PC can't keep up with fast typing

I got a strange problem that started yesterday.

The typing is acting slow in all programs.
Normally, if I hold down a key it'll write maybe 8 characters a second. Now it is about half that fast or less. It can type about 3 characters a second and that's slowing me down a bit when I write. And it takes an awful long time to move the cursor using the arrow keys.

It is like this in all programs, browsers, Notepad, Outlook Express- simply all programs where I can type.
The CPU load is almost at zero, so it's not caused by CPU overload. The PC itself is not working slower than normal.

I have tried to fix it from the Windows Control Panel. No luck.
From where can I speed up this thing?

 

Have you tried a system restore?

 

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/accessibility/characterrepeatrate.mspx or your third post here. The more precise you can be, the better.

Here, another ATI poller - along with a few notes incase it's a laptop you're experiencing the problem with.

Failing these, maybe someone could suggest a keylog scanner? The possibility exists ....

 

Possible Software Key Logger, run these two online scanners (must accept ActiveX)

01)- Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool (choose run, not download, also choose full system scan):
http://www.microsoft.com/security/malwareremove/default.aspx

02)- Microsoft Windows Live OneCare Online Safety Scanner (run the Protection scan first then the Clean up scan):
http://onecare.live.com/site/en-US/default.htm


HKEY1952

 

No, I disabled Sys Restore many months ago because Sys Restore stopped working. No restore points would work. I got an error message every time I tried to restore the system. I suspect that XP put parts on restore points on the USB connected backup disk that are not always connected.

 

1) The keyboard properties Repeat Rate is on 'fastest'. This is what I had already checked before I started this thread.

2) The ATI HotKey Poller service is not running. I have set it to Manual in WinPatrol. So the ATI Poller can not be the reason to the slowness.

 

Sounds not good.
I'm running the scanner now.

Thank you all so far.




Edit,

I have two "rundll32.exe" running. I think I used to have only one.
The online scanner has not found anything so far, but it has scanned only 1%. This is going to take a while.
If the PC is infected then Norton must have failed me.

 

I have two rundll32s as well, shouldn't be a problem. I know you have a variety of suggestions.

I would download http://www.hijackfree.com/en/hijackfree/ and see what's starting up, disable/uninstall any services you don't need, and see which outbound connections are being made. If it's a program you don't approve, you can stop the connection and delete the file (for example, might be a program trying to repeatedly connect/update slowing you down).

A-squared is also good with keyloggers. You can run a browser scan only - through IE and accepting activex. Do a deep scan, will take awhile. It scans and removes problems. http://www.emsisoft.com/en/software/ax/

 

... and ESET SysInspector (maybe in Safe Mode): http://www.eset.com/download/sysinspector.php


P.

 

If you make it to safe-mode, note whether the condition exists there. I take this isn't a laptop we're referring to?

 

I hadn't thought about safe mode yet. I'll try it.
I didn't say it was not a laptop? Because it is a laptop. (Not sure why this matters though.)

Damn this Microsoft scanner takes long. 3 hours and 30 minutes and it's only at 27%.
I have only a 20 and a 60 GB hard disks and they are only half full.
It seems as nothing bad is found so far.

 

It took a little more than 5 hours, but now is the scan completed, at last.

Microsoft OneCare scanner found nothing. No viruses, no spyware. No ports are open.

Next thing to do is to try safe mode to see if the problem occurs there.
And then run Hijack This.

But it'll have to wait until tomorrow. Thanks for all suggestions, they are appreciated.

 

That it's a laptop matters according to comments made by the folks in my fourth link. Yank the battery, throw it on ac - type.

 

I forgot to check out the fourth link yesterday, I was too sleepy. I'm very surprised to read that the battery can cause this. But my battery is in medium good shape, it's a little over a year old.

I don't know what have happened, but now the keyboard works like normal again. I now can type 260 characters in 10 seconds in Notepad. This is 26 characters a second, opposed to 3 characters a second yesterday.

This was the only I did after my last post here yesterday:

• Restarted and booted into safe mode. The keyboard was fast, in 10 seconds it could type about 260 characters.

