# Myriad of problems on HP laptop Windows 8.1



## grobo3 (Sep 30, 2014)

To whomever can help!
I seem to have a number of issues with my HP laptop :banghead:

http://speccy.piriform.com/results/x23SNLKtzHrqDYFY1A8sMYo

I cannot remember whether these all started occurring at the same time, but I have definitely had enough. Not sure if they are to do with Windows 8.1 or a virus or just software/hardware issues. I have run AVG virus scanner and malware scanners but all seems fine when I run them. Same with defrag and the windows admin tools. Have also tried to uninstall/reinstall all programs I mention below but nothing works.

Problems:
1. Synaptics touchpad 7.5 always freezes, hangs, or doesn't start working straight away, especially when trying to scroll pages on chrome/firefox. I have tried to reinstall/delete driver but problem remains. Also tried to update a new/old driver but would not install.
2. Adobe flash always crashes when browsing the internet but updating does not help.
3. Most likely related - any video I try to play whether it's youtube or elsewhere either does not work, or especially in chrome, will take at least a minute to start. It will play the first 6 seconds without sound, then stop for a minute or 2 even though it has buffered, then finally start playing.
4. VLC media player also has this problem, whereby it will not start playing for at least a minute or 2 (irrespective of the version of VLC). Not sure if the video issues are somehow related?? VLC seems to always have a tough time opening any video these days; used to be immediate.
5. Chrome pages keep crashing, telling me either to wait or kill the page. It is happening at an increasing rate.
6. Computer just generally seems to be running noticeably slower. 

Apologies if this should have been posted in a different category (ie hardware/software/internet)

Thanks!


----------



## Stancestans (Apr 26, 2009)

Hi, welcome to TSF!

First off you need to get rid of Vuze/Azureus. Torrents (and torrent sites) are an easy way of getting infected. Uninstall it from your system ASAP. Download, install and run Revo Uninstaller for complete uninstallation (I would recommend the Pro version 30 day fully functional trial).

You need to tune down your PC usage. You are running multiple, memory hogging programs (Chrome, Firefox, Itunes, VLC etc), 93% memory usage is just too high to say the least.

After getting rid of Vuze, try a clean boot and report back. While you are at it, we could do with a peek into your Event Viewer logs, specifically Applications and System logs. Export them and attach them in your next reply or paste them in a code box.


----------



## grobo3 (Sep 30, 2014)

Apologies for majorly delayed reply! I missed the email notifying me someone had replied :uhoh:. Thank you!

1. Deleted vuze via Revo.
2. Did a clean boot but can't tell if any difference (shockwave crashed immediately as an embedded video tried to play on the techsupport forum page.

Logs are attached.


----------



## grobo3 (Sep 30, 2014)

bump

The issue is not resolved - but the problem seems to be localized to the synaptics problem, vlc problem and embedded video ie youtube etc problem (perhaps to do with flash).

These three problems seem to be interconnected. If I play a youtube clip and a vlc video at the same time, they both stall for a minute or 2 before playing at the exact same time. The mouse(synaptics) seems to be affected by the stall, and either stops responding or the scroll function will not work.

Also, if I pause a VLC video, try to play a youtube clip, then resume the VLC video, the VLC video remains paused until the youtube clip starts (a minute later).

These problems occur individually too - but this is the correlation I can see.

Very odd! Not sure if there is a common issue you can think of?


----------



## Stancestans (Apr 26, 2009)

Does your notebook have a HDD LED (indicator light)? We could do with knowing the make and model of the notebook too.

As for the lags you are experiencing, the first thing i notice from the Speccy snapshot is the high memory usage. I know that this is a decently powered machine, but you are pushing it hard and you might not get the expected performance. Web browsers are notorious for high memory usage, so you might wanna go easy on the number of tabs you open simultaneously, the number of enabled extensions, toolbars, plugins, themes etc. According to the Speccy snapshot, chrome alone is using 1.1GB (1129MB) in multiple instances, Windows Explorer is using 417MB, firefox 270MB, VLC 100MB, itunes 176MB; just to mention a few of the many running processes. My point is, you are using a lot of memory by running these programs all at once. I do not see why you would play a video in VLC while at the same time play another video on the web. Playing web video is particularly memory intensive, adding to a browser's typically high memory usage even while displaying light sites (small images and text).

