fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2276 ]

[ SECRET POST #2276 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2276 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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02.

[The Vikings]

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03.

[Homestuck]

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04.

[Spartacus]

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05.

[Zettai Karen Children, The Unlimited Hyoubu Kyousuke]

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06.

[From Eroica With Love]

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[Naruto]

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08.

[Homestuck]

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09.

[Ava's Demon]

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[Zero Escape]

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11.

[Colin John Rudd]

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12.

[Once Upon a Time]

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[ASOIAF/Game of Thrones]

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14.

[Community]

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[Evangelion]

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[Discworld]

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17.

[FFIV (Rydia)]

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[Teen Wolf/Harry Potter]

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Notes:

Sorry, late day at work.

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 050 secrets from Secret Submission Post #325.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 1 - not!secrets ], [ 1 - not!fandom ], [ 1 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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A few months back, my computer started having this problem:

After having it on a few hours, everything gets slower. It's especially notable when doing things like playing videos, music, opening programs (or even switching tabs or scrolling down in a browser) or loading "heavy" webpages. When playing videos, it will make the videos sort of... skip? making the audio that was playing screech like it's getting stuck, and skipping parts of the video (about 2-4 seconds, every ten seconds, give or take).

The only solution seems to be to restart the computer.

Is this something to do with RAM memory? There appears to be an allotted "number" of stuff my computer can do before it starts slowing down like this, but it's getting shorter and shorter over the months!

Is it a virus? Is my computer just too old? I know they're making computers and OSs to last less and less with every generation to make you buy a new one >:[, but dammit, I don't have the money to upgrade components or computer.

The OS is Windows XP Home Edition SP3, AMD Athlon 64 Processor 3500+ 991 MHz, 960 MB RAM, hard disk 186 GB

This is part venting and part a plea for help. :(

The OS is Windows

Well there's your problem.

ayrt

I somehow knew that was going to be the first answer.

I am this close to switching to Linux Mint. This close.

It really isn't that bad of an idea, honestly. (I can't really specifically talk about Mint though, I'm pretty much Ubuntu or bust, but Linux just runs so much SMOOTHER than Windows for basic browsing+office suite use that I only recommend Windows for gamers.)

This is obnoxious and doesn't help anyone. If you're just going to post to be smug about a fucking operating system then don't bother at all.

Forgot to mention:

The hard disk is about 2/3 full; would going on a deleting spree to free up space help?

I'm not too knowledgeable about computers but I'd say if your hard drive is rather full that could be part of the problem. Maybe back up your files then delete them? If that doesn't fix your issues, maybe you need to upgrade your computer or something...

:( IDK, hopefully someone else can be more helpful.

I just nuked a good chunk of it (now it's about 60% full), and if I see improvement I'll keep at it.

Thanks. c:

You don't have a lot of memory, and it's possible one of your programs is a memory hog.

If you use Firefox, try just shutting it down and restarting it. But before you restart it, check Task Manager to make sure there isn't another copy of it running -- if there is, kill it.

If you don't use Firefox, or if that doesn't help, try doing the same thing with other programs you're using. If you can identify a culprit, shutting down a single task takes a lot less time than rebooting the computer.

ayrt

I am using Firefox. I'll have to check that, thank you
!

I think a lot of the problem is that you're running a computer with very low specs compared to the current standard. As a comparison, my mid-end laptop has eight gigs of RAM! On top of that, the older a computer get, the more things wear out, so yeah, the age likely doesn't help.

If updating isn't possible for you right now, then there's a few things you can do:

- Defrag and clear out your hard drive. Uninstall unused programs! Go for having about a third of your hard drive filled up.

- Minimise the amount of things that are running at the same time. If you have Skype, multiple web browser windows, music, as well as stuff running in the background? That's all competing for the limited RAM you have. Shut down background applications you aren't using and try to stick to a limited amount of tabs.

- What antivirus are you running? Some of them can be very bloated and slow your computer down hogging RAM. Norton is a notable offender, but I've had problems with AVG. Consider swapping to a free and lighter one! I use Avast, but do your research as I have stated I am running a computer with much better specs.

- When playing video, drop tp the lower qualities. This may help with loading lag, which is what's causing the audio skips.

- In general, just accept that you are very much on the lower end of the spectrum, and that people are currently developing their websites, videos, and programs for computers with a lot more clout than yours. Take advantage of low end solutions when provided, and just try and be patient.

- If everything's stuffing up and just running TOO slow, then the computer might benefit from being turned off for a while and left to cool down. Also, definitely give it a really good clean out - dust clogging up overworked hardware can lead to overheating, which will make your computer stall even more. If you don't feel comfortable unscrewing a computer don't do it - Get a savvy friend or the like to help.

This is all pretty general advice and I'm not an expert in this stuff at all, but I hope it helps a little. In the end though, your problem is that your computer is very old and outdated, and until you can fix that, you'll just have to live with it. :(

Sadly seconding this. My computer has 2gigs of ram and I can only run two major programs at a time before things start slowing down. So pretty much all what deenaa said, and then what I also found that helps is to keep the Activity Monitor (or whatever it's called in Windows) up of all your running programs/the memory space they're using. That way you can identify problem programs so to speak, and get a feel for what combinations your computer can handle.

