Decently Terrible Performance (Help me?)

[Death1223]

I installed Windows 7 onto this computer years back, and have been using it every single day since then. It's had it's problems. Mostly with driver problems. I've hesitated reinstalling Windows 7 because I have 3tb of information on all of my hard drives/solid state drives. I would rather not reinstall all of my games as well.

Let's get down to business.
My computer takes a long time to start up, and it has extended with time. Now it takes like 5-10 minutes after actually logging in and reaching the desktop for anything to become responsive. I can try opening things but firefox won't open, I usually just go to the Network center for no reason, but it slowly works. After that it is just like usual, but of course it isn't at 100% performance... sometimes everything will slowly lock up and become unresponsive and all windows that I had open will be frozen until I restart my computer.

How exactly do I get this fixed? I want to go through and fix it without doing a fresh-installation of Windows 7.

 

[voide]

I installed Windows 7 onto this computer years back, and have been using it every single day since then. It's had it's problems. Mostly with driver problems. I've hesitated reinstalling Windows 7 because I have 3tb of information on all of my hard drives/solid state drives. I would rather not reinstall all of my games as well.

Let's get down to business.
My computer takes a long time to start up, and it has extended with time. Now it takes like 5-10 minutes after actually logging in and reaching the desktop for anything to become responsive. I can try opening things but firefox won't open, I usually just go to the Network center for no reason, but it slowly works. After that it is just like usual, but of course it isn't at 100% performance... sometimes everything will slowly lock up and become unresponsive and all windows that I had open will be frozen until I restart my computer.

How exactly do I get this fixed? I want to go through and fix it without doing a fresh-installation of Windows 7.

Might help to provide some of your system specs....a model number if store bought or a breakdown of CPU, RAM, etc. because it sounds like it could be a hardware issue depending on the age of the computer.

 

[Death1223]

Alright, here's my DxDiag

 

[Layback Bear]

It would be helpful if you used these tutorials to display you system in My System Spec in the lower left corner of your every post. Look in the lower left of this post and you will see My System Specs. Just tick on it and you will understand.

Make sure you list your power supply and Security program.

By Brink:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/180324-system-info-see-your-system-specs.html

BY Kari:
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/311593-speccy-publish-snapshot-your-system-specs.html

 

[Death1223]

It would be helpful if you used these tutorials to display you system in My System Spec in the lower left corner of your every post. Look in the lower left of this post and you will see My System Specs. Just tick on it and you will understand.

Make sure you list your power supply and Security program.

By Brink:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/180324-system-info-see-your-system-specs.html

BY Kari:
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/311593-speccy-publish-snapshot-your-system-specs.html

It's basically literally everything that's in my DxDiag, right? I'd have to go through and write everything down from the DxDiag anyways...

 

[Layback Bear]

Members don't want to look through threads looking for system specs. That is the reason for the tutorial. So a members specs are always in one place.

Just follow this tutorial and be done with it until you change your system.
Don't argue about it. Just do it as requested so we can get with helping you with your problem.

Of course you don't have to do anything requested by members but you are the one asking for help.



System Info - See Your System Specs

 

[Death1223]

Nevermind then, thanks for the help.

 

[dsperber]

How exactly do I get this fixed? I want to go through and fix it without doing a fresh-installation of Windows 7.

As was previously requested, we know ZERO about your machine other than that you're apparently running Win7 and have been for a number of years. And apparently you have never reinstalled Windows from scratch and have lots of data, programs, games, etc., installed, so you really don't want to be forced into a Win7 reinstall if it's not necessary.

And it likely is not necessary. But it still would be extremely helpful is we knew the details of your hardware... motherboard vendor, CPU, graphics, memory size, hard drive(s) and/or SSD, etc. This is what normally goes in your SevenForums "specs" in your user profile, which expands for us when we click on the "My system Specs" in the lower-left corner of your post. It's helpful for us to know what your hardware setup is, and this is where you store that information for us to then see.

Please give us the details about your hardware setup, so that we can better help you.


Anyway, your "system performance slowdown" can be coming from lots of different possible causes. For one, your system startup delay could be caused by many many programs/tasks that auto-start with Windows. Over the years as you install more and more software, there may be a piece of those products that kicks off at boot time, and it's just gotten to be a very substantial list. Looking at MSCONFIG -> Startup tab would tell us what's happening at your boot.

Or, maybe you need a less intrusive anti-virus/anti-malware set of protection products. Some of these are notoriously intrusive and have a noticeable negative impact on overall system responsiveness, and others are quite "thin and lean and mean", and you truly don't even notice they're around.

