Windows XP Extremely Slow Shutdown -n- Slow Overal Performance

[TechyShAgGz]

MY windows XP system is taking approximately 3-5 minutes to shutdown.

System:
AMD 1.4ghz T-Bird
ECS-K7S5A Motherboard
512MB Crucial DDR RAM
40GB 5400RPM WD HD (Primary) IDE
13GB 5400RPM MAXTOR (Secondary) IDE
8x Plextor Burner
16x DVD-ROM
64MB PNY GEFORCE 2 Video Card
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Any Suggestions???? - Overal System Performance of my computer is Horrible . . . I notice my hard drive seems to be working quite frequently. When shutting down it goes through the whole process, says shutting down windows, the dialogue box disappears and it sits with just the default blue background nothing displayed on the screen.... then it finally shuts down.

I have the latest BIOS Flashed to Motherboard (just FYI)

Any help would be greatly appreciated,

I upgraded this PC from a 400mhz Pentium II with 384MB SDRAM and I don't see much of a speed difference at all, except when using graphic proggies like Bryce, and Adobe.

 

[meson2000]

I would check this site out.

Linky

It has a number of different tweaks that you can try to improve XP performance. I believe
I also read a couple of tweaks that can improve XP shutdown time. Check it out. It has
helped my system.

 

[GonzoDaGr8]

Yes...Shutdown with XP is rather slow. There is some tweaks out there that can help that a little. I just have gotten rather used to it. As far as running performance goes, Try this: Start>settings>control panel. Once in control panel, open system applet. Turn off system restore and automatic updating. under the "advanced" tab, click "settings" in the performance box. Turn off all visual B.S. (I personally turn off all except "visual styles" and "show window contents while dragging" ). Makes a big difference in HDD thrashing and overall performance. Your second biggest slowdown is those 5400 rpm drives. They got to go. Step up to some 7200 rpm deals (I prefer WD drives). Everything will feel MUCH snappier. Your system as a whole is outrunning those drives.

 

[TechyShAgGz]

All those settings were already set, (I noticed them awhile ago and figured they would help out)

I went to that site and did some of the tweaks that said it was to speed up windows XP shutdown ... ie. the shortcut, and the killtimeout registry entries..... using the shorcut increased the shutdown a little bit, but it still gets to that blue background screen (after the shuttting down windows box goes away) and sits for like 3-5 minutes ..... I have no clue why it does this .....

Another question EVERY time i reboot my computer it says it has to do those 5 steps (which it does when you try to do scandisk in windows XP) ... it does it everytime on my secondary hard drive..... is their a way to prevent this (i just usually skip it) but i have let it finish too, and it still comes up the next time.

Thanks,