Asus laptop is suddenly extremely sluggish

[56k For Life]

I bought an Asus A6NE last week and within the past two days, it's been extremely sluggish when starting up Windows (specifically, at the point where it says "Loading Your Personal Settings"). It will just hang there for about 30 seconds and then my desktop will slowly load. Norton Internet Security is completely updated and ran a virus scan. Windows Update is all up to date with security patches and SP2. The only other programs that I installed on this thing are Photoshop, Office XP, and PGP for security (it's a laptop after all). I even ran System Restore and went back in time to when the laptop was fast and it didn't work.

The only thing I can think of that could be slowing it down is that my PGP encrypted files are 5GB each and I have 3 of them for a total of 15GB. Could a 5GB file be slowing down a laptop like this? To make it even stranger, after it all starts up, it goes back to being the normal speed.

So what could be the problem? Anyone wanna take a stab at it?

 

[Arju]

My Mom's is also a little sluggish... they preload a fair bit of junk. I got to format it next week.

My Asus V6V was really sluggish upon first boot so I axed XP and formatted.

No wonder guys always reformat... and Norton Internet Security is garbage. Antivirus (Preferably Corp) is far better.

 

[56k For Life]

Why is Norton Internet Security crap? I kind of like it. Corp edition doesn't protect you enough.

 

[IceDigger]

It's crap because it really slows down your pc and on some clients computers I have had the program either totally mess up windows or they were not able to go onto the internet/network.

 

[burningrave101]

Why is Norton Internet Security crap? I kind of like it. Corp edition doesn't protect you enough.

Symantec AntiVirus is the only product worth installing because its the corporate edition and it is completely different from the normal Norton AntiVirus. Corp has way better antivirus protection then Norton ever did. All you need to install is an antivirus and a software firewall. Two of the best antivirus programs are NOD32 and Kaspersky. AVG isn't too bad and its free. Kerio and ZoneAlarm are about the two best personal firewalls.

 

[56k For Life]

Symantec AntiVirus is the only product worth installing because its the corporate edition and it is completely different from the normal Norton AntiVirus. Corp has way better antivirus protection then Norton ever did. All you need to install is an antivirus and a software firewall. Two of the best antivirus programs are NOD32 and Kaspersky. AVG isn't too bad and its free. Kerio and ZoneAlarm are about the two best personal firewalls.

wtf...never even heard of NOD32 or kasperksky. how could they ever compete with such a huge company like Symantec that has people working around the clock to find new threats?

and is a personal firewall really necessary if I am on a campus connection?

 

[burningrave101]

wtf...never even heard of NOD32 or kasperksky. how could they ever compete with such a huge company like Symantec that has people working around the clock to find new threats?

and is a personal firewall really necessary if I am on a campus connection?

NOD32 and Kaspersky are both better then Symantec Anti-Virus which is WAY better then Norton Anti-Virus which is total bloatware. Check the General Software forum here.

I would also recommend a software firewall on any PC because even if you have a hardware firewall you still can't monitor whats going out from your PC. Your only blocking whats coming in. Applications on your PC might be sending out information or connecting to the internet without you knowing it. Plus its always good to have that added layer of protection in case something ever gets inside the network.