My Harddisk Is Working All The Time Even if i have lots of free ram and cpu

[Amezis 0]

Well, my harddisk is working and working and working, and everything is really slow.All the time, I hear the computer working in the background. I've tried to restart the computer twice, but it doesn't fix it...I think the harddisk is working instead of the RAM, but I have no clue why...Anyone knows who to fix it?By the way, when I was about to click the submit button, firefox stopped responding, and I had to wait 15 secs. (and then I wrote this paragraph)

[ameribass 0]

Hmm, it sounds like you have some kind of process eating up your cpu power and harddisk usage. If I were you, I would try to scan for adaware or any other malicious spyware/software/program that might have been recently installed without your consent that might be starting up with your computer. Then, you may want to run a disk defrag. It is possible that you might have not done this in a while, but sometimes just running helps things be put back in order. If you need any help, please post back. I am sure that I or somebody else here will be more than willing to help you. Good luck!

[selim 0]

Virus?Try and see what processe(s) is taking up the most CPU in the Windows Task Manager>Processes tab. Maybe that bit of information can help the more technical minded ones here.

[Amezis 0]

I've already told you that my CPU and RAM are fine, the program that uses most RAM now is Firefox (19MB) and the used CPU never goes above 10%.

[Amezis 0]

Ohhhh ooops I actually forgot to tell you that.... But now you know it anyway

[moldboy 0]

You said that it could be that your HDD is being used rather then RAM, that sounds like a possability, or that your page file is set to dynamicayl resize as it sees fit, so my fisrt question is, DO you have enough RAM? and two what OS are you running, I'll tell you how to check your page file on Win XP the process varies slightly for other OS's1)Go to the control panel, the precess varies depending on your start menu layout.2) I use classic view in the start menu, so on winXP for the time being swich to classic view3) Select the system icon4)I have SP2, and can't remember if this changes with the update, Choose the advanced TAB5)In the preformance area choose Settings6) Choose the advanced tab, and at the bottom choose the change button, I use the set memory option, general rule of thumb set the max and min value to 1.5x your current ram, unless you don't have near enough ram then doubble or tripple it, (make sure you set enough, if you don't the computer might not come on!)7) okay out and then restart the computerAs good as that sounds you may want to try the spyware scan, that does sound like the better option

[serverph 0]

ameribass' suggestion for a diskdrive defrag should be on your priority. also, might as well clear out your harddrive for unnecessary files, in case you are running out of disk space and it would surely slow down your PC. but in the likelihood that you are using a drive with huge space still available, maybe you can consider the possibility of partitioning it into smaller partitions if you can (be careful on this one, as partitioning is supposed to be done most effectively on a clean/newly-formatted harddrive; otherwise you may lose precious data. backup, backup, backup.).

[Amezis 0]

Well, I have 512 MB ram. That thingy you talked about was at 756MB, so that shouldn't be any problem. But I don't think it's a spyware or virus or something like that, as I already said, the program that used most RAM was firefox, and my CPU usage never goes above 15%. So something is probably wrong with my system, which is a Windows XP SP2.

 

ameribass' suggestion for a diskdrive defrag should be on your priority. also, might as well clear out your harddrive for unnecessary files, in case you are running out of disk space and it would surely slow down your PC. but in the likelihood that you are using a drive with huge space still available, maybe you can consider the possibility of partitioning it into smaller partitions if you can (be careful on this one, as partitioning is supposed to be done most effectively on a clean/newly-formatted harddrive; otherwise you may lose precious data. backup, backup, backup.).

186922[/snapback]

Yes, I have only used about 10-15GB of 160GB, so it shouldn't be a problem.

 

Oh I wasn't able to split the harddisk into smaller partitions when I got the computer, I don't know why though.

 

And merge these triple posts

 

Notice from serverph:

merged 3 posts.

[pawitp 0]

Would you post your computer spec? That would help if you post what OS, what AV do you use? An misconfigured Avast! could use your harddisk all the time generating VRDB.PS: Does your Harddisk work when the computer is idle

[sandbox 0]

Another option to consider in addition to everyone else's excellent suggestions is that an antivirus scanner is running. If this is the case, then your hard drive behavior is expected. You can schedule the scans so they run at night or something. Otherwise I would recommend taking a look at the msconfig startup tab (start->run-> then type "msconfig" without quotes, then go to the startup tab). Take a look at the paths to all the processes that are checked in the list to see if any of them look like they don't belong.If nothing pops out at you in msconfig you might want to boot in safe mode. Go start->run-> msconfig -> I think the place to select safe mode is in a "boot" tab, but I'm not sure. One of the tabs will have a checkbox where you can select to boot into safe mode. If the problem doesn't occur in safe mode then you can rule out a hardware issue at least. Good luck! back up your data...

[Dragonfly 0]

After reading all the posts I come to the conclusion that you need to scan your computer and check if there is any virus in it. It looks like it has got virus. 512MB RAM is strong enough to run your system smoothly. I'm using the same configuration and its quite fast here. Well, hard disk is 160GB that is quite a lot. Mine is three times lesser than yours and still my system is quite fast... you don't need to delete any files since you haven't even used 50% it should be fine too. Finally, I suggest you scan your computer of spywares as well.. Virus and spywares can cause much troubles for our systems. All the best!

[frc 0]

may be scan for virus, spyware, adware, reboot ur computer, uninstall unused programs, and if its really slow format ur computer, but it might not help

[jlhaslip 4]

All excellent possibilities. Another thing to check for is a spyware detection pgm that might be scheduled for a time of day when you don't want it to be. Or other processes, so take a look at your scheduled task list. I run an older version of Windows (98se) and the path is : start>programs>accessories>system_tools>scheduled_tasks.Another old flaw with windows is that the msoffice software had a "fast find" utility that would fire up randomly through the day and index all your files. Not just the file names, but the full contents of the files. This caused the processor to slow down at times as well. It never did works too well, anyway. The trick to disabling it was to find the process (I forget where or how) and set the frequency for it to run at some ridiculous number of days. Like 9999 days between runs, so it didn't bother you.If you are running xp or another (read newer) os, this post won't be much help except to show you that whatever it is can be halted.Personally, I would do a scandisk, spyware detection, anti-virus, malware search, then a full clean up (uninstall and delete unused software) followed by a de-frag. If this is a recent phenomenon, have you installed any new software that is keylogging? There is a package available, might be ad-aware by lavasoft that is supposed to be pretty good with those...Hope this provides some insight...

[Amezis 0]

I've scanned with Norton Antivirus, Ad-Aware, Spybot S&D, done a defrag, checked the disk for errors, but no problems/viruses/adwares or other malicious softwares were found. Also, there are no programs using much CPU or RAM.And to pawitp, I have already told some of the specs:160GB harddisk512MB RAM2.8 GHz Intel Pentium 4Also, YES, my harddisk works when idle, but only a little. It's mainly when I do something, like going online, chat with people etc.

[moldboy 0]

Also, YES, my harddisk works when idle, but only a little.

I don't remember if you said it was XP, but XP will work in the background all the time, it's designed to optimize the system but only when your not using it, as far as the speed, have you tried looking into the system heat?