Why does my computer run so slow at night?

FrostedxB

FrostedxB

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Like the title says, every night after 9:30 my comp just seems to crap out. Webpages take five minutes at least to load and music just seems to freeze or skip. Youtube videos buffer for the first 3 seconds and won't play any farther.

My antivirus (AVG) says the system is clean, and I seem to have a lot of space left on my C drive (299GB remain). So I just don't understand why it slows down so much at night. Any ideas?

EDIT: Ran a diagnostics scan, it claims everything is running fine as well.
 
Check if there are any scheduled tasks running. Some utility programs such as defrags tend to run the scheduled tasks at night as not to affect the PC's performance during the day. Check which processes and services are running during the day and compare it at night when you PC slows down.
 
Open up task manager (ctrl + alt + del) and look under processes. Make sure "view processes from all users is clicked or checked". Pay close attention to the memory and cpu usage tabs.
 
it's a hacker using your comptuer!!

no but seriously listen to No Limit
 
Right now, there are 77 processes running, 14 percent CPU Usage and 55 percent physical memory. Is that normal? Physical Memory usage seems fairly high...
 
77 processes isn't really normal unless you have a whole bunch of stuff open. Constant usage of 14% also isn't normal.

Which processes are taking up the most memory and cpu (list the actual amount along with process name). You can sort processes by CPU usage or by memory usage using the tab colums on top. Ignore "Idle system process".

You can also take 2 screenshots if it's easier for you to do it that way. One with the processes sorted by memory and one by CPU (sort with the largest usage on top).

Also on edit: Close all your programs when you look at task manager.
 
Process1.jpg


process2.jpg


Seems that System Idle Process is using the most CPU during the day.
 
You are sorting it by name. Take one screenshot sorted by memory usage and another sorted by CPU. System Idle is not a "real" process, when your CPU is at 0% system idle process will go to 99%.

I see that you have limewire which Im sure can be blamed for many of your issues. Use frostwire instead.
 
...limewire

Also it looks like you have a Windows update icon in the task bar (along with a ton of others...). Do you have it set to allow it to auto update or just to inform you there is an update?
 
Asus said:
...limewire
Click to expand...
Good spot Josh, he's right! Limewire in the first screenshot which is obviously a person 2 person sharing network. You have that running in the background constantly uploading your illegal downloads to other users = your internet is slow. Increased P2P network usage occurs in the evening when everyone gets online after work.

edit: Also you have way too many applications in the system tray, stop being lazy and do some maintenance! Go to start > run or press windows key + R - type in msconfig, go to the start-up tab and untick a load of the programs running on start up.

Also download ccleaner - do a scan and a registry clean. And remove limewire and stop downloading that rubbish.
 
No Limit said:
I see that you have limewire which Im sure can be blamed for many of your issues.
Click to expand...
Yeah, this is true.. I never imagined that someone would be confused as to why streaming would be problematic while the available bandwidth is saturated. Limewire users downloading from his computer unthrottled or what? Never used Limewire, but I understand how it works.

Could also be that your ISP/data plan has a poor upload speed, which means when people are downloading from your computer that your download speed is severely limited.

Why not run speedtest a few times, once when it is working well, and again when it is giving you problems:

http://www.speedtest.net/
 
He didn't really say it was just streaming music so I wouldn't assume that right away. I found that many people who had limewire and bittorrent applications also had viruses all over the place.

I don't think it has anything to do with the ISP, it is more likely that some process(s) are causing the problem.
 
He never specifically mentioned or described symptoms that his CPU was running slow either, despite the misleading thread title.
 
No Limit said:
You are sorting it by name. Take one screenshot sorted by memory usage and another sorted by CPU. System Idle is not a "real" process, when your CPU is at 0% system idle process will go to 99%.

I see that you have limewire which Im sure can be blamed for many of your issues. Use frostwire instead.
Click to expand...

How different is Frostwire?

Asus said:
...limewire

Also it looks like you have a Windows update icon in the task bar (along with a ton of others...). Do you have it set to allow it to auto update or just to inform you there is an update?
Click to expand...

Its supposed to do it automatically, but I usually have to start it manually for some reason. Once the updates started daily, I said **** it and let them collect. Usually do one massive update a month.

Hectic Glenn said:
Good spot Josh, he's right! Limewire in the first screenshot which is obviously a person 2 person sharing network. You have that running in the background constantly uploading your illegal downloads to other users = your internet is slow. Increased P2P network usage occurs in the evening when everyone gets online after work.

edit: Also you have way too many applications in the system tray, stop being lazy and do some maintenance! Go to start > run or press windows key + R - type in msconfig, go to the start-up tab and untick a load of the programs running on start up.

Also download ccleaner - do a scan and a registry clean. And remove limewire and stop downloading that rubbish.
Click to expand...

Removed limewire for now (may try Frostwire though). Would turning off the p2p sharing work though, as there is an option to turn it off. You download a song and it doesn't get re-uploaded.

No Limit said:
He didn't really say it was just streaming music so I wouldn't assume that right away. I found that many people who had limewire and bittorrent applications also had viruses all over the place.

