Solved Erratic PC Speed, Hangs/Freezes at input, unable to perform scans

[AlainB]

Hello guys,

Lately I've been having a few problems with my 4~ years old computer. It was becoming rather slow, and sometimes it started to hang. Did a chkdsk, the bad clusters "were fixed", problems stayed, decided to clean install and the problem still persisted. Now, about a month later, the problem is becoming extremely frustrating. Everything simply takes 100 times longer than it used to take. I'm not sure how to approach this problem so I've compiled a short list of irregular things (Most notably the HDTune report?):

I've tried chdsk some time ago, it had some bad clusters (it fixed those). However, HDTune showed 1 cluster during a quick scan (I can't do a full scan since I have a 2 m/b scanning speed, combined with "not responding" messages) and the benchmark results are really strange: http://oi58.tinypic.com/2hmk9aq.jpg

sfc /scannow got stuck at "Verification 69% complete", after which I received the message: "Windows Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation." No error number or anything.
Frequent freezes and "This program is not responding" messages. Sometimes there are shutdown problems. Most problems seem to occur whenever I 'input' something. For example whenever I right click anything, open a program and/or activate a skill in a game.

It seems to be the case that my HDD is failing, but I am extremely inexperienced in PC problems, so I would truly appreciate some help from experts such as you here. I've tried to fill in my system specs, but I'm not quite sure exactly which information you guys require for a problem such as mine.

 

[ICIT2LOL]

Hello and welcome Alian first I don't know what brand hard drive you have but this usually works on all SeaTools for Windows | Seagate

You also have a ? mark against the RAM is that because you are not sure of the GB you have installed? If you want to analyse the hardware right down to brand etc use this
HWiNFO, HWiNFO32/64 - Download < download the right bit version and take off the running panel so you have the main panel exposed and then click and open out the devices see pic it is my machine with RAM opened up but you can open what you like

 

[AlainB]

Hello and welcome Alian first I don't know what brand hard drive you have but this usually works on all SeaTools for Windows | Seagate

You also have a ? mark against the RAM is that because you are not sure of the GB you have installed? If you want to analyse the hardware right down to brand etc use this
HWiNFO, HWiNFO32/64 - Download < download the right bit version and take off the running panel so you have the main panel exposed and then click and open out the devices see pic it is my machine with RAM opened up but you can open what you like

Hello and thanks for your reply. I'm actually quite sure I've got 6gb ram, I'm just not sure what the specific type is.. Also my HDD is a WDC WD20EADS-14R6B0 (2TB) as seen in the picture.

I've done some scanning to see what the SMART status is of my HDD and I've found out that Crystal Disk Info gives:
"Caution". (<-- Health Status)
Reallocated Sectors Count (05) and Current Pending Sector Count (C5) are not "Blue" (as in Good health) like the rest.. But no indication they're "bad" either. Simply Caution (Yellow).

Is my HDD faulty? Would replacing my HDD fix my hanging/freezing issues (Because the HDD is having trouble reading or something?)?

 

[ICIT2LOL]

Alain mate as it is 4 + years old then it is a fair bet the drive is reasonably "well used" you could try the surface test with Partition Wizard too it isa physical test as opposed to a contents test.
Best Free Partition Manager Freeware and free partition magic for Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista and Windows XP 32 bit & 64 bit. MiniTool Free Partition Manager Software Home Edition. < very handy tool to keep I use it all the time.
See my pic for how it runs and looks.

 

[AlainB]

Alain mate as it is 4 + years old then it is a fair bet the drive is reasonably "well used" you could try the surface test with Partition Wizard too it isa physical test as opposed to a contents test.
Best Free Partition Manager Freeware and free partition magic for Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista and Windows XP 32 bit & 64 bit. MiniTool Free Partition Manager Software Home Edition. < very handy tool to keep I use it all the time.
See my pic for how it runs and looks.

Thanks for your fast reply!

I've downloaded Partition Wizard, and it's currently running. However, it's basically the same as an error scan in HDTune, and my scanning speed is less than 2mb/sec.. Which means it takes more than 20 hours to go through 2TB... Not really viable. I have done a quick scan in HDTune, which gave me 1 bad cluster. I'm letting the test run regardless, hope that it gives me some extra indications.


Yep: 2 minutes in there's the first error in a block!


EDIT: Scanning speed is less than 500mb/sec.. Will take 70 hours at this rate. I'm starting to believe this isn't just a random occurrence and something is really wrong with my hdd.

Power on count for my hdd is 12132 hours.. might very well be a natural slow death..

 

[AlainB]

Will my freezing errors be fixed if I get a new HDD?

 

[ICIT2LOL]

Will my freezing errors be fixed if I get a new HDD?

Most likely Alain but make sure any data you have is saved before to that scenario.

I am offline for a bit but will be back. But do let that scan run full course.

John

 

[AlainB]

I've bought and installed a new HDD and the problems seem to be fixed.

Thanks for your help.

 

[ICIT2LOL]

I've bought and installed a new HDD and the problems seem to be fixed.

Thanks for your help.

No probs Alain glad to be off some assistance, and you might be interested in this
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/11728-optimize-windows-7-a.html

John