The General "Computer Issues" Thread

[En Sabah Nur]

Yeah, I did that of course, but it still seems to boot rather slow compared to XP (which is what I was switching from). Might just be standard OS bloat I guess, it's just a little frustrating to pay Microsoft money for a product that slows things down rather than speeds them up. Oh, well.

I would not say its the OS, I have win 7 and its zippier than vista or xp ever been, something is bogging down your system boot. What part is slow, the POST or the Windows load screen, or the windows welcome screen or the part after that where all the icons and settings appear?

 

[Beefy]

While we're talking about Windows 7 being slow: I've noticed Windows Explorer is really slow as well.

When I'm viewing the contents of a folder and want to sort by file type or date modified, it takes a few seconds for Windows to scan the folder and sort it.

I have NTFS Indexing enabled on my partitions. In XP the sorting is instantaneous, but in 7 it's like it has to rebuild the index every time I view a folder.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

While we're talking about Windows 7 being slow: I've noticed Windows Explorer is really slow as well.

When I'm viewing the contents of a folder and want to sort by file type or date modified, it takes a few seconds for Windows to scan the folder and sort it.

I have NTFS Indexing enabled on my partitions. In XP the sorting is instantaneous, but in 7 it's like it has to rebuild the index every time I view a folder.

did you do an inplace upgrade from xp/vista or was it a clean install on Win 7?

 

[Beefy]

did you do an inplace upgrade from xp/vista or was it a clean install on Win 7?

7 doesn't let you upgrade from XP, you have to do a clean install. It wanted to upgrade Vista, but I had it do a clean install.

This is a dual boot system with XP and 7. Could both XP and 7 be trying to make their own index instead of sharing the same one?

 

[En Sabah Nur]

7 doesn't let you upgrade from XP, you have to do a clean install. It wanted to upgrade Vista, but I had it do a clean install.

This is a dual boot system with XP and 7. Could both XP and 7 be trying to make their own index instead of sharing the same one?

You have them on different partitions? With Win 7 Professional Windows XP Mode I no longer see the need for XP at all, just keep it virtual and that's it. Use it only when necessary.

 

[Mynd Hed]

I would not say its the OS, I have win 7 and its zippier than vista or xp ever been, something is bogging down your system boot. What part is slow, the POST or the Windows load screen, or the windows welcome screen or the part after that where all the icons and settings appear?

I'll have to do some tests to be sure: it's my gf's machine.

Not to be nitpicky, but when you go from XP to 7 without changing anything else and it boots slower instead of faster, it can't be anything but the OS. Whether the OS is slower in and of itself or it's indirectly causing a problem with something else, it's the OS that caused the problem. Glad you're having a good experience with it, though.

 

[defunctzombie]

Mine was so slow to boot after I upgraded to 7. That and other qualms with 7 drove me to linux.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

I'll have to do some tests to be sure: it's my gf's machine.

Not to be nitpicky, but when you go from XP to 7 without changing anything else and it boots slower instead of faster, it can't be anything but the OS. Whether the OS is slower in and of itself or it's indirectly causing a problem with something else, it's the OS that caused the problem. Glad you're having a good experience with it, though.

well as Beefy pointed out ( and i forgot) Win 7 cant be upgraded from XP, only a clean install would be an option. Now are you sure that you have each and every system requirements met? CPU, RAM Video, etc...
Sometimes it helps to format and try again. If the system requirements are met, Windows 7 should boot under a minute the longest without all the extra software such as antivirus/firewall and other startup applications. With them present, it should slow down your boot but not above 2 minutes. I clocked my machine st 1:45 minutes to fully boot from a cold POST to Norton 2010 being ready.

 

[Beefy]

You have them on different partitions? With Win 7 Professional Windows XP Mode I no longer see the need for XP at all, just keep it virtual and that's it. Use it only when necessary.

XP and 7 each have their own hard drives. They both access data on two other drives like videos, music, and pictures. It's these data drives that are slow to sort in 7, but sort instantly with XP.

My CPU does not have the hardware virtualization support required to run XP Mode in Windows 7.
I keep XP around because some of my hardware does not have drivers for Vista/7.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

XP and 7 each have their own hard drives. They both access data on two other drives like videos, music, and pictures. It's these data drives that are slow to sort in 7, but sort instantly with XP.

My CPU does not have the hardware virtualization support required to run XP Mode in Windows 7.
I keep XP around because some of my hardware does not have drivers for Vista/7.

In win 7 try thin, go to start and type in search bar "indexing options" abd click on the first choice. There click on Modify and make sure your entire hard drive is checked and indexed. Maybe that will help.

 

[Beefy]

In win 7 try thin, go to start and type in search bar "indexing options" abd click on the first choice. There click on Modify and make sure your entire hard drive is checked and indexed. Maybe that will help.

