Start bar problems?

[The Black Pumpkin]

Kinda wierd problem here for the experts!

This is my main computer, so it is kinda important, too. (To me anyway. )

I have several processes that start up every time my computer turns on, such as wireless, the nvidia control panel, stuff like that. Every time it turns on, though, it seems to freeze partway through loading those programs. Always after the audio icon appears, and always before the network connection icons appear. Everything else in windows works fine, all the icons on the desktop work, and so on. But the start bar is completely frozen until it finishes loading, which usually takes two to three minutes.

And Supreme Commander runs strangely slow as well.

Things on my list to try are reinstalling drivers for audio, chipset, and graphics, and maybe in safe mode. One of those should probably do it, but I'm just curious as to everyone else's opinions.

P.S. It's not a virus or spyware or anything either, at least not anything AVG stuff can detect. And my registry is good according to CCleaner.

[Zephik]

Whats your system specs?

Get rid of unwanted programs and get rid of all unnecessary start up programs. That sometime helps.

[The Black Pumpkin]

cpu: Athlon 64 3800+ X2
mobo: XFX MB-N590ASH9
ram: G.Skill 2x1GB DDR2 800
video: 8800 GTS 320MB
psu: Corsair CMPSU-620HX
case: Z-Alien full tower (like in the Water Alien Rebirth mod)
screen: Sceptre X20WG-Naga 20"
storage: Samsung SP2014N 200GB (IDE)
optical: Sony DW-Q28A DVD-RW (IDE/Sata adapter installed)

If you wanna know any other parts, just let me know. Safe mode is gonna be my next thing, if it happens in there, somethings messed up with Windows, if not, it's other software.

[Zephik]

lol oh yea, something is definitely messed up. You shouldn't be experiencing any lag with specs like that.

Have you tried a system restore?

[Drum Thumper]

When was the last time you defragged your hard drive? What you are experiencing is a classic tell tale sign that your drive might be overdue for a defrag.

[r0adawg]

Might take a little time, but might try msconfig... and uncheck 1 item at a time. reboot if the problem goes away it would at least point to that one program.

if it is just a timing sequence

http://tinyurl.com/28k44s

one of these programs might lend a hand at allowing one process to finish loading before the next one starts...

[Eclecticos]

Well if it goes frigazee after your audio loads you may have installed the wrong drivers.

I would Remove the unnecessary startup programs. HERE or HERE

That will help free up some memory as well.

Also clean up your prefetch folder.
You can remove some of them easily with SpyBot ->Mode ->Advanced Mode-> Tools-> Startup.

[Nagoshi]

100% chances of fixing this trouble way to do it : format and clean install

[The Black Pumpkin]

Snowfire: Never done a system restore before, wouldn't know where it start, and I don't want to try it for fear of fudging it up more.

Drumthumper: Actually that was one of the first things I tried. Didn't help.

r0adawg & Eclecticos: Somethings to try for sure...

Nagoshi: I know! I know! I'm just trying to wriggle around that! I hate backing up and then reloading my programs...

I'm gonna try Safe mode tomorrow, then try msconfig.

[The Black Pumpkin]

I'm just gonna reinstall. Not worth any more headaches.