Laptop filling up/slow

john1921

Any ideas how i can clean up my laptop. I've used all the usual suspects windows tools but its a dual core and 1 80% full other 5% full and noticeably slower
Thanks
John

simon.griggs

Dear John,

If your hard disk is filling up you can always go for a larger disk.
If you have another machine at your disposal, you could always use a utility like Drive Image XML and copy the contents of your smaller drive onto a bigger one. Any computer store should be able to do this, if you do not feel confident, and it should take no more than an hour. Reckon on around £40 for labour and the cost of the parts.

The other alternative is an external hard drive, you can then move anything non-critical onto this drive and free up space in your machine.

Make sure also that you have not caught a virus which might be causing your drive to fill up with junk. You should as a rule keep around 10% of your drive space free, but if you are 80% full then that should not be an issue to you, yet.

I hope this helps.

Simon.

closed

usual suspects?

80% isn't full, and has nothing to do with speed, check for malware with malwarebytes and limit what runs at startup.

need more info, operating system, ram, hijackthis log

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/2436849

aliEnRIK

Download MALWAREBYTES (Make sure you click 'DOWNLOAD LATEST VERSION')
http://www.filehippo.com/download_malwarebytes_anti_malware/
Open malwarebytes and goto UPDATE and click 'check for updates'. After its updated goto SCANNER and click PERFORM FULL SCAN then click SCAN
Remove everything thats found (needs to be ticked)
Post the COMPLETE log here AFTER youve deleted everything it finds

reboot
Download HIJACK THIS (Make sure you click 'DOWNLOAD THIS VERSION')
http://www.filehippo.com/download_hijackthis/2894/
Click MAIN MENU then DO A SYSTEM SCAN AND SAVE A LOGFILE(Takes seconds) then post the log so we can see whats running
(do NOT do anything else with Hijack but scan and post the FULL log)

gonzo127

well although someone else will be along shortly to point things out better a big problem is running norton, as thats a massive resource hog - so just wondering how long you have left of your subscription?

The_Grandmaster

pdfforge gets highlighted... think that's another big problem (although norton slows too). PDFfroge is apparently causing controversy as malware http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PDFCreator.

O9 - Extra button: eBay - {C08CAF1D-C0A3-40D5-9970-06D067EAC017} -(file missing)
can be ticked and fixed.

There's suggestions that: Spigot, Inc. - C:\Program Files\Application Updater\ApplicationUpdater.exe is linked to mywebsearch.com toolbar. Have you ever 'caught' this in any previous scans? Please post log if you have.

aliEnRIK

TICK and FIX these in hijack ~
R3 - URLSearchHook: IObitCom Toolbar - {31c7d459-9cc3-44f2-9dca-fc11795309b4} - C:\Program Files\IObitCom\tbIObi.dll
R3 - URLSearchHook: (no name) - {E312764E-7706-43F1-8DAB-FCDD2B1E416D} - C:\Program Files\pdfforge Toolbar\SearchSettings.dll
O2 - BHO: Lexmark Toolbar - {1017A80C-6F09-4548-A84D-EDD6AC9525F0} - C:\Program Files\Lexmark Toolbar\toolband.dll
O2 - BHO: IObitCom Toolbar - {31c7d459-9cc3-44f2-9dca-fc11795309b4} - C:\Program Files\IObitCom\tbIObi.dll
O2 - BHO: pdfforge Toolbar - {B922D405-6D13-4A2B-AE89-08A030DA4402} - C:\Program Files\pdfforge Toolbar\IE\1.1.2\pdfforgeToolbarIE.dll
O2 - BHO: (no name) - {E312764E-7706-43F1-8DAB-FCDD2B1E416D} - C:\Program Files\pdfforge Toolbar\SearchSettings.dll
O3 - Toolbar: Lexmark Toolbar - {1017A80C-6F09-4548-A84D-EDD6AC9525F0} - C:\Program Files\Lexmark Toolbar\toolband.dll
O3 - Toolbar: pdfforge Toolbar - {B922D405-6D13-4A2B-AE89-08A030DA4402} - C:\Program Files\pdfforge Toolbar\IE\1.1.2\pdfforgeToolbarIE.dll
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [SearchSettings] C:\Program Files\pdfforge Toolbar\SearchSettings.exe
O9 - Extra button: eBay - {C08CAF1D-C0A3-40D5-9970-06D067EAC017} -(file missing)
O23 - Service: Application Updater - Spigot, Inc. - C:\Program Files\Application Updater\ApplicationUpdater.exe


Please run COMBOFIX
http://download.bleepingcomputer.com/sUBs/ComboFix.exe
Shut down your anti virus
Follow the simple instructions it gives
Post the COMPLETE log it creates here (Split into sections if need be) ~ if there are loads of 'SNAPSHOT' pages then leave them out
If it comes up with a RENAMING error then RIGHT click the exe file and RENAME and call it QWERTY (Making the complete file name 'QWERTY.exe') Or SAVE as 'QWERTY' on download

The_Grandmaster

You're up late alienRIK! What do you think it is?

aliEnRIK

The_Grandmaster wrote: »

You're up late alienRIK! What do you think it is?

Its my 'job' to be up late

Id guess removing that toolbar is going to make quite an improvement. Then we'll see what (if anything) combofix shows up

aliEnRIK

Open notepad and copy/paste the text in RED below

File::
c:\program files\pdfforge Toolbar\IE\1.1.2\pdfforgeToolbarIE.dll


Save this as "CFScript" (FULL file will be 'CFScript.txt' EXACTLY as shown)

Then drag the CFScript into ComboFix.exe as you see in the screenshot below.




This will start ComboFix again. After reboot, (in case it asks to reboot), post the contents of Combofix.txt in your next reply

Combofix should never take more that 30 minutes including the reboot if malware is detected.
If it does, open Task Manager then Processes tab (press ctrl, alt and del at the same time) and end any processes of findstr, find, sed or swreg, then combofix should continue.

aliEnRIK

Download CCLEANER
http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download/slim
Run the CLEANER scan (UNTICK 'cookies')
Then run the REGISTRY scan (Backup the registry when it asks)

Hows it running now?