Looks like that worked. I was also able to choose what folders to scan and what file types to index just the file properties and which to index the file contents.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

Looks like that worked. I was also able to choose what folders to scan and what file types to index just the file properties and which to index the file contents.

And now that they are indexed they should load very quick. Win7 is different from Vista in many ways, im still learning it, but im already 70% proficient in it.

 

[Beefy]

And now that they are indexed they should load very quick. Win7 is different from Vista in many ways, im still learning it, but im already 70% proficient in it.

Thanks for your help earlier. The folders sort much faster now.

Here's a new fun problem for the room:
A friend of mine got a 500GB hard drive and put it in an external enclosure. He created one big partition for the entire drive and formatted it as NTFS.
He backed up all his music, videos, pictures, and other files to the external drive.

He then reformatted his internal hard drive in his computer and reinstalled Windows.
Now when he connects the external enclosure to transfer his files back: Windows sees the partition on the 500GB drive, but says the drive is not formatted. Needless to say he's not thrilled at the idea that all his data might be lost.

I put the drive in a different enclosure and tried it on my computer, same result: partition shows up, but says it's not formatted.

After reading up on the issue on the interweb, the symptoms indicate that the NTFS boot sector is damaged. Can anyone recommend a program that will repair or rebuild it so the data on the drive can be recovered?

 

[CrazyChase]

And while we wait for an answer on that, I too got a issue. Though, this one is small and minor, but really annoying.

You see, whenever I post something on these forums and others forums like these, after I type a post (and it might pop up once I post this), there a space there that I can't get rid of. Replacing it with words reveal that it's a hyperlink to a broken Javascript that I'm guessing is related to the hyperlink.

So my question is, what do I do to get rid of it? And this is in case the reinstallation doesn't work.

EDIT: I think it has something to do with the edit button. But again, in case it happens, how do I fix it?

 

[En Sabah Nur]

And while we wait for an answer on that, I too got a issue. Though, this one is small and minor, but really annoying.

You see, whenever I post something on these forums and others forums like these, after I type a post (and it might pop up once I post this), there a space there that I can't get rid of. Replacing it with words reveal that it's a hyperlink to a broken Javascript that I'm guessing is related to the hyperlink.

So my question is, what do I do to get rid of it? And this is in case the reinstallation doesn't work.

EDIT: I think it has something to do with the edit button. But again, in case it happens, how do I fix it?

to better discribe your problem do a print screen and show it to us.

as for Beefy's problem, NTFS boot sector is used if its a boot drive, if its just a storage drive boot sector has nothing to do with it. NTFS file system is corrupted, in which case a format is the only option, im afraid the info is lost. One thing you can try though, take out the drive from the enclosure and connect it straight to the motherboard. Maybe its the enclose thats damaged. See if the PC is reading the drive from the motherboard. And if its not, then you have my sympathy.

 

[Hanshotfirst1138]

I still can't get my Quicktime player to display the proper controls. Also, I have a new iPhone, and after syncing it to my computer, my iPod literally will not work at all-just a black screen-and I can't discern why. Can't even get it connect with my computer, and can't figure out why it would just die all of a sudden.

EDIT: On a tangential note, what the heck happened to Google video's ability to play things on the right side?

 

[En Sabah Nur]

I still can't get my Quicktime player to display the proper controls. Also, I have a new iPhone, and after syncing it to my computer, my iPod literally will not work at all-just a black screen-and I can't discern why. Can't even get it connect with my computer, and can't figure out why it would just die all of a sudden.

EDIT: On a tangential note, what the heck happened to Google video's ability to play things on the right side?

give us screen shots of both issues so we can better assist you, otherwise its just giving a blind advice.

 

[Hanshotfirst1138]

give us screen shots of both issues so we can better assist you, otherwise its just giving a blind advice.

Yeah, sorry about that. Was a little desperate. Did manage to fix one issue. How do you take screenshots?

 

[En Sabah Nur]

Yeah, sorry about that. Was a little desperate. Did manage to fix one issue. How do you take screenshots?

press the Print Screen button sometimes labeled "Prt Scrn" on your keyboard, then paste it into any whoto editing software, save as a picture and post it here.

 

[MDawg]

press the Print Screen button sometimes labeled "Prt Scrn" on your keyboard, then paste it into any whoto editing software, save as a picture and post it here.

Or hold

down the Alt key and then press the Print Screen key to capture just a specific error box or program window. It's a lot cleaner in most instances than having to capture your entire desktop.

Once that's done, paste it into Paint or whatever other art program you may have and then save the image. Upload to Imageshack or whatever other space you may have online and then link the image here.