[lukeram]

Worst OS ever.
Here are my problems. Please help.
Just so you know no i do not want to format and re-install windows "just because". I would like to avoid that if possible.
Ok so here are my computer stats, i know they're crap i will be buying a beast when i get back from europe.
AMD Athlon 1800+ 266MHz FSB
512MB PC2100 DDR SDRAM
Epox 8KHA
Creative Labs Soundblaster Audigy Digital Entertainment
Windows Vista Home Premium (Legit)
NVidia 64mb GeForce3 Ti200
Thermaltake Volcano 7 TC Fan
19" LCD
2 megabit Cable connection.

Ok so my problems are:
1. Nothing updates. I update firefox daily, and i have a windows update from the 13/3 which fails to update every day. iTunes won't update, AVG attempts the same update daily. And yes, they all have access to the internet and yes my internet is working, no active firewall's apart from windows defender.
2. My graphics are slow (weren't bad with XP, were actually really good). I know this may be due to a big part of vista being based on graphics.
3. My sound is horrible - while playing any music there are jumps in it. Im not sure whether this is due to the lack of ram - hence the computer being slow. But the sound was incredible with XP. (I have all the updated drivers as far as i am aware, whether they have installed or not who knows).
4. I can't get any decent graphics programs to download, please suggest some. Photoshop and corel aren't available for vista unless you update from SE2 (photoshop) and then run the beta. But i can't run SE2, i have installed, uninstalled and installed numerous times but when i go to register it says the registration program has an error, i have tried different source files etc but still no luck. Corel is just crap in equivalent.
Thats all i can think of for now, but please do help.
Oh, the error code i get when using windows update is: 800736CC
Surprise surprise, "Host services for Windows has just stopped working and was closed"
Nice.
Windows wont refund my money for lack of program compatibility will they? Because i really think i would be better off running XP.

Thanks again.
Luke - Australia

[Rollin' Rog]

First I have to tell you that I don't think you have near enough horsepower in that system to run Vista with decent performance. Start by disabling Aero if it is enabled.

I think your Windows Update issue is due to corrupted downloads -- just a guess.

Here is a list of "performance" related questions I usually ask. You've answered some of them. But pay attention to item 6 in the list, some of your symptoms parallels others whose IDE controller has fallen out of Ultra DMA mode.

>>> You're going to have to ignore the "commit charge" directions to fit Vista -- they were written for XP. But just report on what Vista reports your current memory usage percentage is. Access it by opening the Task Manager (right click on quicklaunch), then check the memory usage.

1 > is it very slow to boot up?
2 > do programs open slowly?
3 > does the same behavior occur both on and off the internet. Or with no connection at all?
4 > does it matter how long the system has been on, and does a restart improve things?

Slow performance issues can often be due to overheating, so if the system is faster after it has been shutdown for a while and then restarted -- that would be especially suspect. To check for possible problems here, shutdown, open the case and blow out any accumulated dust. Then turn it
on and check to see that the fan is working. Sometimes it helps to physically clean the fan.

If a laptop, check to see that the vent is clear of dust and verify the fan is working. Temps and fan speed can usually be monitored with SpeedFan (except on Dell desktops), a free utility.

5 > if you do a ctrl-alt-del, do any processes show excess cpu usage, other than System Idle Process?

6 > If you open the Device Manager (run devmgmt.msc) and select the entry for IDE ATA/Atapi and select the Primary IDE > Advanced Settings, does it say the "current transfer mode" is Ultra DMA or PIO?

If it says PIO or even just DMA (rather than “ULTRA” DMA, first ensure "Use DMA if Available” is selected, then select the driver tab and uninstall the driver and reboot. Then check again.

*note that the above will not apply to RAID drive configurations.
___________________________________________________________________________ _
COMMIT CHARGE

Do ctrl-alt-del to open up the task manager. Select the "performance" tab. Let me know what you see under:

Memory

edited ....

[lukeram]

ok here's a reply:
1. no, boots relatively quickly, no problems
2. programs do open slowly once the OS has booted, for example. Desktop is showing, clikc to run msn messenger or firefox and i will wait 2 mins and nothing will happen, click it again later and it will. Or after a minute or so 2 will load or however many times i clicked. i know this makes it run slower.
3. Yes same behaviour, im pretty sure.
4. generally no change unless its been on for a few days.
5. just Iexpore.exe, 44000KB
6. there are 2 channels
ATA Channel 0 has (in advanced settings)
Target id 0 & 1 Ultra DMA mode 5
Channel 1 has only multi-world DMA mode 2 for both target id's of 0 & 1.

its not a laptop.

Under the performance tab, memory is running at between 350-360mb.
Or according to the windows sidebar which i have since closed, around 60-80% usage.

What are your thoughts. Should i just revert to XP and throw vista in the trash? Because when i get back from europe im going to be spending 4000-5000 on a laptop

[lukeram]

Corrupted downloads for the updating? Each i have downloaded different ones, somehow i dont think its corrupted downloads considering its every automated update process

[Rollin' Rog]

Well the main thing might be your processor speed as far as the performance goes -- and when you start reaching 80 percent ram usage you will probably find the disk drive being paged a lot -- which slows things down.

But I'm not sure this explains ALL your issues. If you are getting corrupt downloads that might be due to processor instability. Heat is a possibility.

On the Processor usage question -- you are looking for the CPU usage for individual processes, not the memory usage.

Failed Windows Updates for example, in XP (not sure about Vista), often result in svchost going wonkers.

You might try some manual downloads of updates and see if you can get those without error.

What are my thoughts on running Vista on that system -- well if you have the retail CD I would save it for a more powerfull system and go back to XP.

I just bought (lol, impulse buy at Newegg) a "Vista Business" system with 512 ram and a 352 Celeron D (3.2ghz).

The processor rocks and gives me frame rates 50 percent faster than my P4 2.54 ghz running visual apps that don't depend on the Display card.

But Vista itself is slower on this system than XP SP2 on my Notebook with a Celeron 2.4 ghz processor and 512 mb of memory

>> Your IDE channels, by the way, are just what they should be.

>> on the update error, there's not much to be found except that it might be a "file hash mismatch" error.

http://groups.google.com/groups/sear...or&qt_s=Search

[lukeram]

Fair enough. F**kin hassle with reloading XP but. I actually attempted to just run xp but my screen was refreshing really slowly, ie. when i would scroll down a web page it would run down the entire screen. Something im not familiar with haha my screen has a 6ms refresh rate.
But seeing how long it has taken microsoft to release a new OS with so little difference i am actually buying a mac when i get back. Sure i can't get a few programs but its smooth sailing on the other side of the boat.

[spdabbs]

Usually, the slow refresh is a lack of driver issue. If it's an AGP card, you'll need the mobo AGP drivers and the graphics card drivers installed. If PCI-E, just the graphics driver should be OK - though any mobo drivers available should ideally be installed anyway

[Rollin' Rog]

Yeah, I agree with the above -- there may be something wrong with your display driver compatibility and you are not running at full hardware acceleration

[mindnumb]

My system behaves much the same way regarding problems with installing most software.
I have a dualboot system with xp and vista, so I have tested this. When I download most anything from vista, installing it is a no go, but rebooting into xp, downloading it there, rebooting to vista, and installing for the most part works... Do any of you guys know if there is some kind of download accelerator or other software that messes with the downloads? For other people experiencing this, I recommend testing it by downloading the software you want to another machine, and transeferring by a cd or memory stick to your vista problem child.