I don't think it has anything to do with the ISP, it is more likely that some process(s) are causing the problem.
Click to expand...

Its Youtube as the streaming, but the music even in WMP will just freeze/crash/stop responding.


EDIT: Speed test @ 5:23 PM



Will try it again in five hours. I'll also take 2 more screens of the processes thing.


EDIT 2: Used CCleaner and removed 813 MB worth of usless crap, then analyzed the registry and got a whole lot of things I don't understand -

-Missing shared DLL
-Invalid default icon/Open with... (its for Realplayer which I uninstalled a week ago?)
-ActiveX/COM issue
-Installer Reference Issue (theres at least 50 of these, all for some Cyberlink\PowerDirector\CellSlideShow?)
 
WMP playing from a file on your computer, or streaming from the internet? This is the key. You've got 2 out of 3 problems on the internet. If you were streaming a file on WMP, then that is 3 out of 3. So that would mean it is a problem with your ISP or bandwidth. It could be limewire sapping your bandwidth, or any number of things.

I simply took a stab at it based on your first post only. I notice my bandwidth sometimes suffers during peak hours because my ISP apparently can't handle the peak traffic.
 
VirusType2 said:
WMP playing from a file on your computer, or streaming from the internet? This is the key. You've got 2 out of 3 problems on the internet. If you were streaming a file on WMP, then that is 3 out of 3. So that would mean it is a problem with your ISP or bandwidth. It could be limewire sapping your bandwidth, or any number of things.

I simply took a stab at it based on your first post only. I notice my bandwidth sometimes suffers during peak hours because my ISP apparently can't handle the peak traffic.
Click to expand...

Its a file on my PC, so only 2/3 come from the internet. Like I said though, with Limewire gone, hopefully 80-90% of the problems will disappear. Still have no viruses, and I also just defragmented my C drive.
 
Cool, OK. Let us know.

Keep in mind that your upload speed is very poor. So if you people are downloading from your computer - that means you are uploading. This can significantly affect your download and streaming speed while watching Youtube, for example.


Also, it's good to make a recovery point before messing with the registry (CCleaner). The software may have a recovery built in as well, I don't remember.

After making a recovery point, I would say you can use the CCleaner safer. Then it should be safe to clean all of it (fix registry errors and such). You can always opt out of some of the things CCleaner does, like if you aren't sure about it.
 
FrostedxB said:
Its a file on my PC, so only 2/3 come from the internet. Like I said though, with Limewire gone, hopefully 80-90% of the problems will disappear. Still have no viruses, and I also just defragmented my C drive.
Click to expand...

Don't be so sure you don't have any viruses, your AV software won't always catch it.

Don't install frostwire for now, see what happens without any kind of filesharing (make absolutely sure uTorrent is truned off). If your computer starts acting up be sure to take screen shots from the task manager of the processes using up the most memory and the most CPU.
 
Not much of a difference in the speed test (half hour before problems usually start.)



EDIT: Updated 9 major windows updates (all listed when I did it) and 2 more show up. Wtf?

EDIT 2:
Process3.jpg


process4.jpg
 
Took a speed test to see how quickly was working (because videos are taking forever to buffer, usually stopping 3 or 4 times to buffer some more)

Heres that result -

Youtube.jpg
 
Kinda busy setting up my new monitor, but you probably have numerous problems. Why are you surprised that you need to update your computer?

Have you ever updated your plugins - like Flash, which Youtube uses?

Firefox > Tools > Add Ons > Plugins > Update

It will take you to a plugin check page where you can update all your plugins.


Update Firefox of course. In Firefox, click help in the menu bar and then click Check for updates...
 
You can also try sorting it by total CPU time, which is a column that's normally not visible. Make it visible through View > Select Columns.

But yeah, I'm betting it's your ISP.
 
Verizon DSL is pretty terrible. I used to have it and it would only work properly about 40%.
 
OmegaX said:
Verizon DSL is pretty terrible. I used to have it and it would only work properly about 40%.
Click to expand...

we have the 3.5Mbps connection and it works all right. I don't host games, and I rarely download anymore so I'm happy.
 
If your ISP is slowing down at night to the point where you can't stream videos you need to call them and have it fix it, I just don't believe a major ISP would fault like that.

Also, if your only issue is youtube videos taking a long time to load it could just be youtube. Youtube has a complicated content delivery system and sometimes certain videos will take forever to load, happens on my work connection from time to time. What's funny is other videos will work just fine.
 
Well you're lucky if you don't have to deal with that. My ISP will sometimes stop working entirely or take several minutes to access a page. Maybe they were in need of an upgrade, that problem seems to have gone away for now.

Like No Limit said, sometimes it's not on your end. It can be the server is overloaded or having another issue. Try other websites to find out.

But yeah, that was my point from the begging. Call the ISP and tell them it isn't working, and also upgrade your plan because those speeds are torturous.

Torture.

How is it working after updating FF, flash and not trying to stream while using P2P?
 
Downloading is almost not worth it, but otherwise FF is doing pretty well. Everything seems to load a little faster, despite the fact that speed tests keep showing the same thing.



Tried that Frostwire too, just turned off the upload feature and it made virtually no difference in speeds.
 
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