hi, a little while back i got a new 200gb WD 8M hard disk (along with A64 3000 and recently a new 7800GS). I've been having this weird problem with it though (i sort of put it off coz it wasn't anything major).

Basically all of my hardware is working fine. HDTach shows 50mb/s average r/w speeds. RAMs running as fast as it should, CPU is running fine and GFX card is (cept for small 2d problem).

When i open up things a lot of the time it will just sit there like its waiting for something then after bout 2-3 seconds itll finally decide to open the program or whatever i clicked on.

Has anybody had this sort of problem before? Coz apart from this sorta freeze thing every thing in my comp (as well as the data of the hdd itself) is fine.

what sort of file monitoring software do you use.. ie.. anti-virus / anti-spyware?

a guy at work is having a similar problem with his computer

if someone sends him a new message on msn (requiring a new window to open) his computer will stall for a few seconds before it comes good again.

but otherwise the computer is running nice and fast.

I'm using ZoneAlarm Security Suite. Actually the desktop just took about a minute to popup after logging in and there wasn't any hard drive or cpu activity :(

Could it be ZA? I've got norton sec suite, maybe i could give that a go.

Try shutting za off and see if the problem stops.

I've got norton sec suite, maybe i could give that a go

Yep......I f***ing hate nortons!!! It's gotta be the worst av/security package out there, oh it's running fine you say? Suddenly it dose a backflip and f***s itself and take your o/s with it. Symantec f*** u very much.

AVG free/windows firewall/spybot S&D FTW!!

norton security works is the cause for over 20% of my call outs to customers.. its amazing how many people buy it, then once its installed, suddenly cant use internet or experience huge performance issues. On the other hand, im not complaining cause its an easy $60 to click 'uninstall' :P

I find a lot of customers machines I look at are loaded with antispyware/antivirus/firewall software, often multiple programs at the same time.

Big problem nowdays is most have some kinda of active scanner that scans pretty much every file you access. Now when you have 4 or 5 different things scanning the file it slows the system down to a crawl. Wah Wah my computer is running slow... fix it!

Keep it to a minimum or it defeats the purpose :/ If you are running a hardware router, get rid of zonealarm, theres no need unless you've opened all the ports... which would be retarded anyway.

If you insist on running a virus scanner all the time, pick one and even disable the background scanner.

Personally I hate having stuff running behind the scenes constantly. I install a VS, update it, scan, remove any nasties then delete the program.

Finally from personal experience Norton = teh poo. It often f***s systems up, especially norton go back *stabs furiously* got a new system and want to just wack in the HDD and copy the data across? Sorry no can do without some monumental f***ing around.

okay thats enough
/rant

last edited by rubba-chikin at 12:57:27 12/May/06

I still use Norton antivirus and it works fine but there's no way I'd ever dump their s***ty System Works stuff on my machine again.

Well windows is now taking its sweet ass time to get round to displaying the desktop >:(. I'll bring up taskman and in the 2 minutes it takes about 10 seconds of it is actual activity. other than that it just sits there like its forgotten to finish logging in.

I'm gonna test it out without zonealarm starting up.

oh and i got norton with my mobo


last edited by thre3dee at 16:45:38 12/May/06

I'd recommend not using the full zonealarm suite with virus scanner and everything, I loaded it on my brothers computer and every time it booted it got slower and slower to load until one day it stopped.

do i need the software firewall alongside my adsl modem? (im a noob at networking sorta stuff)

Is it an modem router?

If theres only 1 spot then no its just a modem, if it is a modem-router it will have multiple network ports where more than 1 comp can plug in and be on the network, and it will also act as a hardware level firewall (so you'd have to login to the router to open up ports for things like bittorrent clients etc) doing the same job as ZA hence why it would be silly to use both at the same time.

Its a "NetComm NB1 ADSL 2+ Modem Router". Its only the single port though. Does this mean its got a firewall? And yeah i've had to log in to the modem for things like port forwarding etc).

Should have enough of a firewall in it, unless you have top secret s*** on your pc, don't get too paranoid about firewalls and s***

Yep......I f***ing hate nortons!!! It's gotta be the worst av/security package out there, oh it's running fine you say? Suddenly it dose a backflip and f***s itself and take your o/s with it. Symantec f*** u very much.

...

norton security works is the cause for over 20% of my call outs to customers..

These guys speak truth.

At my work, we do IT stuff on the side and have had plenty of people coming for assistance with their PCs screwing up ... all Norton related. From personal experience at home, I had two PCs blue-screening frequently. I tracked it down to Norton Anti-virus, removed it, and the problems away.

Norton/Symantec software is not recommended by me!

Yeah you have set up port forwarding for some of your proggies so thats basically unlocking a door in the router's firewall for that program to communicate to the big bad intarwebz. Pretty much the same as you would click "allow" to let a program access the net with ZA.

So essentially you have 2 things doing the same job, and if the router can do it indepedently without using any computing power from your machine then let it do its job and take back whatever resources ZA is using :)


Really when it comes down to it, if you have something *that* important that if someone got a hold of it you'd be ruined and have to /yourself then leave it on an offline machine that is never connected to the net or invest in some uber encryption stuff.

Noob question then about the routers and firewalls. What about the windows firewall in XP? Worth having turned on (if you have a router)? Not effective?

Again its going to be doing the same thing as ZoneAlarm. If you have a hardware firewall enabled (inside the router) then piss it off.

It will still be effective in doing its job but... its already being done at the router.

*thinks of example* It's kinda like wearing 2 pairs of sunnies when its bright outside. You'll still be able to see, and they both do their intended job to dim the brightness, but it would be pretty stupid to any sane person.

I personally find the windows firewall to be pretty crap anyway :)

Well i have no ZA on startup and it instantly popped the desktop up :)

That was the problem all along. With AVG can u scan for viruses without having the prog actually running in the background beforehand? Coz ZA has to be up and running with all its gayness to be able to scan (using the right-click menu on files).

Im pretty sure AVG does have a background scanner type thing, I think you can disable parts of it in the menu.

I do actually use AVG myself, I just install it every now and then, update the virus def's, scan and uninstall the prog when im done.

Clamscan for windows is what I've used for ages, it had a habit of eating your cpu cycles during a scan but they improved that quite a bit with a recent update...