Avoid having lots of folders open, especially locations with lots of media files, specifically images and videos which are probably being displayed as thumbnails. These can easily cause high memory usage by Windows Explorer.

Your Event Logs show a lot of errors, some of them critical. I'm seeing parts of Windows hanging, which is a sign of a corrupt installation or incompatible apps/programs to say the least. The backgroundTaskHost.exe and LiveComm.exe processes hung. Firefox 35.0.0.5398 nightly* also crashed at some point. Services linked to RealPlayer auto updating also failed at least once. Explorer.EXE (Windows Explorer) crashed possibly due to incompatible or buggy extensions installed by any of the third party media handlers (RealPlayer, VLC etc). ASKInstaller, installer for the ASK toolbar most likely for firefox, also caused an error. All these errors occured within 24 hours from 19/10/2014 to 20/10/2014. I also notice that there were three forced shutdowns at 10:08, 10:23 and 10:37. That is alarming and not good because it could easily cause corruption of core system files.

I'm still analysing the Speccy snapshot and logs for further indications of what could be causing your issues, but lets start with performing disk checks and system integrity checks for corruption.

Open an elevated command prompt (right-click the Start button and select CMD (admin) then run the command *CHKDSK /R.* When prompted to schedule a disk check at boot time, press Y and reboot. DO NOT interrupt the disk check once it has started, no matter how long it seems to run. This will take some time due to the size of the disk and its contents. Make sure to plug in the AC adapter so that the notebook doesn't run out of power during the disk check because this could cause more trouble. The results of the disk check will be logged in Event Logs, so you can paste them in your reply.

After the disk check, perform system checks by running *SFC /SCANNOW* in an elevated command prompt the same way we did with chkdsk. Let us know if any errors were found and not corrected. If necessary, I'll post details on how to retrieve the results of the system integrity check.


----------



## grobo3 (Sep 30, 2014)

Thanks for replying! Obviously I don't play vlc and embedded videos at the same time - I was merely trying to see whether the 2 issues were related.

*Model and Make of notebook:* HP Pavilion 14-b030TU

Attached are updated Speccy and application/system logs (the last ones were conducted a while ago and may not be accurate reflection of computer).

I also ran the SCANNOW and errors have been found "Found corrupt files but unable to fix them". I have attached the CBS.log which has these details.

*Results from CHKDSK*

Checking file system on C:
The type of the file system is NTFS.

A disk check has been scheduled.
Windows will now check the disk. 

Stage 1: Examining basic file system structure ...
442112 file records processed. File verification completed.
8398 large file records processed. 0 bad file records processed. 
Stage 2: Examining file name linkage ...
547402 index entries processed. Index verification completed.
0 unindexed files scanned. 0 unindexed files recovered. 
Stage 3: Examining security descriptors ...
Cleaning up 6159 unused index entries from index $SII of file 0x9.
Cleaning up 6159 unused index entries from index $SDH of file 0x9.
Cleaning up 6159 unused security descriptors.
CHKDSK is compacting the security descriptor stream
Security descriptor verification completed.
52646 data files processed. CHKDSK is verifying Usn Journal...
38463368 USN bytes processed. Usn Journal verification completed.

Stage 4: Looking for bad clusters in user file data ...
442096 files processed. File data verification completed.

Stage 5: Looking for bad, free clusters ...
86652656 free clusters processed. Free space verification is complete.
CHKDSK discovered free space marked as allocated in the volume bitmap.

Windows has made corrections to the file system.
No further action is required.

950305791 KB total disk space.
602951856 KB in 247969 files.
165448 KB in 52649 indexes.
0 KB in bad sectors.
577859 KB in use by the system.
65536 KB occupied by the log file.
346610628 KB available on disk.

4096 bytes in each allocation unit.
237576447 total allocation units on disk.
86652657 allocation units available on disk.

Internal Info:
00 bf 06 00 50 96 04 00 c0 33 08 00 00 00 00 00 ....P....3......
54 d9 00 00 45 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 T...E...........

Windows has finished checking your disk.
Please wait while your computer restarts.


----------



## Stancestans (Apr 26, 2009)

Hi! Sorry for the delayed reply (helluva commitments, you understand).



> Attached are updated Speccy and application/system logs (the last ones were conducted a while ago and may not be accurate reflection of computer).


