[MGaz]

Really am at my wits end with this POS.

its a DELL inspiron 531 running VISA

Its never really run right, and if it were me i wouldn't have bought it it.

Basically as soon as windows loads, its on a 'go-slow' . Seriously, iv'e got a duron 700mhz running windows 2000 and its 1000% faster than this pill of steaming excrement.


You click on something and it just sits there , like a car spinning its wheels waiting for it to actually move.

the sreen often goes lightish in colour and you can't do anything with it till its finished doing what ever it is doing.

I can't even do anything to tweek the bios becae there seems to be SweetF***all to change in there, I've never seen a bios with so little options.


Any one else had a problem with a DELL? i really just want to reverse over it sevral times with my car. And I would have if it wasdn't my sisters PC.


Please help.

[BlueMak]

The problem is not Vista, the problem is it is a DELL.

What are the specs of the system?

Unless it is a seriously outdated system, the problem might be with 3rd party software.

[MGaz]

Originally Posted by BlueMak

The problem is not Vista, the problem is it is a DELL.

What are the specs of the system?

Unless it is a seriously outdated system, the problem might be with 3rd party software.

i think it is a AMD 64 x2 4400 cpu with 1GB ram, and a Geforce 6800gts PCi-E.

not sure on the other components makes..

[Tyrsonswood]

You will be limited because it's a Dell, but it shouldn't be "that slow"

Did you check for malware and get rid of useless 3rd party apps. Run defrag and maybe up the ram if possible.

[MGaz]

Originally Posted by Tyrsonswood

You will be limited because it's a Dell, but it shouldn't be "that slow"

Did you check for malware and get rid of useless 3rd party apps. Run defrag and maybe up the ram if possible.

Microsoft 'narrator' loads up at start up as well (really annoying) , and altho i can turn it off once its loaded, i don't know how to strop if from loading at startup in the first place!

Why isn't anything where you would expect it top be in VISA? i chuffing hate it. I find it so hard to do the simplest of thigs sometime (vist in genral)

[Judas]

startup and registry entries are in the exact same place as xp..

IMO i would backup important files..... NUKE the entire vista installation... and find someone with a REAL microsoft OEM vista disk you can borrow. Install it.

I would also suggest installing an extra 1gb of ram at the very least.... it should be dirt cheap. (shit you can get 4gb kits for 50 bucks or less)

[Tyrsonswood]

ram won't be cheap if this system runs DDR (not ddr2)

[BlueMak]

Just uninstall all 3rd party software you don't need. That's always a good first step.

[Judas]

dell has a habit of screwing up the uninstall programs on vista..... so trying to remove the 3rd party garbage can actually introduce even more issues.... i've seen this personally several times.. specially with dell machines that were the first to have vista.

[MGaz]

Originally Posted by Judas

dell has a habit of screwing up the uninstall programs on vista..... so trying to remove the 3rd party garbage can actually introduce even more issues.... i've seen this personally several times.. specially with dell machines that were the first to have vista.

there's a couple of programs i've tried to remove and they still seem to be here after un-install!

[Tyrsonswood]

As Judas said earlier, if possible use a Retail or non-Dell OEM version of windows. Dell's supplied version of windows is "different" somehow.

[MGaz]

Originally Posted by Tyrsonswood

As Judas said earlier, if possible use a Retail or non-Dell OEM version of windows. Dell's supplied version of windows is "different" somehow.

'Different'..?

different in that it doesn't work? lol

[kris23]

pretty much...... lol

find a way to obtain an OEM copy of vista 32 or 64.... (not a Dell or HP modified OS but the real deal MS original), then reformat with that.... the system will feel alot better..... i do this with ALL prebuilt systems im given.

you can still use the key that is given with the Dell.

[Zardon]

Well as much as its going to look weird me defending Dell I have owned a few latitude laptop systems and they were fine and the recent XPS we reviewed was great.

I had the same issue with a friend recently who bought a dell and said it was 'crap' - 'rubbish' and was slower than his friends laptop. So i get over to his house and find out that he was visiting all sorts of dubious sites without antivirus or any common sense and a quick scan revealed that he had 185 viruses on the system, 45 trojans and a bunch of popup spyware and other system hogging applications. I think the question to be asking is this "is it slower NOW than it was when I got it, or was it always crap?"

