about 2 weeks ago my computer started to run rather slow on some games(even the simplest of them) and its been running slower then normal. When i check my cpu performance it is normally running around 50% performance when i dont even have anything runnin! I tried seeing what programs were using up the CPU but it said it was 98% idle? odd? The only changes i actually know on my computer that i have made was #1 installed a game and #2 got some more ram. I did virus scans, defrag, disk clean up and its still running slow. Any help or ideas on the situation would be welcomed.

Man watch this topic get hammered with answers. Did you install any type of software then noticed this? In your task manager under processes what is running? Get back to us.

Hmm well quite a few programs running, dont even know what most of them do.
winmgmt.exe
WINLOGON.exe
waol.exe
wanmpsvc.exe
tcpsvcs.exe
taskmgr.exe
System Idle Process(says 94% but in performance it says 40% is being used)
System
SymTray.exe
svchost.exe
svchost.exe(yeah 2 of em)
spoolsv.exe
snmp.exe
smss.exe
shellmon.exe
services.exe
regsvc.exe
nvsvc32.exe
NRPROTECT.EXE
NOPDB.EXE
NISUM.EXE
NAVASPVC.EXE
mstask.exe
MDM.EXE
LSASS.EXE
inetinfo.exe
GhostStartTrayA
GHOSTS~2.EXE
GBTray.exe
GBPoll.exe
explorer.exe
csrss.exe
CCPXYSVC.EXE
CCEVTMGR.EXE
ccApp.exe
aolwbspd.exe
acsd.exe

Those are all the programs running in processes, 37 in all. I dont know what most of them do.

This is also what my computer runs on
74.5GB seagate HD(33.9GB left)
Athlon XP 1800+
Gforce FX5200
785 333DDR
SB Live!
Kt333 Dragon Lite

Im sorry but best I can track this problem back to is a game I installed (FF11) which I can't really tell any diffrence in which it runs. There might have been some other installed software because I let my family use my computer too.

If any of those above processes look strange tell me about it becuase it gives me a access denied on some of these.

Is it possible that my sound card might cause this? because some of my sounds have sounds have been delayed or choppy lately.

If u need any more information post it and ill try to get back to u on it.

Hello,

My *guess* is that you have Gaobot virus or the Sasser. There is an extensive writeup at www.symantec.com about it. You did say that you scanned with an antivirus tool... were the definitions current? I would get *today's* definitions and look at it.

It is also unfortuntate that Windows doesn't have a TOP command to see how much CPU time has been consumed historically by a particular process. On my Mac OS X box, I was able to tell that the Palm Pilot software wasn't consuming many resources in realtime, but over the course of the week, that time builtup a lot, and I realized the "leak".

Good Luck.

I updated my virus definitions and scanned again. It did find a virus but it isnt the route of my problems. I tried removing my 512 ram to see if it was the problem and it wasnt. Indeed somthing is wrong with my computer thats causing it to have problems because im noticing changes in programs i havn't used in awhlie. The best I can do is hope someone will be able to help with the best of their ability.

I think your problem is software related, rather than hardware related. I'd suggest the heart of it lies in your comment:

"There might have been some other installed software because I let my family use my computer too."

You are unaware what's occurred on your system, and in one way or another Spyware or other problems will likely be slowing your system down. Please work through the suggestions made in the "Helping Yourself" sticky in the Security section of the Forum, and then report back here once you've eliminated those software issues.

This is part of the reason why im not sure if the problem is software related, because I do scan my computer constantly for viruses and spyware and I do have a firewall. I used both spybot and adaware and it wasnt spyware that was causing this. I scanned my computer with 4 virus scans (3 online and one with my nortan), I still cant seem to find the problem. Only thing I can think of is a virus or worm that cant be detected yet or somehow some setting got changed and its causing my computer to run slowly.

Also I asked my family if they had used my computer during the past 3 weeks and it seems no one has used it for awhile.

Still the problem persists and I thank you all for your help. If i can't figure this out soon I might take this to the secruity section.

Make sure that your spyware and AntiVirus tools are the latest versions and updated.

Have you also used 'Disk Cleanup' to clean out temp files, cache files and so on. If those become 'clogged up' then your system performance will suffer.

Yes, they are all up to date. I cleaned all my internet cache, cookies, ect. I defragged my computer too.

I still think your problem is software related, but please post your system specifications so we have a measure to judge by.

Your processor speed, amount of RAM installed, display card and other hardware info is rather necessary to a hardware discussion.