this message window to see what it showed, but it only went up to about 8%. Now, I don't know anything about this "CPU Usage" function of the Windows Task Manager, but it seems to be relevant to my problem. Any comments?
As far as Word causing 50% CPU figures, I have 8 major programs open including Word IE and Excel and the maximum spike was 7%, as I typed in Word. This is on an AMD 2.4Ghz + 756Mb RAM
Go to Explorer and find your Temp folder (I have several and only one ever gets anything thrown into it, so look for them all)
Order the files by date and delete anything over 2 days old. This applies just to the files in Temp, not in subdirectories. I am told that you can delete them too but I have always been too cautious.
Empty the recycle bin.
Now do a search for *.log, delete all but the 2 latest ones in each folder. I know Zone Alarm for example keeps more logs than you can wave a stick at, and you only need the last 2 at the most.
Now do a search on all drives for
*.tmp; *.gid; ~*.*; *.bak; *.old (cut and paste this into the search box)
In the search results, order the files by date and delete anything over 2 days old
Now go to IE and delete all cookies and off-line files
It is not a case of unloading unneeded files, although you might see why that is a desireable thing; it is a case of a known problem with XP that does not rid itself of *.tmp and other unwanted files and these file cause trouble when Windows and other programs start to load.
Although it appears on the face of it that Real Player is the problem, and Dell have been more than generous, failing to clear out the files mentioned is certainly a cause of slow running and erratic behaviour.
More to the point, it doesn't take long and it costs nothing to do.
Since I was having problems with MS Word being sluggish, Realplayer crashing and Dell PC Restore non-functional, Dell decided to exchange my system for a new one. Before adding/subtracting/altering very much on the new system, I decided to transfer a few Word documents to the desktop and work with them, to see how it responded.
MS Word again gets slow :smileymad:, and the CPU usage rises to 50% at these moments of sluggishness. Not constantly - only what seems to be randomly. A software developer friend of mine suggests that it must be some configuration parameter in Windows on new Dell computers. I am waiting for a Dell technician to reply to my email, but does anyone here have any more thoughts to share?
~ Bao Pu
ps: I have been trying out Realplayer on this new system and so far it works perfectly.
ps2: I have had several blue screen episodes so far, but these seem to be due to a corrupted Kingston Flash Drive (Dell technician). None since I stoped trying to use it.
Not really, This computer has never had a printer hooked up (yet).
I have installed new fonts (some special Chinese ones), but they display normally. I don't know enough about Word and fonts to know what problems can occur.
1. Did you delete all temporary files as I mentioned earlier? You must do. These do cause a real problem and it has nothing to do with space on the hard disk.
2. Do a search for the file, normal.dot
2a. delete all instances of it.
3. re-boot, and Word will create a new clean normal.dot
User97502
138 Posts
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October 24th, 2006 00:00
fudgieguys
1.3K Posts
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October 24th, 2006 22:00
Delierious
414 Posts
0
October 25th, 2006 08:00
Have a look at the "Processes" tab, and look at the "CPU" column - this tells you which application are using which percentage of power.
If if the computer is just sitting waiting, then System Idle should be taking the most percentage of power.
If there is any process which seems to be taking up more than its fair share of power, you may have your culprit and thus you should remove that program (as long as it is not essential for the running of the computer) and then check how the computer behaves with it out of the way.
If it behaves well, you may wish to re-install the program afresh, as sometimes installs simply go wrong, and see what happens then.
Remember though, this only tells you the *percentage of power* being used by the CPU so that if the computer is idling, it is only using, say 1% of its power, System idle will take up 98% but that equals 98% of 1%.
So, with Task Manager open, you need to open Word and look at the figures in Task Manager and repeat this with Real Player.
I would also recommend you download and run "Hijack This" and Ad-Aware (both free). (do a Google search for these programs) and post in the Virus/Spyware forum for someone to check the Hijack log (unless of course you are skilled in interpretation of results yourself.)
A further thought is that the memory might be faulty, there is a program called "Memtest" (also free) that will test the memory - you need a floppy for this, if my own memory serves - but I think you can run it just as well from a USB memory stick.
Message Edited by Delierious on 10-25-2006 04:10 AM
Bao Pu
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42 Posts
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October 25th, 2006 10:00
Bao Pu
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42 Posts
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October 25th, 2006 17:00
Delierious
414 Posts
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October 25th, 2006 18:00
As far as Word causing 50% CPU figures, I have 8 major programs open including Word IE and Excel and the maximum spike was 7%, as I typed in Word. This is on an AMD 2.4Ghz + 756Mb RAM
Go to Explorer and find your Temp folder (I have several and only one ever gets anything thrown into it, so look for them all)
Order the files by date and delete anything over 2 days old. This applies just to the files in Temp, not in subdirectories. I am told that you can delete them too but I have always been too cautious.
Empty the recycle bin.
Now do a search for *.log, delete all but the 2 latest ones in each folder. I know Zone Alarm for example keeps more logs than you can wave a stick at, and you only need the last 2 at the most.
Now do a search on all drives for
*.tmp; *.gid; ~*.*; *.bak; *.old (cut and paste this into the search box)
In the search results, order the files by date and delete anything over 2 days old
Now go to IE and delete all cookies and off-line files
Now re-empty the recycle bin.
Re-boot.
Any improvement?
Delierious
414 Posts
0
October 25th, 2006 20:00
Although it appears on the face of it that Real Player is the problem, and Dell have been more than generous, failing to clear out the files mentioned is certainly a cause of slow running and erratic behaviour.
More to the point, it doesn't take long and it costs nothing to do.
Bao Pu
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42 Posts
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November 12th, 2006 19:00
Delierious
414 Posts
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November 12th, 2006 22:00
Does this solve anything?
Bao Pu
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42 Posts
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November 13th, 2006 01:00
Delierious
414 Posts
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November 13th, 2006 06:00
1. Did you delete all temporary files as I mentioned earlier? You must do. These do cause a real problem and it has nothing to do with space on the hard disk.
2. Do a search for the file, normal.dot
2a. delete all instances of it.
3. re-boot, and Word will create a new clean normal.dot