I'm running WinXP Home Edition SP2 on this one machine. Latest updates from Microsoft. I have systematically updated my hardware drivers in an attempt to solve this problem, including Nvdia's drivers just this afternoon.
I'm seeing this behavior where the system will reboot okay, except there is an INCREDIBLY LONG delay between when the WinXP splash screen shows up and when the user login screen appears. By that time, my flat panel has decided nothing is happening soon, and has turned itself off, so to check that login is available I usually have to move my mouse.
I have tried to systematically track this thing down, including worrying that my hard drive or IDE were going and being really careful about backups, and buying a replacement hard drive in hand. It does not appear the system is concluding C: drive is dirty. I have tried setting dirty scan time long and deliberately setting C: dirty, thinking that was a problem and I could intervene. Doesn't speed things up. I have tried going into Safe Mode and poking around, but I don't see what to look for, i.e., all seems okay. There are no special startup gizmos AFAIK and boot.ini looks pretty vanilla.
I thought maybe nothing was wrong and there was something amiss with the display or graphics card, but I have no consistent evidence of that.
The system returns, and is stable, it's just that this happens maybe a half hour or so later. I'm loathe to try different kinds of system combinations because of that. I could, if necessary.
There was no obvious change to software at the time this started. I did download Disney's "Pirates of the Carribean" game about that time, but have since uninstalled it. I have also cleaned up other video games, primarily to save some disk space. I have been struggling with this now about 50 days.
I have worked through the long bootup troubleshooting guidance in "WinXP Annoyances" and the like, without good results.
I have fixed my Virtual Memory setting so WinXP does not manage it itself.
I have scanned my disk using the WinXP utilities, and that scan reports no errors of any kind.
I even did a defrag a couple of weeks ago.
Suggestions?
I'm seeing this behavior where the system will reboot okay, except there is an INCREDIBLY LONG delay between when the WinXP splash screen shows up and when the user login screen appears. By that time, my flat panel has decided nothing is happening soon, and has turned itself off, so to check that login is available I usually have to move my mouse.
I have tried to systematically track this thing down, including worrying that my hard drive or IDE were going and being really careful about backups, and buying a replacement hard drive in hand. It does not appear the system is concluding C: drive is dirty. I have tried setting dirty scan time long and deliberately setting C: dirty, thinking that was a problem and I could intervene. Doesn't speed things up. I have tried going into Safe Mode and poking around, but I don't see what to look for, i.e., all seems okay. There are no special startup gizmos AFAIK and boot.ini looks pretty vanilla.
I thought maybe nothing was wrong and there was something amiss with the display or graphics card, but I have no consistent evidence of that.
The system returns, and is stable, it's just that this happens maybe a half hour or so later. I'm loathe to try different kinds of system combinations because of that. I could, if necessary.
There was no obvious change to software at the time this started. I did download Disney's "Pirates of the Carribean" game about that time, but have since uninstalled it. I have also cleaned up other video games, primarily to save some disk space. I have been struggling with this now about 50 days.
I have worked through the long bootup troubleshooting guidance in "WinXP Annoyances" and the like, without good results.
I have fixed my Virtual Memory setting so WinXP does not manage it itself.
I have scanned my disk using the WinXP utilities, and that scan reports no errors of any kind.
I even did a defrag a couple of weeks ago.
Suggestions?