Ianharrogate Posted October 16, 2011 Report Share Posted October 16, 2011 Shortly after I start using the PC the disk seems to be driven 100% and the screen and mouse become very slow. Someimes this is obviously caused by downloading updates but usually not. This state can last for 15 or 20 minutes and happens after hibernating and after a fresh start. Subsequently, performance is fine. The only programs I believe to be running are Firefox and Outlook. Taskmanager shows the cpu is idle typically 95%. I have tried archiving emails and removing a large folder of music, putting it into another user's account. I have also defragged the disk which is 75% empty. Is there anyway I can find out what is going on and stop it? Any help would be very gratefully received. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-pops- Posted October 16, 2011 Report Share Posted October 16, 2011 This could be an indexing service - Windows or some other program trying to be helpful and organizing your hard drive for you. I find these helpers more of a nuisance than they're worth unless you have a business machine with loads and loads of small files. Have a look around for Indexing Service and turn them off. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianharrogate Posted October 16, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2011 Thank you for that. The suggestion seems highly plausible, though i don't understand why any decent indexing would appear to start from scratch each time. I have found:computer management/services and applications/services/Indexing Service but it has a start up type "manual" so I assume that is not the guilty party.alsocomputer management/services and applications/services/Indexing Service and below this both "System" and "Visio". It isn't obvious what these are or if they are active. I don't use Visio, though I may have tried it once in the past, and I don't use Microsoft Index as far as I know. Can I safely turn these all off and if so how? I do use google desktop search. Might it be the problem? I have not knowingly provoked it by re-indexing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianharrogate Posted October 16, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2011 Ah, searching further I see that my files - not disk - appear to have been marked for indexing. I have disabled this so let me see if this does it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianharrogate Posted October 17, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 17, 2011 I was very optimistic when I carried out limited trials yesterday but this morning the procedure has started again. The system is effectively dead to the console for about 15 minutes. As far as I can see I have turned off indexing everywhere except google. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-pops- Posted October 17, 2011 Report Share Posted October 17, 2011 Have you carried out a malware scan? Have a go with http://housecall.trendmicro.com/ - it's quite safe and free and it doesn't download on to your machine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianharrogate Posted October 17, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 17, 2011 That ran without finding anything. I wonder if it scanned the complete system or only my own files. I do have the system set up for two other users, so there are other files, but this is no particular reason to be concerned, one is used by me when I work on a large collection of music and the other (seldom) by my daughter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bludgard Posted October 17, 2011 Report Share Posted October 17, 2011 I have had this type of behavior (major indexing) with removable media that is on its last leg (failing).How old is the HDD? Have you checked integrity of the disk lately? How to perform disk error checking in Windows XP. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianharrogate Posted October 18, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 18, 2011 I have now run a full scan with Trend software. This took several hours and found no threats. I shall now check the disk. Thank you for the suggestion. It, like the computer, is about 5 years old. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianharrogate Posted October 18, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 18, 2011 I have run chkdsk in read only mode with the following report (retyped by me so I hope without introducing errors other than the caps). The type of the file system is NTFS.WARNING! F parameter not specified.Running CHKDSK in read-only mode. CHKDSK is verifying files (stage 1 of 3)…File verification completed.CHKDSK is verifying indexes (stage 2 of 3)…Index verification completed.CHKDSK is recovering lost files.CHKDSK is verifying security descriptors (stage 3 of 3)…security descriptor verification completed.CHKDSK is verifying Usn journal…Usn journal verification completedCHKDSK discovered free space marked as allocated in the master file table (MFT) bitmap.Correcting errors in the Volume Bitmap.Windows found problems with the file system.Run CHKDSK with the /F (fix) OPTION TO CORRECT THESE. 153059287 kb TOTAL DISK SPACE. 35956216 KB in 131011 files.49824 KB in 17440 indexes.0 KB in bad sectors. Although it said it was correcting errors in the bitmap I wonder if it was doing so since it was running read only. Also, i wonder quite what problems windows found with the file system - more than the bitmap or not? I shall run with the fix parameter as soon as I have completed a backup which is underway now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-pops- Posted October 18, 2011 Report Share Posted October 18, 2011 I didn't realise the drive was so old. I think a new one would be a good idea. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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