XP Pro SP2 install becomes unusable

[scubasteve]

Hi,

I'm hoping someone can point me in the right direction here, 'cause I'm stumped.

I'm setting up a second XP Pro SP2 installation. I'm doing this so I can troubleshoot the game Oblivion, which has forced me to reinstall XP twice already. I also use my PC for my work, so it's been a hassle!

What Oblivion was doing is sometimes it slowed down disk operations to unusably slow levels. It'd hang, then even after rebooting XP was exremely slow and I had to use System Restore from Safe Mode to get back to normal speeds. Then eventually System Restore wouldn't work, so I had to reinstall.

It seems to be disk operations that are the problem as it becomes very slow when opening programs, opening new folders in Explorer, and when I try to copy a file of any size it has bursts of almost normal speeds, then stops for long periods.

I've set up a new second XP installation, but I've found that this one is getting the same problems when I just try to install the drivers & updates, nothing to do with Oblivion.

It's not happening when installing any program or driver in particular as far as I can tell, it seems random.

My original installation is still working fine.

I've tried deleting and reinstalling the second installation, but keep getting the same problem.

Some specs:

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-965P-S3

CPU: Intel Core2 Duo 6400 2.13GHz

Video: WinFast PX7900 GT w/ForceWare 94.24

Audio: RealTek HD Audio

HDD: 2 x 320GB Seagate Barracuda 7200 SATA ST3320620AS

Monitor: BenQ FP202W

DVD Drives: 2 x Pioneer DVD-RW DVR-111D SCSI

I've configured the HDDs like this:

First physical drive

C: Original WinXP install

E: Documents

F: Software Archive, 2nd WinXP install (including it's Program Files & Documents & Settings)

Second physical drive

D: Games

G: Installed Programs (for 1st WinXP install)

H: Media

So I don't believe it's a HDD problem, as both XP installations are on the same physical drive.

I've tried updating the drivers for:

BIOS

Chipset

Monitor

Network Card

HD Audio

Video

DVD Drives

DirectX

but as I mentioned, sometimes I haven't even been able to finish doing this.

I've defragged and chkdsk'd every drive before reinstalling.

If anyone can suggest what to try next, I'd be grateful.

[scubasteve]

I stand corrected on the symptoms - it's now happened a couple of times to my original install, so it looks like it's hardware or driver related.

Yet a System Restore usually fixes it, so I have no idea what's going on.

Anyone?

[cluberti]

If system restore fixes it and you make no changes between broken and working scenarios, perhaps your antivirus or antispyware software is causing it? Disk issues like this are usually caused by filesystem filter drivers misbehaving, and those are found in antivirus, antispyware, firewall, and backup software.

[scubasteve]

It's happening in the new install before I can install any antivirus, antispyware, etc. The only thing running is Windows Firewall, and that's not running in my original install, so it doesn't look like that's the problem. I'll try deactivating it and see what happens tho.

[cluberti]

How quickly does it occur on a first install, and does it always start at around the same point in the build, or is it random?