XP SP3 - Windows Explorer Slow

Hi there,

What kind of a hard drive do you have in the computer?
Is it an older drive? If so I believe this could be your bottle-neck.

-FB

Hi,
This could be from a hardware problem ( a failing hard disk drive, optical drive, even a memory module)
Try installing windows on a different hard drive on the same computer, run a memtest.

Thanks for the quick replies.

I don't think that it would have anything to do with the hard drive since this happens on the network shares as well.

As for the memory modules, I will try just swapping them out, however I have not noticed any other problems with the PC.  I think there would be some more problems if a module was bad.

I've attached a couple of files with installed programs and Hijack log.

Thanks,
Mycah

Download and install Process Monitor:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896645.aspx

Then open it up and while it is running open up windows explorer.
Look in the process explorer to what uses the most resources during this process.
(Look at the hardware interrupts section, if something spikes up there it could be a faulty hardware device)

Hi,
while browsing network shares, windows constantly reads and writes to your local drive - that's why I think it could it.
You are probably write about the memory module, it usually manifests itself more obviously.

I swapped out the RAM, didn't help.

I tried running the Process Monitor but I'm not familiar with it so I wasn't sure how to get to the info you were refering to.

However, I used Task Manager to check while I was scrolling in Explorer:

explorer.exe - 50%
asghost.exe - 2%

Also, I should have mentioned that this is not only a problem when browsing files, it's also slow when opening files (at least on the network shares) but it can also be intemittent.

I completely uninstalled all of the Protect Tools components.  The good news is the machine is running noticabley faster after that but the problem lingers.

Hmmm....
What does the fragmentation look like on the drive if you run analyze on Disk Defragmenter?

The disk is fragmented enough that it could use a defrag, but it's not horrible (not to the extent of causing the problem I don't think).  I'm defragmenting now since I'm out of ideas ...it can't hurt at this point.

Thanks!

Oh and to make the defragmenting process even more effective disable the pagefile first, reboot then start the defrag. After that re-set the pagefile.

Hope this helps

well it could be  a hard disk problem
you may also trying to create a new profile before and try

As I suspected the defrag hasn't helped.

I'm sure it's not a HDD problem since it's having the problem when accessing network shares.

My sense is that there is some system file, registry entry, etc. type of fix that needs to be done.

Also, I did try loggin in with my profile (instead of the users profile) and it experiences the same problem, so it's not profile related.

EternalMycah--It is not clear if you tried the ideas in http://pcsupport.about.com/od/findbyerrormessage/a/missinghaldll.htm
as suggested in the first reply above.
A hotfix is pretty easy.

jcimarron -

I missed the link in that first post, however it doesn't seem to be for the specific problem I am having.  Also, that is a pretty intensive list of steps to go through to try to resolve the issue, especially since I am not getting the errors listed in the article.

Is there a specific reason and steps to try for my issue?

i hesitate to go through all of those steps if it is just a guess or "this might work" type of scenario.  I feel like I've already spent way too much time on this and I am hoping someone has some real  troubleshooting steps rather than just more stuff to try.

I had already restored IE8 default settings, but after taking a quick look at that article I might just try uninstalling IE8.

Thanks.

jcimarron -

Actually I clicked on the link in your post which is not the same as the original post.  After checking that link I'm not sure the hotfix would apply to this issue.  However, since it's an easy thing to try I might do that when I'm back in the office tomorrow anyway.

Specifically the problem that I am experiencing is that no matter how I try to browse folders (My Computer, Windows+E, expanding folders in the sidebar, double clicking folders in the main window) whenever I try to scroll through a list of folders and files it lags.  The longer the list the more lag I expereince.  Basically it seems like it has to cache the files and folder before I can scoll through them smoothly.  I guess that would be normal in theory but it is taking too long and lagging a lot.  Furthermore, the real problem arisis when trying to open some of the files.  For example a 50K Word file that takes several seconds to open (even get a status bar at in the bottom of the Word screen) ...that should be instantaneous.

This has nothing to do with the network or server or the local HDD.  This is the only PC having this problem even at different ethernet ports.

Thanks.

Update -

I tried to install the hotfix but it was "older than the service pack" which is SP3.

Also, I've already tried reinstalling:
IE8
SP3

Neither have helped.  Is there anyone out there that is aware of a registry edit or .dll file that Explorer uses that my be corrupt etc?

Thanks

Is anyone aware of a registry edit or .dll file that might be corrupt?

Thanks.

EternalMycah--For the record, this link was posted by error
http://pcsupport.about.com/od/findbyerrormessage/a/missinghaldll.htm
I meant to post
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=873414  as mentioned in my first post at the top.
Regrets.

jcimarron -

Yeah, I realized that and tried the hotfix, but it was older than SP3 so was not allowed to be installed on the PC.