Windows 7 Started off fast... getting slower, now it's glacial!

FalconFour

New Member
Okay, I'm getting fed up with my Win7 RC installation already. I just clicked a program off the start menu, and after nearly an entire MINUTE of waiting for the app to launch, I found it had opened 3 times - Windows was responding so slowly that it kept the Start menu open after I had clicked it once... then twice (thinking it hadn't registered the click as apps are known to do), then a third time!

I mean, there's the basic fundamental problem that Windows even keeps a menu open after it knows it had been activated. That issue cannot even occur in a WinXP-class operating system, but it's rampant and wild in Vista-class OSes, as if the entire GUI is constructed from a big plastic Flash framework or something.

But my issue is that my Win7 installation is getting slower than crap, and I'm downright getting sick of it. I started off with it running great, installed VMware and loaded up my previous WinXP installation into a virtual machine (Ghosted the drive to a VMDK file before installing 7). It ran great after tweaking the CPU parameters to avoid timing issues with desynchronized TSCs. Well, I fired up that same VMware machine and it hadn't even finished booting after 20 minutes of waiting (just got to the desktop and was still loading programs but unresponsive, HDD going full blast).

I dunno if I just needed to vent or what, but this crap is ridiculous. Win7 seems to be swapping to/from page file like there's no tomorrow, even though I only have 1gb in use out of 2gb RAM installed. Programs take up to an eternity to bring up if they hadn't been active in a while (paged off to disk for no good reason). What gets me is that this is known behavior for XP (and a common reason to disable the page file as I typically do), and yet two Windows versions later, Windows is still grinding away at the page file when it still has RAM available!

... Not to mention the display driver issues. Hoy... I love having no brightness control after coming out of standby, or getting a whole system crash (or just unusable video) coming out of hibernate... but hey, comes with the territory, I guess.

Win7 RC 64-bit on an Acer Extensa 4420 (recent "designed for Vista" PC), 2gb Kingston HyperX RAM, 1.9GHz Turion 64 TL-58, 160gb HDD, ATI X1200 graphics/chipset.

You think Microsoft is reading these timing statistics? Would they even notice? Or care?

edit: Also worth noting... it seems like _everything_ in 7 is slower than in XP. Navigating folders is painfully slow as it reads the file icons and locks up the shell as it finishes. Launching apps always takes several seconds before it even starts them. It's almost like it's doing the whole useless "file identification" thing (like XP does with IE7 installed, running a downloaded or from LAN file)... to EVERY file. Is anyone else having these stupidly huge performance problems?
 
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Okay, I'm getting fed up with my Win7 RC installation already. I just clicked a program off the start menu, and after nearly an entire MINUTE of waiting for the app to launch, I found it had opened 3 times - Windows was responding so slowly that it kept the Start menu open after I had clicked it once... then twice (thinking it hadn't registered the click as apps are known to do), then a third time!

I mean, there's the basic fundamental problem that Windows even keeps a menu open after it knows it had been activated. That issue cannot even occur in a WinXP-class operating system, but it's rampant and wild in Vista-class OSes, as if the entire GUI is constructed from a big plastic Flash framework or something.

But my issue is that my Win7 installation is getting slower than crap, and I'm downright getting sick of it. I started off with it running great, installed VMware and loaded up my previous WinXP installation into a virtual machine (Ghosted the drive to a VMDK file before installing 7). It ran great after tweaking the CPU parameters to avoid timing issues with desynchronized TSCs. Well, I fired up that same VMware machine and it hadn't even finished booting after 20 minutes of waiting (just got to the desktop and was still loading programs but unresponsive, HDD going full blast).

I dunno if I just needed to vent or what, but this crap is ridiculous. Win7 seems to be swapping to/from page file like there's no tomorrow, even though I only have 1gb in use out of 2gb RAM installed. Programs take up to an eternity to bring up if they hadn't been active in a while (paged off to disk for no good reason). What gets me is that this is known behavior for XP (and a common reason to disable the page file as I typically do), and yet two Windows versions later, Windows is still grinding away at the page file when it still has RAM available!

... Not to mention the display driver issues. Hoy... I love having no brightness control after coming out of standby, or getting a whole system crash (or just unusable video) coming out of hibernate... but hey, comes with the territory, I guess.

Win7 RC 64-bit on an Acer Extensa 4420 (recent "designed for Vista" PC), 2gb Kingston HyperX RAM, 1.9GHz Turion 64 TL-58, 160gb HDD, ATI X1200 graphics/chipset.