Or, you may be outgrowing your years-old existing hardware. Your providing specifics about your hardware will help us decide what to suggest you do to evaluate this. Maybe your hard drives are old, slow, and IDE or SATA-II. Perhaps you need a hard drive upgrade, maybe to SATA-III if your motherboard supports it, or SSD (although it would be optimal if that could also be at SATA-III which might be impossible with your motherboard). Maybe you just need more memory, which depends on your motherboard and whether you're running 32-bit or 64-bit Win7.

Or, you may have picked up malware/viruses, browser hijackers, etc., in any number of ways. There are "recipes" for "disinfection" from this type of crap which are truly remarkable in what they can do to bring back a system from almost being non-functional to once again performing as it used to.

Or, who knows what. Everybody complains over time about their system "slowing down" or being "unresponsive". You've asked for help and suggestions, and we can provide brainstorming which likely will be very productive.

But we need some details about your setup.

NOTE: your DXDIAG.TXT file does provide some information:

Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU X 990 @ 3.47GHz (12 CPUs), ~3.5GHz
24GB RAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 graphics, 4GB, Driver Version: 9.18.13.4725, 1/20/2015
1920x1080 resolution, font size 100% (96dpi)
Monitor Name: SyncMaster S27A350H (Digital)
looks like 3 hard drives

 

[DavidE]

It's basically literally everything that's in my DxDiag, right? I'd have to go through and write everything down from the DxDiag anyways...

Did you look at the tutorials that Layback Bear gave you ?



Source: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/180324-system-info-see-your-system-specs.html

 

[Death1223]

It's basically literally everything that's in my DxDiag, right? I'd have to go through and write everything down from the DxDiag anyways...

Did you look at the tutorials that Layback Bear gave you ?

View attachment 347423

Source: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/180324-system-info-see-your-system-specs.html

No, I did not.

Sorry all above that had replied. I wasn't feeling very well yesterday and lacked any form of motivation. I am deeply sorry that in the first sign of manual labor I looked away. I will not do so in the future. Again, I'm sorry and thank you for your time!

I updated my specs(manually and automatically)

 

[Layback Bear]

Thank you for filling in your System Specs. Nice system.

There are many things that can cause this problem and most likely more than one thing.

Here is a tutorial that gives a list of things that could help.
You probably don't need to do many of them but it's worth reading.

By Brink:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/11728-optimize-windows-7-a.html

The next thing I noticed is you have Malwarebytes. That is good.
You also need a anti virus program. So I would recommend using MSE.
MSE and Malwarebytes Premium or free work well together. Infections and PUP's could be causing part of your problems.

Microsoft Security Essentials - Microsoft Windows

Eset free online Scan is a great scan and I would start with it. We need to know your system is clean.

ESET Free Online Scanner :: Complete Malware Detection :: ESET

Once Malwarebytes, MSE and Eset says your system is clean we can continue. It will take a little while to do these scans. Let us know what is found.

If you will work with us we will do this in step at a time and you will get fixed or know why.

Remember you are are eyes and ears. We need your input so we can give proper guidance.

Just notes:
1. Your cpu has 6 cores and 12 threads. Very nice cpu but they do run a litte warm.

2. You are running Marvell Raid. I know very little about raid.
Most home users really don't need such a thing. Marvell leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Enterprise systems use it because they need Raid.

 

[Death1223]

Personally I don't like an active Anti-Virus because it always seems to get in my way for most of the things I do. I can do a complete scan with say... RogueKiller, MalwareBytes etc. but I don't want active protection.

Thanks

Also Okay. I was under the impression it has 12 CPUs since it says right here that it does:

but honestly I'll admit I don't know much when it comes to hardware. I'm more of a software guy.


Update:
I finished scanning using Malwarebytes and no signs of any viruses.

 

[dsperber]

Update:
I finished scanning using Malwarebytes and no signs of any viruses.

Assorted anti-virus and malware-related software products seem to look for an assorted variety of clues and problems. As I had alluded to earlier, MSE and Malwarebytes are probably the two least intrusive such always-running always-protecting you products out there, at least as compared to more commercial big-name (but terribly intrusive) alternatives.

Anyway, a one-time scan with Malwarebytes is step #3 of this particular 7-step recipe for examining and cleaning out all types of infestation. Seven different software products are used, and although the previously mentioned ESET used to be part of this recipe (as an eighth step) it no longer is mentioned but shouldn't hurt anything to also run it. I'm suggesting you spend the one-time energy running these scan/clean products, just to gain the benefit of all of their different search targets, perspectives and opinions that they each have.