A quick format of his hard drive and a simple reinstall of the OS - plus a quick tutorial of what to do and what not to do (and a bitchslap), as well as a quick install of Avast has cured his problems.

I am aware some of the Dell systems arent exactly hardcore (and the original OS install is cluttered) but I have found over the years that people are really all too willing to blame the hardware when the problem is quite often between the chair and the monitor.

1: control alt delete, check running processes
2: check CPU hogging - and relevant apps
3: try a free antivirus and spyware app such as avast (and one of the plethora of high quality malware, spyware removers) might help.

The information is a little vague to help more.

[Judas]

Originally Posted by Tyrsonswood

As Judas said earlier, if possible use a Retail or non-Dell OEM version of windows. Dell's supplied version of windows is "different" somehow.

just for clarification... if you want to use the Dell supplied cd key. IT MUST BE a OEM version of vista... you CANNOT use a RETAIL disk.

[Tyrsonswood]

Originally Posted by Judas

just for clarification... if you want to use the Dell supplied cd key. IT MUST BE a OEM version of vista... you CANNOT use a RETAIL disk.

Correct.... I should have edited my post because it could be read that way, but that was not my meaning.

[MGaz]

Originally Posted by Zardon

Well as much as its going to look weird me defending Dell I have owned a few latitude laptop systems and they were fine and the recent XPS we reviewed was great.

I had the same issue with a friend recently who bought a dell and said it was 'crap' - 'rubbish' and was slower than his friends laptop. So i get over to his house and find out that he was visiting all sorts of dubious sites without antivirus or any common sense and a quick scan revealed that he had 185 viruses on the system, 45 trojans and a bunch of popup spyware and other system hogging applications. I think the question to be asking is this "is it slower NOW than it was when I got it, or was it always crap?"

A quick format of his hard drive and a simple reinstall of the OS - plus a quick tutorial of what to do and what not to do (and a bitchslap), as well as a quick install of Avast has cured his problems.

I am aware some of the Dell systems arent exactly hardcore (and the original OS install is cluttered) but I have found over the years that people are really all too willing to blame the hardware when the problem is quite often between the chair and the monitor.

1: control alt delete, check running processes
2: check CPU hogging - and relevant apps
3: try a free antivirus and spyware app such as avast (and one of the plethora of high quality malware, spyware removers) might help.

The information is a little vague to help more.

well,.. the biggest prob is i'll be using the internet, and all is running OK for a little while, and then FREEZE.. with the browser saying (not responding) but mouse works. i can't click on desktop or anything else, and then the mouse freezes as well. and then the browser goes white (empty box) . Leave it a couple of mins and its starts working ok again.

then if i try opening a folder, the compuer goes on a go slow, then freezes again. leave it a while and its fine again.

I get a noise from the mobo speaker sometimes when trying to move the mouse when its frozen.


but it also seems to freeze up a little as soon as its started.. with out even useing the internet.


I think it has gotten worse, for sure. but ever since she had it, it always seemed slow. it would load the GUI/desktop fast enough, but then seemed to spend sevral minutes still flashing its hard disk light and you had to wait much , much longer than other PC's i've used before till it was 'free' or 'not busy' loading what ever it was loading, to be ready to use.

[MGaz]

mind you, i've noticed this problem with my own vista set up at home. its as if the desktop loads but its as if VISTA has not actually finished loading.

that what i like about win2000, once the desktop is up, its pretty much ready to go. XP is better than VISTA in this respect, but still not as fast as WIN 2k.

[kris23]

ur going to need more than 1GB of RAM for vista or issues like those will happen..... once you load up 4GB of RAM it should take off like a stock car...... vista is capable of utilizing more RAM better than XP so in the end it is snappier.....

games take a bit of an FPS hit due to the higher requirements of the OS but the only ones who complain about it are just nit-picking as the drop is tiny

[BlueMak]

Do you have an antivirus or firewall installed? Something from Norton or McAffee perhaps? Remove them ASAP.

[MGaz]

Originally Posted by BlueMak

Do you have an antivirus or firewall installed? Something from Norton or McAffee perhaps? Remove them ASAP.

my sister pc is running AVG?

