Compaq (HP) Presario SR1503WM

[HayZee518]

My wife runs the above named computer. She is on almost 18 hrs a day running yahoo and pogo games. We have a dial up server (localnet) 56K modem. We cannot get cable or even dsl. We upgraded her available RAM from 256 to 1 gig. We removed any extraneous programs which may slow down the system. We both run Windows XP. Virus protection is mcaffee, spyware is adaware, have personal firewall on both machines, windows firewall is enabled. Disk Cleaner takes about a half hour to complete, mcafee virus scan takes all night to finish. Tried selective start by msconfig - doesn't help. Need to speed up machine. I realize that graphics take up a lot of memory resources, over-clocking the bus does no good. Celeron processor used.

[Aurora]

Disk cleaner is a program which rids your disk of unused and unwanted files, however, have you run a defragmenter program to re-organize the files on your disk to make them faster to access? Here are the Microsoft Windows XP instructions for using the built in defragmenter:

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/d....mspx?mfr=true

How big is your hard disk? Perhaps the hard disk is approaching a point where it is too full to quickly find storage areas for your large graphics files. You may want to look into getting a second larger hard disk for the graphics files.

[HayZee518]

We run the defragmenter three times a week. Hard drive reports 15% used - part of the hard disk contains the recovery files. Virtual memory is using a part of it for java.

[Oblongada]

Are you trying to speed up your processing of local applications or are you referring to speeding up your internet? If it's internet there is nothing you can do to speed it up when you have a 56K connection. The extra RAM is nice for speeding up your local system applications but will do nothing to speed up your internet. As for the defraging and disk cleanup, it is a waste of time with the amount of data on your harddrive. Think of your hardrive as a giant warehouse. In that warehouse you are just using a tiny amount of space. So no matter how many times you are stacking and restacking the boxes in that little space it will not matter. You are pretty much giving your computer busy work (useless work) to do by running those jobs. Are you able to get high-speed internet via satellite in your area? That may be an option.

[HayZee518]

Satellite service is out of the question. For one too expensive. The copper line dial-up will have to do. This part of NY, we are so far in the sticks, we're lucky to have tv cable. House heat is by means of a coal pot belly stove and kerosene at $2.99 a gallon. We got three bars tho!

[doitmyselfer]

Do you have an aftermarket firewall installed as well as the microsoft version? If you do, you should disable the microsoft firewall as it will usually cause a conflict in your system to have both running. Hope this helps!