X P start up problem

richard burton · Post by **richard burton** » 5 Nov 2002 12:06 pm

It can sometimes take me an hour or more to start my computer. I usually have to press F8 and either reboot or try last good configuration several times before it is up and running. Does anyone have any ideas?
Thanks, R B.

Rob Hamilton · Post by **Rob Hamilton** » 5 Nov 2002 2:45 pm

Send a nastygram to Bill@microsoft.com.
Seriously though, you may have unwanted junk in your startup manager, put there by adware/spyware. Or you might have a computer virus. Once your computer is running does it behave more or less normally? Have you tried running an adware/spyware program such as Ad-aware from www.lavasoft.de ? Windows XP is infamous for "phoning home" to Microsoft, even when you instruct it not to. Is it trying to access a powered-off modem or cable box when you start up?

--Rob Hamilton

Everett Cox · Post by **Everett Cox** » 5 Nov 2002 5:33 pm

Richard-- You haven't given enough detail to really nail the solution. I'd hazard a guess, though, that you've had some previous crash or shutdown problem that left your hard drive messed up. Scandisk is probably being invoked on startup and has found the disk needs a 'thorough' or 'surface' scan. If you have a fairly large disk and have not partitioned it into smaller 'logical' drives, the scan can take a very long time.

If Scandisk IS being run at startup, LET IT FINISH. --Everett

Ron Page · Post by **Ron Page** » 6 Nov 2002 9:45 am

I've been searching Microsoft's Knowledge Base to check on issues like this. Select Windows XP and have it search for "startup" and you'll get 25 hits, including a webcast on troubleshooting startup and shutdown problems.
<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Ron Page on 06 November 2002 at 09:46 AM.]</p></FONT>