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Thread: Unknown constant disk activity slows Vista

  1. #1
    Paul H Guest

    Unknown constant disk activity slows Vista

    Well, it looks like I have to restart my Vista Home Premium again. The disk
    meter frequently goes to and stays at 90% or greater, and anything I attempt
    to do takes minutes, not the already unreasonable seconds like it did until
    last Wednesday. My old XP Pro is lightning fast compared to this. A
    restart fixes the problem for an hour or so. Task manager does not show any
    program other than those showing on the bottom of the screen. I run
    Ad-Aware frequently (it always finds 20 or so) and I'm using Avast to
    prevent any virus. Help, anybody?


  2. #2
    ...winston Guest

    Re: Unknown constant disk activity slows Vista

    If malware and virus free, start by looking at Msconfig(Start/Run/Msconfig/startup) and the Windows search index(it may take some time to finish).

  3. #3
    Tiberius Guest

    Re: Unknown constant disk activity slows Vista

    Microsoft wants to convert your hard disk into dust.. don't worry!

    Its improvements!!! LOL

    Vista has several SERVICES that make the disk thrash like it has drank a
    swimming pool full of coffee.

    What are these services? Indexing (windows search),
    Ready Boost, and defrag that is now automatic and has a stupid gui.

    You can turn off indexing (windows search) and readyboost from
    Control Panel> Administrative tools> services

    disable those 2.

    Windows still will be able to search the disk.. it just will not index it...

    Make sure you organize your stuff and you wont have a problem.

    Indexing is stupid, and a dying technology. MS did one more mistake by
    including it,
    turning it on by default, and not having a GUI way that is very apparent to
    turn it off.

  4. #4
    Paul H Guest

    Re: Unknown constant disk activity slows Vista

    Thx, "Tiberius". I turned off search and ready boost. I look forward to
    better performance.

  5. #5
    Rock Guest

    Re: Unknown constant disk activity slows Vista

    Run the Reliability and Performance monitor to get an idea of what files are
    being accessed. From Start type in Reliability. Right click on it when it
    appears at the top left. Choose run as administrator. Once it opens expand
    the disk section to see what files are being accessed. The PID corresponds
    to the process that opens those files.

    Note I have the ReadyBoost process running and it doesn't cause any disk
    access. I have no idea where Tiberius is getting that from. Now if you are
    in fact using ReadyBoost with a thumb drive or SD card, then yes that the
    ReadyBoost cache file that is created on those drives will be accessed, but
    it's not continuous like you are experiencing, and it certainly doesn't have
    the impact you are seeing.

    I also have indexing service running and again don't see the same effect you
    are.

    At any rate the first step is to find out what actually is writing to the
    disk.

  6. #6
    Lang Murphy Guest

    Re: Unknown constant disk activity slows Vista

    Start | Run | perfmon

    Check the disk section... sort on read or write (read first) and see what's
    pounding your HD.

    If there's nothing painfully apparent, then... -maybe- your box has
    something illicit sucking your resources.

    Lang

  7. #7
    Paul H Guest

    Re: Unknown constant disk activity slows Vista

    Rock, I did as Tiberius suggested, and not only did my system get extremely
    fast, but some Windows Mail performance problems went away! So it's too
    late to determine what disk activity was taking place. I would have tried
    what you suggested, and I appreciate yours and Lang's help. Thx. Paul

    Run the Reliability and Performance monitor to get an idea of what files are
    being accessed. From Start type in Reliability. Right click on it when it
    appears at the top left. Choose run as administrator. Once it opens expand
    the disk section to see what files are being accessed. The PID corresponds
    to the process that opens those files.

    Note I have the ReadyBoost process running and it doesn't cause any disk
    access. I have no idea where Tiberius is getting that from. Now if you are
    in fact using ReadyBoost with a thumb drive or SD card, then yes that the
    ReadyBoost cache file that is created on those drives will be accessed, but
    it's not continuous like you are experiencing, and it certainly doesn't have
    the impact you are seeing.

    I also have indexing service running and again don't see the same effect you
    are.

    At any rate the first step is to find out what actually is writing to the
    disk.

  8. #8
    Nick Savoiu Guest

    Re: Unknown constant disk activity slows Vista

    Hi,

    I've removed avast, disabled the two services below but my HD LED still
    blinks every second even when I have no programs runnning.

    And from time to time explorer.exe seems to access just about every .eml
    file in my Mail folder (>1GB of it) looking at some OECustomProperty!

    <vent>I've had it with this crap! I want control of my computer and I'm
    about to throw this out the window!</vent>

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