• Then I defragged the hard disks (still in safe mode). But I don't think this solved the problem, because typing is not dependent on the hard disk. The hard disk was not very fragmented, Windows told me I did not need to defrag it but I did it anyway because I had not defragged it for several months.

• I did not start Windows to test the typing after I did the above two steps, I just turned off the PC. And when I started Windows today everything worked like normal.

I have no explaination for the problem and why it went away, but I'll post again if the problem returns.

 

You saying here the battery was never disconnected, and only safe mode (reboot, later boot - one and the same) was cycled?

 

Last time the battery was disconnected was a couple months ago.
Last time I ran the PC on battery power was about a month ago. I've only been using AC power (240 volts) since then.

What do you mean with the last half of your post ("cycled")?

 

Boot-in, boot-out .... wind up where you started. Don't fret the explanation of "why" either - electronics is not an exacting science.

Well actually, the other thing might be heat related. This condition exist after a cold boot or goes wonky later on in a session?

Tell'ya what - next time she's slow boot over to BIOS and note her speed, then update your post.

 

Heat:
I did not run games or heavy programmes. If it was caused by overheating, I think the fan would have ran on high gear. It did not.

At one point yesterday I had many browser tabs open and used much RAM (light CPU load), but the problem didn't go away after I logged out and in to Windows (not rebooting, just logging out and in). If I recall correctly, the problem did not occur when I used much RAM.

384 MB hard RAM installed. The page file was (temporary increased to) 1 GB and 800 MB of it was in use at one point.
Hmmm when I think closer, I can recall that this was during the scan process, which means that the problem occured prior to this. So I don't think the memory usage triggered the slowness.



Where I started:

After I left the forum yesterday, I:
1) Shut off the PC.
2) Booted into safe mode as "Admin" (the hidden XP admin account).
3) Tested typing speed in Notepad. It was 26 characters a second.
3) Rebooted.
3) Went into safe mode again, this time I logged in with my own admin account.
4) Tested typing speed in Notepad. It was 26 characters a second.
5) Started the XP defrag tool. The only partion that was a little fragmented was C. The XP defrag program did not recommend defragmenting, but I defragmented all stations anyway. Then I ran a second defrag tool (Power Defragmenter) to defrag some small files that the standard XP defrag tool did not defrag.
6) I shut off the PC and unplugged the power.

7) Today: I plugged in the AC power, booted up and everything was fine!

If you want more info, please ask and be spesific.

 

A hiccup of some sort - we'll let it go for the time being. If she returns at a later date, toy with (level descriptions) hardware acceleration.
I suppose the following could have some impact, detox your system a'lil anyway - temp files cleanup. Alt-1 - sans reg cleaning, alt-2.

 

Thanks.
Who would think that reducing or turning off hardware acceleration can improve the performance? I would think the opposite.
I can try this if the problem returns later.

I have already uninstalled a load of unused programs earlier this year. But I recently noticed that the amount of free space on C: is down to 43%, it used to be around 48%.
The internet cache is deleted every time I close the browser. It must be those other temp files that takes up memory.




EDIT:

I ran the disk cleaner thing in XP. It was able to free up a whopping 5 kB of space.
Seems I have better luck of finding something to clean behind the computer.

 

I know the built-in XP tools aren't the best, but my pc is relatively clean so it's no surprise that it found almost nothing at all.

After the XP cleaner was done, I manually deleted about 150 MB of rubbish. Some leftovers from Adobe Reader, I uninstalled it long time ago but I found 40-50 MB left behind. I also deleted other left-overs and temp files. Some stuff that were not obviously junk and would not been cleaned even by the best cleaners.

I deleted a total of about 150 MB. And what happened? The free space went down from 43% to 41%! This is the first time I've deleted a lot of stuff and got less free space.
System Restore is turned off, so new restore points can not explain one single MB of this.
I checked the free space by using the XP Defragmenter, it was 43% before the cleanup and 41% after.

I have Abylonsoft apm-wipefile, East-Tec Eraser Lite and a program called just Eraser. I forgot which one I used, I guess I better not install even more cleaners.


EDIT,
You deleted your post?

 

Typing speed's good regardless, yes?

 

Yes, typing is fast. Now, it's me that can't keep up.

 

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