The goal here is really to get an initial "clean bill of health" malware-wise for your BEAST of a system before seeking out other possible causes for your gradual slowdown symptom, since malware infections are very often directly responsible for such issues, and effective removal of same is unbelievably successful in rejuvenating a system. The fact that you aren't running active anti-virus and anti-malware protections is actually a bit concerning, and possibly quite relevant.

So, starting with a freshly taken "system image" backup just in case something unexpected occurs during the scan/clean sequence, I'd recommend running more than just Malwarebytes scan. I'd recommend following all the steps in that "guide to easily cleaning infections" (and adding ESET), which has been very successful in my own experience when asked by friends to explain why their own systems have slowed to a crawl.

Even if this one-time full scan sequence finds nothing, at least you now have certified proof that whatever your issues eventually turn out to be, they're not caused by malware infections.

 

[Layback Bear]

Could you explain what you do on your computer that a anti virus gets in the way. Just curious.

ARK | Intel® Coreâ

# of Cores 6
# of Threads 12
Processor Base Frequency 3.46 GHz
Max Turbo Frequency 3.73 GHz
TDP 130 W

 

[Death1223]

I've actually tried MSE before, and the active protection got in the way 2 times before I disabled it. It gave false-positives for certain game files I was playing (might I add they were official and nothing illegal. Both were free online MMORPGs), and I kept getting corruption errors while patching until I disabled active protection. I'll go through those seven steps right now and update this post with the results though.

Also thanks for the information, Layback Bear, good knowledge to have about one's system.

 

[Layback Bear]

I have found that MSE seldom, I say again seldom give false positives.

Did you run the Eset on line scanner? If so what was found?

 

[Death1223]

Step 1.
Kaspersky TDSSKiller:

Step 2.
RKill:
Done.

Step 3.
Malwarebytes Anti-Malware (Free):

Step 4.
HitmanPro:

Step 5.
AdwCleaner:

Done. Deleted some Registry values.

Step 6.
RogueKiller:

Done. Deleted some Suspicious.Path Tasks

Step 7.
EMSISoft Emergency Kit:

The AV detected 8 Suspicious Files, which I deleted.
It also found two "trojans" which I think was a false positive since It's the official EverQuest... and I am pretty sure MotionJoy isn't a virus, let alone a trojan.

I deleted them anyways, and uninstalled EverQuest since I only played it once.


And completely finished. Everything came back fairly clean. Even without active anti-viruses I have decent intellect when it comes to avoiding viruses. I've operated without an active anti-virus for most of my computer's life. Just takes a little common sense to not infect yourself, and I do weekly maintenance which does include RogueKiller(I usually run MalwareBytes then RogueKiller weekly.)


Thanks for your help so far, I really do appreciate it.

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

[Bonus] Step 8.
ESET Free Online Scanner:

All of the "threats" it found were programs that would translate games I play. I play Japanese Visual Novels and don't know their language well enough to play them without the help of 3rd party help, so I use the programs which "hook" onto the visual novel and translate it real-time for me. Also this scan took a LONG time, so sorry about that!

 

[Layback Bear]

Can you show some snap shots.

msconfig/Startup and Non Microsoft Services?

It really doesn't really mater what language a infection is.
A infection is a infection. Every one found should be removed of completely research to verify it's a false positive.

The time to run the scans is no problem. We understand because we have also done those scans.

 

[Death1223]

Oh, I know why it detected it as a false positive is what I was saying. It hooks onto the program and reads the data. It's definitely not an infected file. I can tell you that much. I did however re-download it cleanly from the official site after the AV deleted it.

Now going about this msconfig thing will be a little difficult considering how many services I have.
I got this from CCleaner which I'm actually able to resize and get it all in one screenshot(It's the same exact start-up as msconfig. I double checked) but there are SO many non-microsoft services that it's a little difficult.

Start-up:

Here's my attempt at the services:
(Thrown together a bunch of screenshots in paint)

Let me know what you think!

Thank you again for this. Much appreciated.

 

[DavidE]

Oh, I know why it detected it as a false positive is what I was saying. It hooks onto the program and reads the data. It's definitely not an infected file. I can tell you that much. I did however re-download it cleanly from the official site after the AV deleted it.

You should be able to report a false-positive to the AV vendor so they can fix their definitions if it is a false-positive.

All AVs I've used allow adding files/folders to an exclusion list, so they will not be scanned.