You think Microsoft is reading these timing statistics? Would they even notice? Or care?

edit: Also worth noting... it seems like _everything_ in 7 is slower than in XP. Navigating folders is painfully slow as it reads the file icons and locks up the shell as it finishes. Launching apps always takes several seconds before it even starts them. It's almost like it's doing the whole useless "file identification" thing (like XP does with IE7 installed, running a downloaded or from LAN file)... to EVERY file. Is anyone else having these stupidly huge performance problems?

I don't have laptops to give you a head to head comparison but my selfbuilt desktops running both X32 and X64 bits of Win 7 7100 RC have no performance problem of the kind you have described: the lag time before a progarm can be launched from the start menu. They have no problems opening browser windows in the Internet using IE8 either. Graphic viewers/editors work well. WMP has no problem. I think your sitauation is unusual.
I hope you have already ruled out any virus/malware issues. If you search this forum you will find an example of a system that was dragging its way and the person was feeling reassured that virus had been ruled out thru' two Antivirus checks both giving a clean bill of health which on subsequent MalawareByte check found the offending agent responsible. I suggest first to rule out an underlying unrecognized malware issue before focusing on the OS even though it is still an RC.
I suggest you run a Disk Cleanup and Defrag if the system has not had such maintenance in a while. I find CCleaner a good multifunction freeware to perform Disk Clean up, minor Registry fixes , removal of unused programs.. something akin to spring cleanup of the computer. For Defrag I like Auslogic Disk Defrag another Freeware which has a good dispaly and runs fast compared to Windows' own.
Hope this helps your problem and reduces your frustration. :)
 
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FalconFour are you running Kaspersky AV by any chance. When I was running it I found it kept dieing and taking the OS with it despite working perfectly well in the beta.

If you are it may be worth checking to make sure that isn't causing the issue.
 
Also worth noting... it seems like _everything_ in 7 is slower than in XP. Navigating folders is painfully slow as it reads the file icons and locks up the shell as it finishes. Launching apps always takes several seconds before it even starts them. It's almost like it's doing the whole useless "file identification" thing (like XP does with IE7 installed, running a downloaded or from LAN file)... to EVERY file. Is anyone else having these stupidly huge performance problems?

No way Never ever. Windows 7 is far fast than XP or Vista

You have some serious problems there.

Did this start immediately after completing the install or after the software you added?

Does it still act this way on a restart?
 
VMware is your issue. Take it off and notice the difference. + are you using ESX or GSX?

My Compaq laptop that now hosts 7 instead of vista is blazing along, however, knowing the requiements of VMware, I would never use it on this laptop.
 
VMware is your issue. Take it off and notice the difference. + are you using ESX or GSX?
Well, I was thinking that as well. After I close out of VMware, many problems are resolved. But I'd never had any issues like this in the past with VMware on this same computer with XP...
(edit: VMware Workstation 6.0.4)

I think it might be related to AVG Free (running 8.5), as AVG isn't compatible with Windows' new AV status reporting (so says Windows), so who knows what else it's incompatible with. I can gurarantee it's not malware since I've only been using this computer since the RC came out, and my job consists of a good part of removing malware and fixing broken Windows.

No way Never ever. Windows 7 is far fast than XP or Vista

You have some serious problems there.

Did this start immediately after completing the install or after the software you added?

Does it still act this way on a restart?
Things were still somewhat slow when I first installed, like loading EXE icons in a folder, and executing programs. One of the first programs I installed was TeraCopy, and it takes forever to launch as opposed to the couple-milliseconds it took to open in XP. That was right out of the box. But to say "Windows 7 is 'far fast' than XP..." is certainly misguided... _nothing_ is faster than XP - not 7, and certainly not Vista. I think MS has dug themselves into too deep a hole with their DRM and "security" to make it anywheres near as fast as XP was. But it's the new shell features and improved UI that keeps me with 7 at the moment. Certainly not its resource usage.
 
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I agree that VMWare can be an issue.

No offense, but remember, this isn't XP.

Terra copy is only 1MB in size. I can;t see why that would be a problem.

When you first installed did you receive any updates from Windows Update?

Go to Start > Run and type msconfig, click the Startup tab and post back with the results.

the only things truly necessary to be in the startup are your anti-virus, spyware detector and personal firewall if you have one.

However, being a laptop there my by others.
 
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