What the hell is wrong??

[Rummy]

Right, some of you may know I have a new laptop as of a few weeks ago. Something is really annoying me however, I know it's gonna seem basic but it shouldn't be happening anyway. First, my laptop's specs can be found here;

http://www.ebuyer.com/UK/product/123116

Specifications:

 

ATI Radeon® Xpress 1100 chipset

 

AMD Turion 64 MK-36 (512 KB L2 cache)

 

1 GB of DDR2 533/667 MHz memory, upgradeable to 4 GB using two soDIMM modules (dual-channel support)

 

120GB Hard Disk Drive

 

8X DVD-Super Multi double-layer drive

 

15.4" WXGA high-brightness (200-nit) Acer CrystalBriteâ„¢ TFT LCD, 1280 x 800 pixel resolution, 16 ms response time, supporting simultaneous multi-window viewing on dual displays via Acer GridVistaâ„¢

 

WLAN: Acer InviLink™ 802.11b/g Wi-Fi CERTIFIED® solution, supporting Acer SignalUp™ wireless technology

LAN: Fast Ethernet, Wake-on-LAN ready

Modem: 56K ITU V.92 with PTT approval, Wake-on-Ring ready

 

PC Card slot (Type II)

5-in-1 card reader (SD, MMC, MS, MS PRO, xD)

Three USB 2.0 ports

External display (VGA) port

Headphone/speaker/line-out jack

Microphone-in jack

Line-in jack

Ethernet (RJ-45) port

Modem (RJ-11) port

DC-in jack for AC adapter

 

512 MB / 1 GB / 2 GB3 DDR2 533/667 MHz soDIMM module

6-/8-cell Li-ion battery pack

3-pin 65 W AC adapter

 

Acer Empowering Technology (Acer eNet, ePower, ePresentation, eDataSecurity, eLock, eRecovery, eSettings Management)

I just copied and pasted that, the important stuff is there with some other stuff which I wasn't sure about.

The 1GB of memory was made up of 2x512, and I bought an extra gig by Kingston(here) which meant I had to take a 512 out, and now it says that it has 1.37GB(1406MB) of RAM. 2.00GHz is the speed of the processor so it says. I also did a Windows Experience Index thingy, picture of that's results follows.

 

Anyway, to the actual issue. As I said, it seems trivial, but basically I play Runescape. For those of you not aware, it's a Java based game not requiring much spec at all. High spec option is 128MB RAM and 500MHz CPU and low spec is 64MB and 300MHz. It's an MMORPG, and sometimes I get some serious lag on it, which can be quite hazardous in online stuff. I determined the problem is caused by my own computer, I opened task manager and found that whenever this lag occured, the CPU was being pushed to 100%. I couldn't understand why, I thought it might be Vista being too fancy, so I turned Vista back to the Win98 look hoping that might resolve things, it didn't.

I thought maybe it was IE, as I've found another problem with it that is quite annoying. If I have IE open for a while, browsing the internet and using various tabs, I find that after a while right click menus don't appear if I try to open a link in a new tab it won't load. Also when this occurs, I find I am unable to open any new applications, unless I close IE first. Sometimes IE will close, but it hasn't really as the task is still running in task manager, and I must end it through there.

So, I tried to use other browsers in case this was an IE caused problem(Maxthon and Firefox) yet I find the 100% CPU thing/lag still occurs! I can't understand why this is happening, it never ever happened on my older computers running XP(well, the CPU may have hit 100% at times, but it wouldn't affect Runscape).

I have also done full virus scans and adware scans in the case of worms or malicious software but nothing's been found.

 

So, what the hell is wrong with my computer? The thing is brand fucking new and I can't work it out! I thought for a while Vista might just be shit(I was gonna title this 'Is it just me or does Vista suck'), but having read the Vista thread it seems that it's not the case, I just seem to have a fucking annoying problem which as my language may show, really frustrates me! Serious thanks to anybody who can shed some light or help on the issue!!

[=NukeBlaze=]

^ Do you know the process consuming the cpu cycles to 100%?

 

Regardless, I would re-install JAVA platform from the interblarg. Uninstall it, restart, and download java platform.

 

https://sdlc1e.sun.com/ECom/EComActionServlet;jsessionid=8ACE744D570DF07D347ACDB45B5C1276

 

Close your browsers before you execute the installer.

[Rummy]

Well I tried the java re-install and it didn't work, so I started looking at the processes and couldn't work out what it was. Obviously the CPU counts move too fast for me to add up and check either. I took a couple pictures of it as soon as I could, but then I noticed the 'show processes from all users' button, I don't remember seeing that in XP. I clicked it, and at first thought it was the system idle process until I saw the desc. of that, so I couldn't figure that one out. Then suddenly another process popped to the top of the list, and I should have fucking known. It's fucking norton liveupdate, as soon as my free 90 days run out I'm getting this shit off here, stupid bloody norton. Thing's opened itself about 5 times already today, how many times does it want to look for updates?!?

However, it doesn't explain the other problem, of IE half responding, not opening new windows, right click menus not appearing, and new apps not opening until IE is ended(well, they will open according to task manager, but they don't actually appear anywhere other than there).

[=NukeBlaze=]

Lets pretend that the 90 days are up and nuke norton. Norton is bulky rubbish.

 

http://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039

 

This removal tool will get rid of everything that is norton, even better than the built in uninstaller.

 

If you want a good AV that has better detection rates and consumes few resources, consider NOD32. Its very good...And you can download on the interblarg as a trial of course...wink wink...I have dirt in my eye.

 

I recommend killing norton first, then we march onward.

[Rummy]

lol, I'll get to killing Norton soon(i've only just read that post, not been on N-E for a few days). I actually turned off the automatic liveupdate feature and the bitch still randomly opens its liveupdate apps, so it solved nothing.

How does avast! compared to NOD32? I used to have avast! on my other laptop before it monged out, and never encountered any real problems. I'll look into NOD a bit more tomorrow when I have some more time, thanks for all your help Nuke, it's much appreciated!

[=NukeBlaze=]

NOD32 and Kaspersky have better detection rates than Avast, although avast is still good and better than Norton and Macafee in my opinion.

 

I typically use NOD32 on my system since its detection is excellent, it has a small memory and resource footprint, and its automation options are not "stupid".