files are slow to open

[johnrs58]

Greetings...I am new to this sort of thing and hope I am in the right place. I need help from someone who has had a similar problem and can help me. My problem has only occured in the last week or so. When I try to open a file in the drop down box in Word the drop down box freezes for about 30 seconds and when it does open and I try to go to the next level for a file the same thing happens again. I have tried numerous things but nothing works. Have searched exhaustively through Google and while there have been many suggestions none have worked. I am operating in XP professional with Office 2003. I have more than enough ram. I reinstalled Office and still no change. I have tried numerous programs which say they can fix it but nothing works. I use Trend Micro and Ad-Aware and have been using them for some time without any probs. I am now starting to get paranoid and thinking maybe microsoft have caused the problem in order to get us to upgrade to their latest programs. thanks in advance for any help that anyone might be able to provide. John

There are some possibilities below:

1. A Virus / Malware
2. Your disk needs defragmentation

Make sure you have Trend Micro's latest updates.

Don't take the foll statement as offence:

I personally suggest people asking me about a good antivirus to use Avast. I had a superb experience with avast. It had removed about 20 viruses, 20 trojans, 1 ad ware and 1 spy ware from my box (when I was using XP, now I use Linux).

You should try out Avast if Trend cannot find any viruses.

[johnrs58]

Thanks for your help. i defragged, upddated and ran Trend Micro and Ad-Aware and even downloaded and ran Avast which did not show any viruses...I even ran Registry Easy which helps to speed up the computer but so far nothing has worked! I have decided to pay for a technician to have a look but if anyone has any other suggestions I am all ears. Thanks in advance.
John

[jholland1964]

Hi welcome to daniweb, First of all, you said you all ready had Trend Micro so installing another anti-virus program was a mistake. Rule #1. ONE anti-virus program should run on a machine. Uninstall Avast. It is a great program but you can't run two.
#2. Registry Easy is not really a recommended program, plus "playing with" the registry unless you know 100% exactly what you are doing is a big mistake. Hopefully you made back ups of the registry before using this program.

Now we need much more information:
You say you have...

more than enough ram.

Well exactly how much is that? How large is your hard drive and how full is it?
Please do this:
Download HiJackThis and run a System Scan with it and save the log. Post back here with that log.

Here is some info on how to test if there is a corrupt file or add-in with Word from the Troubleshoot Word website:

If Word is not launching for you at all or is crashing or freezing as soon as it comes on the screen, odds are your global template is corrupt or something is loading automatically in your Word Startup folder that is misconfigured or corrupt. To see if it's a corrupt global template or some add-in that is loading on startup, go to your Start button and click on Run. In the Run box, type "winword.exe /a" (without the quotes, but WITH the space before the slash). If Word launches OK, then it probably is either a bad normal.dot file or a corrupt add-in (since this switch launches Word with a clean, empty template and no add-ins). To get yourself a new, uncorrupt template, simply close Word and search your computer for normal.dot and rename or delete it. (If you find more than one, rename or delete ALL of them.) When you launch Word again, it will look for normal.dot and if it can't find it, it will create a new one.

[johnrs58]

Thanks for your input, it is much appreciated. I just had an external technician have a look and he managed to find and fix the problem for me. Apparently it all started when I purchased and installed a new multifunction printer. For some reason a memory card appeared on my network drive and it is this that was causing all of the problems. The technician simply disconnected/disabled the memory card and the problem rectified itself. We do not know why or how the memory card came to be on my machine and not on any of the others connceted to the network, and disconnecting it has not interfered in my use of the new printer.

I have taken your advice and deleted the Avast antivirus program, but in doing so am now wondering if I should keep it over Trend as Avast is at least free to use...what do you think? If Avast is the better program then I would be happy to purchase it and use it over all of my pc's for my business.

Thanks again,
John

[jholland1964]

Avast is an excellent program, and as you say, it's free. I highly recommend it.