I have defragged and uninstalled everything I dared. I will keep freeing up more space, though.

I only really have Firefox running, and every now and then, Windows Media Player, but the problems happen even if it's only Firefox, and even if I only have like 5 tabs open.

I am using Panda Cloud Antivirus Free. I have no idea how much of a memory hog it is (but the whole "being online all the time" can't be helping, right?)

Video quality: I'll have to try that.

! Dust! I don't know why I didn't think of that. I've had a lot of dust problems lately in the house. I'll have to open it up and clean it. Thanks for the tip!

Thanks for all the advice, this is exactly the kind of information I wanted to get! c:

Firefox is actually quite a bit of a hog itself when it comes to web browsers! Especially if you're running multiple addons. Does Firefox come with a built in task manager like Chrome? You might find that one of your addons or a particular tab is sucking up all the RAM.

Firefox also has had problems with memory leaks if I recall, so keep an eye on it in general!

As for Panda, I have no idea! It'd be a good idea to google and see what other users have to say. Might be fine, might be terrible!

Good luck with the rest! Be careful dusting it out, and hopefully it runs a bit better with some love and care! :3

Firefox has a NASTY memory leak that's just gotten worse over the years. I actually switched to Chrome because, while there can still be memory issues, each tab is its own individual process, and thus I have much more control over closing the thing that's decided to eat up all my memory. (Google Reader and Gmail and Facebook LOVE to do this.)

However, you do IMO want to look at an upgrade. FWIW those specs were low end and years out of date when I built my last computer in 2007. It is not really much of a surprise that you're having issues, because everything is being updated to keep up with modern computer tech and specs. :(

Some things you can do that can help...
-Cleaning out your files to free up space
-Organizing your documents better (no folders with 10,000 images, break that shit up into smaller collections)
-Uninstalling any programs you don't use, especially games and junky pre-packaged shit
-Cleaning off your desktop (goofy but it can do wonders)
-Emptying your recycle bin if you haven't in a while
-Running your disk defrag a few times
-Buy an external harddrive, back up everything you want to save, and wipe the computer (this assumes you still have whatever boot disks you might need and should be a last resort)
-If you know what you're doing, you can carefully dust out the fans and inside of your computer (I wouldn't recommend this if you aren't computer savvy though)

Also, I don't know exactly how old your computer is, but XP is several generations behind the current Windows OS so I'm guessing its pretty old. PCs have NEVER been built by any company to be current for more than a few years, and wear, tear, and dust can be an issue.

You can do some good dusting even without being computer savvy. Get a can of compressed air, a dust mask***, turn off the computer and bring it to a ventilated area** or outdoors. Keep the can upright and point the nozzle about half an inch away from a holey opening and squeeze out a burst of air. It's the sudden gust of wind that's most effective at blowing dust out so you'll want hard quick squeezes, not hard long squeezes.

If you have a laptop, clean out the air vents (where hot air comes out) and your keyboard. If you have a desktop tower, take off at least one side panel* and clean out any fans, cooling coils and hard drives. You should be fine as long as you remember to not touch anything inside the computer and to keep some distance between the nozzle and the part you're cleaning. :D

*If you are not comfortable taking off the side panels, you can still dust the tower by blowing air into visible openings. It won't be as effective and will take longer to get dust out is all.

**You don't want the dust to linger around indoors, right? Unless you're willing to vacuum and wipe everything after, it's better to do this outdoors. If you got a desktop, take a picture of the back of the computer where all the cables are so you'll know where to replug them later. Computers now use cables that are one-way only and some cables (like non-USB keyboards and mice cables and mic/speaker cables) are color-coded. There is almost no way you can get them in wrong!

***Very recommended. Especially if you have a 10-year-old desktop that had never been dusted. Even a bandanna is better than nothing. Trust me.

You want to be careful using compressed air on the fans, though; it is possible to break them by causing them to spin too fast. No sustained bursts of air directly at the fans. Even better, hold them in place with a q-tip or something or wipe them down manually instead.

Those are things I already did, sadly. I have already backed up everything I would miss, so I'm going to try to start over (maybe with Linux).

I'll have to check for dust first, as that is probably a likely culprit!

Thank you very much for the tips!

Do you ever use disk defragmentation or disk cleanup? Is your drive partitioned between critical files and your personal files? Do you have a lot of programs running at once, or are using memory-heavy programs, or have useless programs running the background sucking up all your memory? I was using Windows XP (AMD Athlon, too, with a lot less HDD space than yours) until just recently, and I'm starting to realize how much maintenance I was really using to keep it going. I was defragging and deleting files and programs all the time, being careful how much I ran at once, but it was as fast as could be expected until I finally replaced it. You might have to up your cleaning game until you can afford a replacement, just my two cents. Good luck.

I think I did/kept an eye on all that, except for the partitioning. Does that really help?

If it's a desktop, definitely check to see whether your tower is clogged with dust bunnies. Overheating can actually have a pretty big impact on computer performance. Like people have said, you want to be careful with the actual cleaning, but it's usually pretty easy to open the casing on a desktop to at least check whether that's part of the problem. If you're not comfortable doing that, you might be able tell by just looking into the vents on the back. If there's dust coated on the fan or clumped up on the vents, get it cleaned out.

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[ SECRET POST #2276 ]

computer help?? :(

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