Windows explorer is running really choppy

FloppyPoppy · 31 Aug 2016 at 11:53

Hey everyone hope you are all well,

First i will start off with my storage setup,

120gb kingston SSD with windows on it,
2TB 7,200 rpm drive for shadowplay
80gb 5,400 for virtual machine
5TBwd red Games drive
5TBwd red Media drive,
5TBwd red misc/software backups

Now my problem is everything on windows seems to run really slowly, for example if i have a couple of unwanted photographs from a dslr maybe 50-200mb in size when delete them and put them in the recycle bin, if i right click and empty recycle bin it may take a minute to come up saying are you sure you want to permanently delete these files.

Also when i navigate to any of the other drives it often stops responding and i really can't figure out why. This is on fresh windows also ( windows 10 )

Is there any suggestions or software i can use to test anything that may be wrong?

Thanks for any advice as this is really annoying me now

chance2228 · 31 Aug 2016 at 12:16

What drive is your OS on?

Rroff · 31 Aug 2016 at 12:34

Not uncommonly reported with Windows 10 - some have solved it by reinstalling. It is also possible one of the drives is failing and the cause of it even when not accessing that drive so check SMART, etc.

jpaul · 31 Aug 2016 at 12:54

If you have the Anniversary update then maybe you need to install the Intel Rapid Storage driver see this this this the latter discusses some potential log messages you might see
(I had this previously installed in 7 and had made a mental note to re-install with Anniversary update)

FloppyPoppy · 31 Aug 2016 at 13:56

chance2228 said:
What drive is your OS on?

As per OP it's on my SSD

Rroff said:
Not uncommonly reported with Windows 10 - some have solved it by reinstalling. It is also possible one of the drives is failing and the cause of it even when not accessing that drive so check SMART, etc.

I have checked smart all are reported just fine and i am already on a fresh install.

General overview of drive health.

Below is a more detailed look at the drives.

120gb kingston SSD with windows on it

2TB 7,200 rpm drive for shadowplay

80gb 5,400 for virtual machine

5TBwd red Games drive

5TBwd red Media drive,

5TBwd red misc/software backups

jpaul said:
If you have the Anniversary update then maybe you need to install the Intel Rapid Storage driver see this this this the latter discusses some potential log messages you might see
(I had this previously installed in 7 and had made a mental note to re-install with Anniversary update)

I don't have the Anniversary update, however i will just for sanitys sake reinstall all my storage drivers ( again ) just to quadruple check

.

Thanks all for suggestions as i said i will reinstall all drivers again but not to keen to re do windows as that would be the 4th time in a month

gpuerrilla · 31 Aug 2016 at 22:31

I had this happen on my installation of 8.1.

I fixed it after weeks of tinkering and remember it coincided with the AV updating itself borking the context menus. My main gripe was the bar took ages to fill when selecting drives, does it sound similar?

bledd · 1 Sep 2016 at 10:35

Install CCleaner.

Go to...

Tools
Startup
Context Menu
Delete/Disable all the crap from here

It's probably some 3rd party software junk in your right click Menu.

Elevon · 1 Sep 2016 at 12:41

Rroff said:
Not uncommonly reported with Windows 10 - some have solved it by reinstalling. It is also possible one of the drives is failing and the cause of it even when not accessing that drive so check SMART, etc.

Regardless it's not normal behaviour for Win10, mine is instant, could be anti-virus or like others have suggested a third party software, even malware a possibility.

It will be interesting to let us know the cause once you know.

FloppyPoppy · 1 Sep 2016 at 12:46

bledd said:
Install CCleaner.

Go to...

Tools
Startup
Context Menu
Delete/Disable all the crap from here

It's probably some 3rd party software junk in your right click Menu.

I will give that a go now

EDIT : I only had VLC and 7Zip in there

i am starting to wonder if it might be the sata controllers struggling? My motherboard is aging now (maximums gene V)

bledd · 1 Sep 2016 at 12:50

Also check event viewer for errors under the System tab.

Post a screenshot

Rroff · 1 Sep 2016 at 12:53

Elevon said:
Regardless it's not normal behaviour for Win10, mine is instant, could be anti-virus or like others have suggested a third party software, even malware a possibility.

It will be interesting to let us know the cause once you know.

