my dad is having computer trouble and asked me to look at it. i did, and it seemed that it was running slow, i ran spybot, cleaned his registry, ran AVG. and it's going faster but still running slow. i checked his running processes and low and behold his System idle process is using 98-99% of the processor. i know the system idle does that when it's "idle" but it's using that much of the cpu ALL the time. what is the deal? should i just end the process? has it got a virus that's just not being picked up?
LOL. Anything under system idle is what is NOT beiing used, that means the computer is only using 1-2% of its CPU, i.e. it's fine.
When is the last time your father has re-installed his operating system? (i.e. Windows) Sometimes OS's can "rot", meaning they just get slow as the current install gets older. The best thing to do is first, back up important files, either by copying them onto an external hard drive or using an online service such as carbonite.com. Second, wipe the hard drive clean by doing a format. Last, re-install the OS and use the online updating services/software to patch up any problems. Everytime I do a new install, it runs really quick. If your dad is a casual Internet surfer, it's best to do this every six months, just to keep the system up to speed.
so what would be causing it to run so slow? i've done everything i can think of short of a format. which at this point is absolutly not an option. TY aksmth, i already ran c cleaner as well as Clean my PC (both registry cleaners i use on a regular basis). it says under processes that the system idle was using 98-99 but i was running IE and AIM at the time so how is only 1-2% of the processor only being used?
Most likely it is programs running in the background using memory, not CPU. IE or AIM is not going to use much CPU at all. I would recommend (if he has XP) going to start, clicking run, and typing msconfig. When it opens, click the startup tab at the top, and anything checked is going to start with the computer. I would find programs that are not essential to run everytime, and uncheck them. Restart the comp, and when it starts, you will get a box that pops up. Check the little box inside and click ok. See if that helps. (if he has Vista, hold the Windows symbol button and hit R instead of clicking run in the start menu) Also, right click on "My Computer" and tell me how much memory is there, and the speed of the CPU.
i have done all that. that's one thing i make sure of, any time i work on someone's computer i clean thier regitry and start-up so it will run faster and even if they asked me to do something small it seems to work much better because they can SEE a difference. i guess the only thing to do now is to maybe go through the processes one by one and make sure i'm not missing anything?
Do all the things that GogDog looked at. Another thing to try is when you reboot it, put it into safe mode, and see if that seems any better. To safe mode it, on startup it should show a screen saying to hit F2 or F8 or something like that to boot to safe mode. Try that and see if your basic stuffs run slow. There is also the chance that it's just an old computer...
i've done all that, i do work on computers so i have an excellent knowledge of how things work (hopefully graduating w/my degree in computer engineering this fall!). sorry if i didn't clarify earlier in the post. all i can do is maybe challk it up to being old. 2.6 gig processor 726 megs of ram 80 gig HDD 2001 model HP
How much space does he have left on the C drive? Lack of space to process anything could cause it to be slow. Run a disk cleanup.
i didn't mean it like that. i'm still learning, i've just never seen the system idle running all the time. in terms of the hard drive, he's only using like 30 gigs of the 80
My System Idle IS almost always running. On every computer I've ever owned. What version of Windows is it running, XP or Vista?
