MY Vista OS has slowed down and it takes ages to load a program. I have 4Mb of Ram and only 67% is being used (max) but there must be program running in the background that I can't find. I thought it was a defrag program so I uninstalled it but the problem was not solved. How could I see what programs are loading during boot up. I remember doing it in DOS but can't remember how. Any help would be appreciated.
Type MSCONFIG in the start search bar and hit enter. Go over to the startup tab at the top and it will show you what is loaded at startup. You can also go to the general tab and choose selective startup and uncheck load startup items so it only loads system services and reboot and see if the slow down still continues.
If you haven't already, remember to run a malware protection scan using a product such as Superantispyware. Malware has been know to slow a machine down to a crawl. Also run an antivirus scan just in case.
How do I choose selective startup?
Good call Commodore Pet, Superantispyware found PUP.Whitesmoke and I'm still working on getting rid of it. I run AVG9 Internet Security but it did not pick it up. I don't have a clue how Whitesmoke got loaded on my computer but it's an sob to get rid of. Thanks.
Hi,
AVG won't help with this particular virus. Whitesmoke is suspected of being associated with RootKits - you need to run the TDSS Root Kit remover in the first instance:
How to remove malware belonging to the family Rootkit.Win32.TDSS (aka Tidserv, TDSServ, Alureon)?
Post the results of the run here once it has been completed.
Next, download, install, update and run Malwarebytes. Post the reuslts here too.
Have you downloaded any translation/writing software recently? There are reports that Whitesmoke has been attached to this type of software recently.
Regards,
Golden
Ran the Rootkit file and it only found;
"Suspicious Object"
Locked File
ServiceName: SPTD
Service Type: Kernel Driver (0x1)
Service Start: Boot(0x0)
File: C:\windows\system\drivers\sptd.sys
I have been checking out sptd.sys and it does not seem to be a malware, I think.
I deleted Whitesmoke and ran Malwarebytes in safe mode and it found and cured some malware. The computer still seems a bit slow loading programs. Now that I ran TDSSKiller.exe I am running Malwarebytes again in safe mode. Will let you know results.
Thank you
Malwarebytes did not find any more problems but the computer still takes it's time loading programs. It took about 2 minutes to load PeretoLogic PCHealth, Internet Explorer 9 the same thing it takes ages to load and then it runs fine. The site you gave me to delete SPTD actually installs a version of it, or am I reading it wrong. Let me know.
Thank you.
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