It ain't far from normal - there are areas where explorer will bog down in normal use and quite a lot of people report that after a few months explorer will stop responding a lot (often along with the start menu), etc. for some reason it seems to plague some systems more than others i.e. as mentioned before one of test systems with 10 on will constantly slowdown after a few weeks to months with the start menu becoming increasingly less responsive - doing a complete clean install will solve it initially but it creeps in again over time.

FloppyPoppy · 1 Sep 2016 at 12:58

bledd said:
Also check event viewer for errors under the System tab.

Post a screenshot

sorry, do you mean on CCleaner? As i don't seem to have that on mine (free version) or do you mean a different event viewer

?

Sorry for the probably simple questions

i don't really delve to much into the software side of these things im more of a plug and play user when it comes to storage

.

EDIT : Sorry you mean windows event viewer *facepalm* There are a lot of errors in there including two i found interesting relating to this issue, i am however going to upload a quick video to show you the list as it would require a few hundred screenshots.

FloppyPoppy · 1 Sep 2016 at 13:28

Okay so below is the video of the errors found in event viewer. The two disk related logs are at 0:40 seconds and another shortly after at 0:50 seconds.

Here is a copy of the log files from the two directly relating to disks

Level Date and Time Source Event ID Task Category
Error 02/08/2016 19:13:11 disk 7 None The device, \Device\Harddisk2\DR2, has a bad block.
Error 03/08/2016 11:25:15 disk 7 None The device, \Device\Harddisk2\DR2, has a bad block.

Something to note is that these are the only two of these events and i do get the slowing / not responding of windows explorer a lot more frequently than this. Every time i access files directly mainly.

If there is any more information that i can provide please let me know and il get it up asap

.

lude1962 · 1 Sep 2016 at 13:34

explorer will hang while trying to read disks with bad blocks
drive may be partly dead, do a full format this will make the bad blocks dissappear and be unused, if it happens again get a new drive

edit nvlddmkm doesnt look good...could be a red herring
is your system overclocked what gpu how old?

also what does the volmgr error say?

FloppyPoppy · 1 Sep 2016 at 13:38

lude1962 said:
explorer will hang while trying to read disks with bad blocks
drive may be partly dead, do a full format this will make the bad blocks dissappear and be unused, if it happens again get a new drive

Not so easy to do a full format when you have upwards of 3.5tb of data on some of the drives, is there any way i can distinguish what disk "\Device\Harddisk2\DR2" is?

I imagine it is just as stated disk 2 in disk management?

bledd · 1 Sep 2016 at 13:45

Check in Disk Management, it lists disk names on the left.

RMA the drive.

When new drive turns up, plug it in and restore your backup to the new drive.

FloppyPoppy · 1 Sep 2016 at 13:47

bledd said:
Check in Disk Management, it lists disk names on the left.

RMA the drive.

When new drive turns up, plug it in and restore your backup to the new drive.

I will need to check the RMA process as i bought this along with the other 2 5TB drives the other day on MM, Going to backup the drive to something now but, is there any use in trying a format of this drive first to see if the problem persists? before perusing a RMA?

bledd · 1 Sep 2016 at 13:47

In event viewer, you can 'Filter Current Log' on the right, filter by...

Event sources.
disk, Disk

See how often this is happening, a format can help sometimes, but in my experience, once a disk starts going bad, time to call it a day.

FloppyPoppy · 1 Sep 2016 at 13:54

bledd said:
In event viewer, you can 'Filter Current Log' on the right, filter by...

Event sources.
disk, Disk

See how often this is happening, a format can help sometimes, but in my experience, once a disk starts going bad, time to call it a day.

Well i am going to backup and format and see if it persists, i don't see why it should be causing my windows to have issues though as the drive with the errors is my backup drive that basically has copy's of some files IE mod files for games, operating systems and such so in short windows should not be accessing it as nothing is installed there and nothing is being read from there.

As i said i will format it and monitor the situation over the next few days if it persists i will remove the drive for RMA that in the meantime will allow me to see if my problem persists with the drive gone.

It's a shame to think that it's not survived long at all. Given that it's a drive made for 24/7 operation for several years

bledd · 1 Sep 2016 at 14:55

harry5522 said:
Sorry for the probably simple questions i don't really delve to much into the software side of these things im more of a plug and play user when it comes to storage .

Not at all mate, happy to help. I'm kind of drip feeding responses instead of giving you one huge response.

1 bad drive can completely stop Explorer from doing anything. Some systems are unusable depending on the type of error.

I guess it's a design flaw in Windows. For now, try removing the disk from your PC (just disconnect the SATA cable) and see if Windows works normally again.