# Something is keeping my hard drive busy all the time :-(



## MT Brain (Apr 3, 2008)

Hi!

Got a new laptop the other day (HP Pavillion DV7-1070eg, great one), but I've been wondering about a few things. One is that I have two 320 GB hard disks installed, but the three drives I have on my computer only add up to a total of 450 GB. So I'm wondering where the other 190 GB of hard disk space are? Do you think Vista has anything to do with that? Or is it a partitioning issue?

Can anybody suggest a free program (or maybe even one included in Vista) that shows me the partitioning of my hard drives?

And the other, even more pressing question, is: whenever I boot that laptop, the hard disk keeps rattling for minutes on end, and long after the GUI is up and running. Some program seems to be doing a lot of business in the background! At first, I thought Vista was just swapping, but this goes on even after I established fixed size swap files for my drives. Any ideas what that might be? It's slowing down the PC, and I can't think of what the PC would be doing. I have turned off the automatic updates already, so I'm ruling them out.

Darn it, I hate it when programs do crap without my knowing and consent.

Hope you can shed some light! Maybe somebody has had the same problem in the past 

Thanks!
Matthias.


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## jcgriff2 (Sep 30, 2007)

Hi Matthias. . .

To check your hard drive and partitions:
START | type diskmgmt.msc into the start search box - hit enter

Your second item about the boot-up - I have an HP dv7-1020us and do like it, but I can tell you that I had to go in and get rid of some items that I found were hanging at boot-up or just causing problems. One was QuickPlay, another Norton Internet Security. There are still some lingering issues that I have yet to get to on my system. I'd like to see what is going on in your system to see if it mirrors this one in any manner.

Please click on the link below in my sig area for Live SysInternals AutoRuns and save it to your desktop. Right-click on it and run as admin. Then let it scan for needed registry info. Save it as an ARN file - you will see the default ARN file extension when you go to save it. For info, the SysInternals AutoRuns program is from Microsoft TechNet.


Also, run msinfo32 and save as NFO file - 
START | type msinfo32 into start search box - enter. Save w/NFO default file extension.

Zip up the ARN and NFO files and attach to your next post.

Regards. . .

jcgriff2

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## MT Brain (Apr 3, 2008)

Sorry for not answering sooner! Thanks, you really helped me jcgriff! I was able to find the missing 140 gig, they were in an empty partition that didn't have a drive letter assigned to it. I deleted it and added its space to the other partition on the same disk. Gonna try the SysInternals asap! I'm solving more problems with this PC by the minute, and it's getting better and better  Thanks again!


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## jcgriff2 (Sep 30, 2007)

Hi. . .

Glad to hear you found the missing 140gb.

Curious about merging the partitions - I understand about deleting the partition... but how did you merge it w/an existing partition?

For the full SysInternal Suite - click on that link in my sig area. Dr. Mark Russinovich now of Microsoft has written dozens of very useful programs.

Please let me know how you make out. I still have issues w/my HP and I would assume some to be the same as yours.

Thanks...

JC

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## MT Brain (Apr 3, 2008)

Hi!

I think I found the culprit after all. From the way it looks, the hard disk thrasher is a service running in the background called "Superfetch", it loads porgrams that the user appears to be using more often than others into the RAM at startup so they will run faster when you open them. Does more harm than good if you ask me. Get rid of it. You can do so by opening "computer management" (well, "Verwaltung" in German, not sure about the English translation) from the Control Panel and then opening "services". While you're at it, get rid of some other services too that nobody ever needs. Read this article, I found it very enlightening:

http://www.beginnerspc.com/Articles.cfm?articleid=2262

About the partitioning: the Disk Manager (you'll also find it under "Computer Management" in the Control Panel) has this little program from which you can mess with the partitioning of your drives. I had a partition that was unused and had no drive letter assigned to it, with this program, I assigned the letter to it, then accessed it from the Explorer, saw that it was empty. Deleted it using Disk Management, then had 140 gigs of free, unused (i.e. unpartitioned) space on the hard disk. So I just added that to the other partition already existed on the same hard disk, which can be done with a few mouse clicks.

I want to check out that SysInternals Suite more, but so far, I haven't. Since all my current problems are solved (except several programs suddenly freezing, getting greyed out and staying idle (with the according mouse cursor) for a couple of minutes for no apparent reason. I hope I can get a grip on this sh** soon. Apart from that, Vista has good and bad, very bad points. Some stuff just does not work with this system.


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## jcgriff2 (Sep 30, 2007)

Hi. . .

Yes, Superfetch does keep track of the most frequently used apps and files, but keeps them in a pre-memory state - between the HDD and RAM. Superfetch is the successor to XP's Pre-fetch. I assure you it will quiet down once it gets to know you.

To see all HDD activity - look in the Vista Performance Moniter - Click on START and type perfmon.msc into the start search box and hit enter. BTW - to reach system services faster - type services.msc in the start search box.

One SysInternals program that is fascinating to watch as it shows you real time HDD activity as well is perfmon.exe - be sure to right-click on it and run as administrator.

Finally re: Superfetch and other Vista system services - visit the web site of Charles Sparks, a.k.a., the Black Viper. Great site for this kind of information - 

http://www.blackviper.com/WinVista/supertweaks.htm

Regards. . .

jcgriff2

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