I built a comp for my dad a few weeks ago and it seems to be really slow despite being over built in terms of its usage (surfing net, MS Office, watching movies) Everything is slow from startup to loading a simple webpage. Everything in the computer seems fine, but the HDD makes a loud whining sound like a turbo jet trying to take off and its always like that.

I'm thinking i need to replace the HDD, what do you guys think?


System specs:
AMD athlon x2 3800+ stock
2x 1gb Corsair xms2
1x 1gb OCZ platinum rev.1
1x 1gb g.skill green one
IGP Radeon x1250
MSI K9AGM3
Dynapower 500w PSU
Stock AMD Opty Cooler w/ heatpipes
CD-R
WD 180gb HDD

I'm inclined to agree. Do operations NOT USING the HD run slow too?

The loud sound makes the drive the leading suspect. Otherwise you might look at malware or a corrupt install first. A faulty drive can definitely cause a system to slow.

Your dad has been looking @ pornz.

you sure the whirring sound isn't the DVD drive trying to read a disk?

Try defragging the hard drive, run some anti spyware programs, and scan with an antivirus program, make sure no dvd's are in the dvd drive, start there and work your way up.

Are all the different rams chip running at the same freqency? the HDD seems to be a good place to start maybe get AVG Free Ed. make sure its up to date and scan it to be sure. Maybe check your registries aswell, I think it could be a bad install on the software side of things what OS you using?

2x 1gb Corsair xms2
1x 1gb OCZ platinum rev.1
1x 1gb g.skill green one

Is it OK to mismatch ram like that in dual channel mode? I always buy in pairs. maybe since it is so easy to do, pull out the two mismatched sticks of ram and see if the problem goes away.

Back to the hard drive. You could use western digital's hard drive utilities to test the hard drive. You can download it here:
http://support.wdc.com/download/?cxml=n&pid=999&swid=3

Other things that could be the problem include the cable, the connectors, and the southbridge on the motherboard.

Other things to try would include removing all things not essential to the build such as a sound card.

I agree with HamRadio remove all no essential component go from there... you can mismatch ram but make sure they are either all dualsided or single sided also make sure they are at the same freqency....

i'm thinking its the hard drive because everything else that doesn't require the hard drive, goes super quick. so i know its not RAM, because of that, but i will use the WD utility someone suggested.

If you want an awsome boot disk, google Ultimate Boot CD or UBCD... It has everything you need for testing...

• 2x 1gb Corsair xms2
• 1x 1gb OCZ platinum rev.1
• 1x 1gb g.skill green one

I would seriously consider removing the slow sticks of RAM, mixed RAM is known to cause problems for some motherboards, and 4GB is overkill with that setup anyways. And I'm gonna take a wild guess and say if you installed vista, uninstall it and install XP. I would have 2GB of RAM for everyday tasks but I wouldn't want it compromised because of the other sticks speeds (they all have to run at the same speed...kill the weakest link, cpu-z is your friend).

The usual suspects

1) The HDD obviously
2) The PSU (Voltages might be off, this might be fixed in the BIOS if so)
3) The MOBO (Try updating the BIOS)
4) The Mixed 4 sticks of RAM (3 different brands, and probably 3 different timings and who knows what else)

Easy ways to decide who is being bad..

1) Swap out his HDD with another one, if you have more than one PC this shouldn't be hard.
2) Swap out his PSU with yours temporarily if the voltages don't look right or if you're still scratching your head
3) Not many ways to test for MOBO issues that I know of, check for bad settings in the BIOS like PCI-E running at 1x instead of 16x...you know the obvious
4) Reduce the RAM to 1 Brand if you can, otherwise just remove the slower sticks

Very unlikely causes

1) The CPU (Test it if all else fails)
2) The OS (More likely if he is running vista to be the issue, but a very unlikely cause)
3) Registry (Clear it out with CCleaner or a similar program)
4) Viruses/etc (Use respective programs)
5) Disable everything in msconfig except for your Anti-Virus and reboot
6) PCI Devices
7) Devices sharing the same IRQ (Look in Hardware Manager)

took out the hdd and everything is all better. thanks guys!