Installed case fan, boot time increased by 5 min. Please help!

[Spitfire7]

My Specs:
Core 2 Duo E6600 2.4GHz
EVGA 8800GT Superclocked (Core 700, Mem 975)
2GB Corssair XMS2 DDR2 800 (4-4-4-12 2.1v)
700w OCZ GamerXStream PSU
EVGA 680i Mobo
320GB Hard drive 16MB cache 7200RPM
Windows XP

My load times have always been pretty long using XP with my setup and is almost up to a minute or more from power on, but my load light was always working and doing something and I just got use to it. I just installed two small spot fans and as soon as I powered on my boot times have gone from a minute or so now to about 6 minutes. Windows will even load without icons, windows bar, or anything but sits there looking at my desk top background for about 3 minute or so and sits idle. Then after the 3 minutes of idle my load light starts working like crazy and everything comes on. Keep in mind its not a lock up because I can still move my mouse as soon as I enter into windows, just no icons or features.

I tried unplugging the fans and restarting my computer and that didn't work and it still takes extra long. I then installed all new divers for everything including BIOS, CMOS, MOBO, GPU, and Sound Card. Still the same thing. What the heck is going on? There's no way I can be short of power. I have one of the best PSU's. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Spitfire7]

I do have an anti-virus program at startup that I have been using forever and never a problem. I also have about 177GB free. I have had this brand new XP installed for about 6 months without a problem. This all just happened this night as soon as I installed the fans.

I also, double checked every cable and uplugged and plugged back in just in case. I also turned off and unplugged my PSU and then hit computer power on and off several times to decharge any static. Just for kicks I am going to turn off my virus program and restart. I have had it running for the entire 6 months without a problem. Thank you for responding. Please give me more ideas.

 

[richenbals]

You can rule the fans out of the equation based on the fact that you got the long load times even after unplugging them (even though they shouldn't have anything to do with load times to begin with). My guess is that something got bumped, hit, or knocked out of place when installing the fans. Make sure none of the fan wires are laying on moving parts.
I honestly can't think of what could have happened after installing two fans that would increase load time.

 

[Spitfire7]

I double checked every connection and all wires are clear. I just did a full virus scan and AD-ware scan and still nothing came up. The night before all of this happened I shut the computer down normally and then the next day started up like a champ and shut down normally again. I even reseated my RAM and switched it around to see if that may have something to do with it. Nothing. Could this be a power issue of my PSU going out and plugging those new fans in shorted out something?

 

[Strobeflux]

just a question, you didnt happen to install nTune the night before everything started to go slowly?

that happened to me, after installing nTune and rebooting the system could take several more minutes than usual to boot up. not sure if thats the case here, but just mentioning!

if something is shorted the PSU shouldnt let the system boot up at all.
*read: shouldnt , some might try still *

 

[Strobeflux]

but. just in case, if you have nTune, uninstall it, and try rebooting.
if so, your system would fly as normal again.

 

[Spitfire7]

well I have always had nTune and its always worked fine. So nothing has changed there. I kind of like it too. nTune does install a lot of start up stuff, so I just turned everything off in msconfig/startup programs and its always been fine enough for me. Thanks for the idea.