Miranda Posted December 31, 2008 Report Share Posted December 31, 2008 I'm using a 4-year-old Dell running on Windows XP. Lately, it's been slower than sin.I've defragged, cleaned off the C: drive, uninstalled everything I don't use, and run virus and spyware scans. Regardless, it seems to be getting progressively worse. It's not just my internet, either. It takes ages to open My Computer, and I freeze temporarily when I use that drop-down bar.My internet connection started getting fuzzy today, too. It's running so slowly that I can't respond to messages on Facebook. A few of my programs (iTunes) are also malfunctioning. Some module fails and it no longer reads it. I don't know if this is Apple's issue or Windows, but I've uninstalled/reinstalled it to no avail.Am I missing something, or am I in dire need of reformatting my hard-drive? And if it be the latter, how can I go about doing that without losing all my files? I also cannot locate my old start-up disk. (Lost over the years.)Quick help is greatly appreciated. :] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Belatucadrus Posted January 1, 2009 Report Share Posted January 1, 2009 I also cannot locate my old start-up disk.May make things rather academic. Does your Dell have a user manual in PDF Acrobat format on the desktop, if so I'd suggest reading it as Dell have a variety of recovery systems and where to go next may depend entirely on what you've got. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rong Posted January 1, 2009 Report Share Posted January 1, 2009 Try this first http://www.ccleaner.com/download It may help to speed it up a bit, I think most on here use it and it's free. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seshomaru Samma Posted January 1, 2009 Report Share Posted January 1, 2009 The first thing I would do is back up all my important files to an external drive, a USB stick, another computer or burn them to a DVD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ɹəuəllıʍ ʇɐb Posted January 1, 2009 Report Share Posted January 1, 2009 Download, install, and run Startup Inspector. Uncheck anything that you don't need (use the Consult button to get information about startup processes). Don't hesitate to ask here if you are unsure about any of these.Run the Secunia Online Software Inspector to see if you have any outdated or duplicate software, or missing security updates.Run Trendmicro Housecall to see if you have any malware on your system (use the red v6.6 link at the bottom of the page).Let us know how it goes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andsome Posted January 1, 2009 Report Share Posted January 1, 2009 It is of course highly likely that being a Dell, it does not have a full installation disk. :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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