Pause at startup

[[AK]Abaddon]

Hi guys,

Ever since I built my computer, it has suffered from an occasional LONG pause at startup. The desktop background image will show in Windows, the little logon screen will popup and disappear, and then I'll get an hourglass display and everything will freeze for more than a minute. This does not happen every time, and seems to correlate with nothing ... I've tried deleting all my temp files, but it does not change. Any ideas? I keep thinking it must be related to the networking ... I am connected directly to a DSL modem through an internal Ethernet card.

[AK]Abaddon

[[AK]The Beast]

You may want to check your Startup folder in Start Menu\Programs. Make sure there's not Microsoft FindFast or anything useless like that; FindFast in particular can take forever to load. Also....if you're running virus protection, check its scheduled tasks. Make sure it's not going out to the internet looking for updates.

------------------
[AK]The Beast
"Get busy livin'...or get busy dyin'." -Tim Robbins, The Shawshank Redemption

[[AK]Abaddon]

Hey Beast,

Thanks for the advice. I had already cleaned out my startup folder, but still encountered the problem. With NOTHING loading in the startup folder, it still happens about half the time I start my computer.

[AK]Abaddon

[Zorro]

Don't suppose the delays happen to coincide with you have CD's in the CD drive, do they?

[AK]Zorro

Chief Operations Officer
<a href="http://www.augustknights.com" target="_blank">AugustKnights.com</a> WizOp

[[AK]Goob]

Here is a shot.... What kind of connection do you have? Cable/dsl? Static IP or dynamic. One thing I have seen is that if you have dhcp set up to get an IP from your isp when you boot up..and it doesnt give you one right away, windows will pause untill it gets an IP or times out. This is just something I have noticed with my connection in the past. Don't know if this is the case, just something to possibly look at.

Also if you have 98 or ME, run msconfig and turn of any programs that will start up at boot.

hope this helps at all

Goob

[The Wraith]

How "old" is your Windows installation and how many programs have you "uninstalled"? What might be happening is your Windows registry is large from old programs that haven't been completely removed. You might try using a registry clean-up program.

Regards,
The Wraith

------------------
Moderator - UBB Code Hacking
InfoPop Corporation - Ultimate Bulletin Board
http://www.ultimatebb.com

"Breaker of UBB code, worldwide..."

[[AK]Abaddon]

Hiya folks

It does not appear to coincide with a CD in the drive. I'll try the msconfig program and see what I can do with it.
Thanks.

Hey Wraith, my install is only about a month old ... I haven't taken many programs off.

System specs:
PIII 667 (overclocked to 733)
256 mb RAMBUS memory
Two hard drives - WD Caviar 6.4 gig and IBM 15.2 gig
TNT2 32mb video card
Creative Soundblaster LIVE X-Gamer
Kingston Ethernet 10/100 adaptor
Efficient Networks Speedstream DSL (modem?)

My version of Windows 98 is very old. I have downloaded all the updates for it, though.

The time of the delay changed when I installed my sound card two days ago. It now pauses with my windows logon on the screen, instead of flashing it off and then pausing.

What I am afraid of now is that I have some form of virus/trojan that is calling home at startup. The delay happens before my firewall is loaded, and I cannot see if there is outbound ethernet activity.

Thanks for the suggestions, y'all.

John

[[AK]Abaddon]

Hey Goob,

Your idea about msconfig was dead-on. There was a bunch of crap that started up with boot, but was not visible in my startup directory. It now takes about 40 seconds for my computer to restart!

Now my question is ... how do I disable the Windows password logon? I really don't want to have to sit here and wait to hit ENTER every time I boot.

[Zorro]

Hey, Ab... I know exactly what the problem is now. The SB Live! install stuff puts a program that checks for new versions of the software. It's called Live!Update or some such. The trick is to tell it to not check for updates, and your computer will load MUCH faster. Sorry I didn't think of that before...

[AK]Zorro

Chief Operations Officer
<a href="http://www.augustknights.com" target="_blank">AugustKnights.com</a> WizOp

[[AK]Abaddon]

Hey Zorro,

There's no program called LiveUpdate or anything similar on my machine. As far as I can tell, the Creative card's only software is its drivers.

The lag was happening before I installed the card - it just occurred then BEFORE the windows logon prompt came up. Now it occurs AFTER that.

[Zorro]

If you have the Live Task Bar thingy loaded (which I don't, BTW...doesn't seem to be a good reason for it), on one of the sub-menus you'll see a little lightbulb with a down arrow button next to it. Hit the down arrow, and, as I recall, you'll be presented with the option to make Live Update stop checking for new software or something. That should speed things up. I'm guessing that the stuff that you ripped out with msinfo32 and the elimination of the Live!Update stuff, you'll get rid of all the delays...

[AK]Zorro

Chief Operations Officer
<a href="http://www.augustknights.com" target="_blank">AugustKnights.com</a> WizOp

[[AK]The Beast]

To disable the Windows Logon password dialog box, just create a new logon with a blank password and hit OK. The computer will use that login automatically every time your computer starts up.

------------------
[AK]The Beast
"Get busy livin'...or get busy dyin'." -Tim Robbins, The Shawshank Redemption

[Wolff]

Now I think about it, my comp takes way too long to boot. It goes through the BIOS init, then flickers to the ME splash screen. At the splash, it stays there for at least 45 seconds without any activity. Even when there's no CD in the CD-Rom drive. After the 45 seconds, the comp kicks into gear and loads everything quite quickly.

Any ideas?

Wolff