T61 - slow startup, freezes all the timem, runs slow

[visio]

For the most part I was satisfied with my T61 then I began to have some trouble... first off from purchase it takes forever to start the thing up, even if I disable everything at startup it still takes forever.

I have 3GB of ram, a dual-core 2ghz processor and after disabling all startup items and then restarting, I got into the TASK MANAGER and it was saying 50% cpu usage when there were only 3 tasks running and average speeds(explorer.exe and 2 MANDITORY bckg tasks) - I have a desktop with 1GB of ram and it runs Firefox with over 100 tabs, Photoshop CS3, ftp tool, thunderbird, dreamweaver, gtalk, msn and zonealarm without any trouble yet this laptop is saying 50% cpu usage when nothing is running... what is going on? Somebody told me it was a issue with XP pro SP or something, if this is the case where and what do I download? If not what is the problem, should I send it in for repait or what? I need some help, thanks alot!

Because of how slow it is, it will sometimes take me 20 minutes of sitting to wait for the Access connections to pop-up so I can search out the wireless network and connect. I don't have time for that and there must be a problem, I have a 95 Thinkpad that ran faster than this...Please send suggestions...

[CanadianNorth]

hey,

for what it's worth, my brand new T61P is extremely slow on startup as well. I don't know what process is taking all the time, I had expected better performance from a dual core 2.4 with 3gb ram.

At the same time, once it's up and running it isn't too bad.

[icantux]

What OS are you using?

I've got my T61 purring like a kitty. XP startup and fully functional on standby in 32 seconds flat. I could probably still shave off a couple of seconds. Before this, I had Vista on the same machine and (after a clean install), it loaded up rather quickly as well ... 53 seconds. (T61, T9300 cpu, 3GB Ram).

Really depends on what OS you're running, what that OS is loading on startup and what other "options" are set to boot from the start.

If you're using Vista, I can bet that you haven't disabled any of the key Vista "features" which would explain why it takes so long to boot. If that's the case, I'd suggest you take a look in the "Vista" sub-forum here at Thinkpads.com or even google "speed up vista bootup" for some suggestions on how to speed up booting time.

Also, there are ways to make a Vista DVD using your backed-up activation (so no need to "activate" after installation). By reinstalling Vista on your machine it also gives you an opportunity to install only the Lenovo ThinkVantage software packages you wish to install - instead of all the stuff the preload comes with (Norton, bloatware, s'more bloat stuff). A clean install of either Vista or XP would make your system much faster at bootup already, although Vista still has too many "features" starting up at bootup that slow down the process.

Regardless...

[visio]

No way, I wouldn't use vista. It has XP pro... and like I said, I tried stopping all tasks from loading at startup and it still took forever and it still took ages to get into access connections... and still the cpu usage is wacko for nothing running.

If a clean install will help I will do it... but I don't want to lose the thinkvantage suite either... or my word suite.

[icantux]

If you're running your system with the original pre-load direct from Lenovo, I'd suggest you first make the rescue and recovery set (takes 1 CD and 1 DVD or 1CD-7CD's depending on what burner you have).

Second, if you're thinking of doing a clean install, make sure to backup these directories:
c:\Program Files\Common\Lenovo
c:\SWTOOLS <--- contains the software that can be re-installed on your machine (Roxio, WinDVD, etc)
c:\DRIVERS <--- contains some drivers that can be re-installed
c:\Windows\$hf_mig$ <-- that's a hidden directory (you'll need to enable viewing hidden files and folders on your system).

The last one's important, because it shows you all the MS hotfixes that are installed on your system right now and which are relevant to your machine - many of those hotfixes deal with multi-processor issues, security issues, etc, so it's important to know which ones to download from MS later on).

Next, download all the applicable drivers from Lenovo for your machine. Just follow the links at lenovo.com in the support/download section to obtain the right ones.

Then, follow the instructions found in a thread in the "Windows" sub-forum for the XP clean install and appropriate sequence of driver installations. Remember to set the SATA BIOS setting to "Compatibility" otherwise the XP installation process will fail completely (XP does not include SATA drive support - even in SP2).

You should be all set.

It takes a fair bit of preparation but it's well worth it. However, as I mentioned, be ready to do some research ahead of time - read up various threads that deal with a clean XP install and you'll be more confident in the install.

Also keep in mind that the first clean install of XP will never go as planned, so allow yourself some latitude for frustration.

Greets