PC Taking long time on boot

Drake5 · 30 Aug 2011 at 21:06

My mates PC is a 3.2GHZ P4, 3GB DDR2 PC.

It was taking a very long time to turn on, about 20 mins. At first I formatted it hoping it'd fix the boot issue but it didn't, even after formatting it still took a very long time to turn on.

This can't be a driver issue or virus because it was doing it right after a full format, so I'm thinking it's got to be hardware related? But what could be causing this?

Cheers

BigBoy · 31 Aug 2011 at 01:02

Is it a LAptop? if yes try removing the battery and see if that helps I know that my girlfriends laptop is slow as a dog when the battery is plugged in as its dead and windows keeps checking on the status of it!

TNGL · 31 Aug 2011 at 02:13

Hmm, a slow, crappy and dieing hard drive?

Nevram · 31 Aug 2011 at 11:29

Id agree with the dieing hard drive, also is it a desktop or a laptop? i know it sounds silly but you could try arming yourself with some compressed air and blasting out the dust? dust = heat which effect overall machine performance, and as the machine is obviously fairly old (being a P4) you could have a lot of dust in there. This probably isn't the issue but if you replaced the HDD and give it a good clean inside i think you'd notice a BIG difference.

nick-fury · 31 Aug 2011 at 12:43

Windows Event Log sometimes shows up disk errors, might be worth checking there for confirmation.

TNGL · 31 Aug 2011 at 12:46

Or run a SMART test on it (if it supports SMART).

platypus · 31 Aug 2011 at 12:50

Any clicks of death audible from the hard drive(s)?

Drake5 · 31 Aug 2011 at 14:42

Nothing audible from the hard drive, but it does make sense it could be a failing HDD. Their has only been a brief clean of the case, i.e some internal fans and around the CPU heatsync.

Would you guys suggest buying a new HDD and applying some new thermal paste to the CPU?

Cheers

Meatball · 31 Aug 2011 at 14:55

I would suggest upgrading to a new computer if I'm honest. Seemes like a waste of money investing in a new IDE hard drive where as you can build a modern desktop for £400

Nevram · 31 Aug 2011 at 15:15

i think there is still probably a big jump in price between a new IDE hard drive and a new machine, but hey if you've got the money nows probably a good time to invest in a new machine (skt1155

)

Drake5 · 31 Aug 2011 at 15:20

The HDD is sata - Not IDE. A new computer would certainly be out of the question.

I think I'll get a 2nd hand HDD from the MM to see if it makes any better.

Also the computer in general is just slow, I know P4's are old but with 3GB RAM it should be fine.

bledd · 31 Aug 2011 at 16:09

Meatball said:
I would suggest upgrading to a new computer if I'm honest. Seemes like a waste of money investing in a new IDE hard drive where as you can build a modern desktop for £400

It has DDR2, almost all DDR1 systems (probably all) had SATA. Every DDR2 system will have SATA

£30 for a WD Blue = sorted

-Sounds like a hard drive issue