[BlueMak]

Make sure she has removed any other antivirus first. Sometimes there are a couple installed.
Same for firewall.

[MGaz]

Originally Posted by BlueMak

Make sure she has removed any other antivirus first. Sometimes there are a couple installed.
Same for firewall.

should i turn off all the 'built in' VISTA firewall/virus stuff?

[BlueMak]

You don't have to disable the ones that come with Vista. At least the firewall.

I remember in 2001-2 a fellow uni student asked me to go and check his PC because it would play the recently released Generals like a slideshow. I went there and I found three (3) anti virus programs running. One that he installed, one that was preinstalled and one that the university installed for him. And while he could be forgiven for installing a third one, what was the excuse of the university's techs (Plymouth) for installing a second one? Anyway, after removing them and fixing a couple of things, the system was far better and playing Generals was far more fluid than before.

[MGaz]

Originally Posted by BlueMak

You don't have to disable the ones that come with Vista. At least the firewall.

I remember in 2001-2 a fellow uni student asked me to go and check his PC because it would play the recently released Generals like a slideshow. I went there and I found three (3) anti virus programs running. One that he installed, one that was preinstalled and one that the university installed for him. And while he could be forgiven for installing a third one, what was the excuse of the university's techs (Plymouth) for installing a second one? Anyway, after removing them and fixing a couple of things, the system was far better and playing Generals was far more fluid than before.

I think its only AVG that's running.. + the VISA stuff

I tried spybot S&D , but when i try to remove the problems it removes some of them and then tell me i need to be an admin to remove the rest! but i checked my user account and i AM set as administrator.

[BlueMak]

Load in Safe mode and take care of all the junk.

[MGaz]

Originally Posted by BlueMak

Load in Safe mode and take care of all the junk.

humm.. the computer seems to work fine in 'SAFE MODE WITH NETWORKING SUPPORT' ?

but as soon as its run in normal mode if f##ks up again.

[BlueMak]

start in safe mode
then uninstall all the junk
then start in normal mode

[craig5320]

I use Mike Lin's Home Page to nuke a lot of startup items, handy as you can restore them the same way if you have issues, and you can run a standalone no install version.


I too would look at a format, but makesure you have the proper drivers for stuff espcially your network hardware, and of course the correct oem OS disc.

If you haven't already switch off Aero and transparency effects, because you don't have the hardware to enjoy it maybe even go to basic mode. Nuke any toolbars and add-ons, disable drive indexing, and check how taxing running your AV is, resident shields and on open scanning really taxes your system, if you have 3rd party spam software like ones with AVG internet security don't have windows defender running as well.

[Takaharu]

Wipe the hard drive. No ands, ifs or buts, wipe it. Manufacturer-bought PCs (ACER especially) usually pile on a load of crapware that you may or may not use. Reformat the system and customise the OS the way you (or in this case your sister) want it. To tweak it that bit further, pop into msconfig, go to boot then advanced options and select the number of processors to the number of cores you have (in this case two). It's a minor tweak but it's free and easy. Vista/XP Manager (depending on the OS) is also a handy little tool to tweak small things here and there. Also, if you know what not to remove, pop into your Add/Remove Programs (aka: Programs in Vista onwards), click Add/Remove Windows Components and uninstall built-in Windows components you don't need.
It was a general rule in our company that as soon as we got a new PC, we reformat. Luckily, that changed before I joined and we now use Dells with a duplicated hard drive (Dell PCs in a corporate environment isn't such a bad thing) but I've seen the amount of fluff ACER stuck on their PCs - the bootup time was horrifying.
Oh, while you're at it, suggest an extra gig or two of RAM. I'm pro-Vista but I will say 1GB isn't enough - Vista will quite happily eat that on its own if you let it.

If you can't wipe the hard drive boot into Safe Mode, open up MSConfig, click the Boot tab then select Safe Boot - minimal. If it boots up fine after that, start going through trial and error by enabling startup items one by one. It's a long process with a lot of restarts (logging off/on is no good because services don't always need you to be logged in) but when you find the PC goes slowly after you've just enabled something then you've found the problem.