Decently Terrible Performance (Help me?)

I'd like to stay away from clean installs(even though I'm sure it'd fix my problem, it isn't what I'd like to do) as much as possible.

Death1223 said:

I'd like to stay away from clean installs(even though I'm sure it'd fix my problem, it isn't what I'd like to do) as much as possible.

True, and understood.

What was being suggested was simply to (a) take a current "system image" backup, so that you can quickly and easily restore it and get back to what you have right now after the "experiment" is complete, and (b) "experiment" with a fresh from-scratch install.

Given that your system has now checked out as "malware-clean", this new "experiment" is to determine if (1) it is all of the software auto-starting at Windows boot time which is responsible for your slow boot times, although you say you've now disabled much of it and you have not seen any boot time improvements... which does seem strange, or (2) it is whatever "unknown detritus" has crept into your working Windows environment during all the hardware upgrades and various software product install/uninstall that I'm sure you've done over time since it was first installed that is responsible for not only slow boot times but the eventual performance degradation of your overall Windows system that eventually forces you to re-boot, or (3) it is something about your hardware that is causing these symptoms.

By "just for grins" doing a from-scratch Windows reinstall with your current machine hardware would let us know how things work without dozens of games and 3rd-party software products installed, and without any "remnants" from drivers for old hardware which has been upgraded/replaced over time. Things would be freshly installed with your existing machine, and all the latest MS-provided Windows Updates.

It would be an interesting experiment, to see if boot times are now normal. And, as you reinstall maybe just a few products or games and begin to use the system, do you still see the "gradual performance degradation and slowdown" you currently see with your current "production" system, or not?

This would be informative. And when it's done, and you've gathered some insight, you can always just restore that "system image" you took and be right back where you are this moment. All you've expended is some time (maybe 1-2 days) doing the experiment which would be quite informative in pointing to what still at the moment is the unknown cause for your system performance issues.

It wasn't being suggested that only a fresh reinstall of Windows is the solution, but rather that a "temporary and experimental" fresh reinstall of Windows might be very informative.

Hmm... I understand why it was suggested. That mostly it would be to rule out hardware issues, but is there any way to do this without having to mess with my current partition and system? Probably not, but I want to check... I really don't want to do that(I also am decently sure it's not a hardware issue and it might even be a driver issue that is causing this.)

You could try a Repair Install.
Here is a tutorial by Brink:
Repair Install

I'll try that and see if it fixes it. Thank you.

I think I might've fixed the long start times...(by updating fully using windows update) now if only I could fix the "Proper boot device" and force Chkdsk during start-up.

Death1223 said:

I think I might've fixed the long start times...(by updating fully using windows update)

Your first mention that you were not up-to-date with Windows update.

Not that missing recent or selected updates would normally affect the performance or behavior of anything, but I think it's generally not even discussed as possibly responsible for system problems (or "slow startup", in your case) because probably everybody who's not automatically applying them overnight will at least always apply Windows Updates when their existence eventually appears in the system tray (assuming you have "notify me" as your option).

Never even thought to ask about this subject.

now if only I could fix the "Proper boot device" and force Chkdsk during start-up.

First mention of these two symptoms as well.

This happens every time you boot? What is your response?

Do you use system optimizers, registry cleaners, etc, ?
I always keep my systems fully updated ...
You could look at this tutorial by gregrocker to see if it will help with "Proper boot device".
Troubleshooting Windows 7 Failure to Boot

1. Boot into BIOS setup by tapping the key given for this on first boot screen, check that Win7 HD is detected and set to boot first (after CD/DVD drive). If not check over all cables and connections, or for a laptop check that it is seated firmly in its bay. If you cannot get the hard drive to show up in BIOS setup, then replace its cable or the drive itself. For a UEFI install to GPT disk the first boot device will be Windows Boot Manager. If possible for repairs unplug all other except the System hard drive.

That's what's most frustrating about all of this. When I try to boot up it's a black screen on all of my monitors until I get to windows login then it shows up on my main monitor. So accessing the bios or anything along those lines is difficult to do. The only way I can start up is if I'm at my computer spamming F8 to get the select boot device then press enter to select the first one, since it's the one I want anyways. Then I sit there for a little bit longer and spam 2 keys to get past the chkdsk... then login. That's how I have to boot up every time.

Death1223 said:

That's what's most frustrating about all of this. When I try to boot up it's a black screen on all of my monitors until I get to windows login then it shows up on my main monitor. So accessing the bios or anything along those lines is difficult to do. The only way I can start up is if I'm at my computer spamming F8 to get the select boot device then press enter to select the first one, since it's the one I want anyways.

Can't you get into the BIOS and disable the "quick boot"? Maybe it's worded differently on your machine, but if you set things for "verbose" instead of "quick" you should see all of the output from the BIOS appear on your screen.

For sure, the boot-sequence in the BIOS should have your bootable hard drive (i.e. the one with the "system reserved" Boot Manager "active" partition on it) immediately following your CD/DVD drive and USB device. This will give you the ability to automatically boot from CD or USB if you insert bootable media, or if not present just to automatically boot from your hard drive. You shouldn't need to get into the BIOS every time you boot just to point to the correct hard drive, which should be automatically selected.

Having the boot hard drive set as #1 drive in hard drive list will generally cause it to also become the first hard drive shown in the boot sequence list, but if it's not correctly placed in the boot sequence list you should correct it. That should permanently eliminate this boot-time inconvenience for you going forward.

Then I sit there for a little bit longer and spam 2 keys to get past the chkdsk... then login. That's how I have to boot up every time.

CHKDSK appears if one of your drives is "dirty", indicating that at some time in the past you just manually re-booted the machine with still outstanding output to the drive scheduled but not completed, which would normally get flushed out when Windows shuts down successfully or restarts successfully.

I would have expected CHKDSK to clear out that "dirty" flag, so that you don't see it again. If you're letting CHKDSK run, I'm surprised it's not turning off the flag. Of course, being in this CHKDSK NEEDED situation at all always frightens me, as I don't know if CHKDSK will actually be able to recover full content and file integrity, or will "orphan" something.

I'm not vouching for this particular article on how to manually clear the "dirty" flag, but the subject is well-discussed on the Interweb.