Please do not attach Speccy snapshots as text files, use the _Publish Snapshot_ option instead and then post the url/link generated here, same way you did in your first post. The attached snapshot contains potentially sensitive information about your system that could easily be exploited. I'll seek the help of moderators to have the attachment taken down.



> Stage 4: Looking for bad clusters in user file data ...
> 442096 files processed. File data verification completed.
> 
> Stage 5: Looking for bad, free clusters ...
> ...


Disk check results indicate zero bad sectors which is a good thing. We can safely give the hard drive a clean bill of health.


```
Cannot repair member file [l:36{18}]"Amd64\CNBJ2530.DPB" of prncacla.inf,
Cannot repair member file [l:36{18}]"Amd64\CNBJ2530.DPB" of prncacla.inf
This component was referenced by [l:186{93}]"Microsoft-Windows-Printer-Drivers-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.3.9600.16384.INF_prncacla"
```
SFC scan results (CBS log) show a corrupt file that could not be fixed. The file in question is a Canon printer driver and probably has nothing to do with the problems you are having, but it's best not to leave any stones unturned. Other than this file, everything else looks good. It may be of interest to note that there are reports of this file's corruption believed to be behind system issues including BSODs (information gathered from other forums) and seems to be a problem occurring in Windows 8/8.1 only. Fortunately there is a relatively easy fix guide here. Try it out and report back the outcome.

There's a significant reduction in errors in the event logs attached, but am still sieving through them for anything notable.

As for browser/vlc playback issues (lag), I'd recommend you install the latest stable releases of your browsers and VLC or any other (media playback) programs you have installed. I'd also recommend installing the latest version of Adobe Flash Player and updating your drivers, particularly your graphics drivers. I notice that you have a version higher than that available in HP's support site for your laptop, probably updated through Windows Update, but I still think you should reinstall the driver from HP's site even if it's a lower version (10.18.10.3304) and use this version for the time being until we resolve the issues and are certain the drivers have nothing to do with the playback issues. This means you have to uninstall the update and uncheck it in Windows Update to prevent it from automatically getting installed.

VLC automatically installs activex components and browser plugins for Firefox. I do not know if these have anything to do with the VLC/browser playback issues, but it's worth investigating. While installing the latest version of VLC, customize the installation by excluding the activex and browser plugins and deleting user preferences.


----------



## Macboatmaster (Dec 17, 2014)

After you have dealt with the suggestions already made by Stancestans, I would suggest the following
1. You have User Account Control set to Never Notify. This may be your desired setting, but it is not generally speaking a good idea. Effectively this turns off UAC. There are numerous implications to this, but the main one is that it leaves you with a weakened security. Without your knowledge - downloaded programs and other items can make changes to your system files without your permission.

2. Whilst I agree entirely about the comments regarding multiple applications running - it is not unusual whatsoever to see only a small amount of memory free in Windows 8/8.1. These two operating systems especially will use most of the memory available.
However apart from Reserved memory - that in use by hardware, you will see that some memory has been held in Standby. This memory will be released by the system as and when required for programs etc.
Please see my screenshot.

3.Your system scan log could possibly indicate the use of a third party maintenance tool. Registry Cleaners, Make it go faster programs are the type of items I refer to.

In an attempt to repair all your system files I recommend you run a DISM cmd
That is Deployment Imaging Servicing. It will attempt repair from backups on your system, plus if necessary files from Microsoft servers. Ensure you have an internet connection

To do this open a cmd prompt with admin rights and copy and paste this

*Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth*

It will hopefully report health restored all in order.
If it does exit the cmd prompt 
REBOOT

Go back to the cmd prompt and re run a system file check on the 
sfc /scannow 

See what that reports.

If that is now all in order
REBOOT
Go Windows Updates and CHECK for updates.
Install as necessary

REBOOT

4. IMHO you MAY find that AVG is a possible cause.
After the recommends from Stancestans and my suggestion of the DISM cmd, if the issue is not solved, I would try depending on if AVG is purchased OR the free edition, and if purchased you have the means to reinstall - UNINSTALL AVG
Use Control Panel, Programs and Features REBOOTand then run the AVG uninstall tool
http://www.avg.com/gb-en/utilities

5. If you do decide to uninstall AVG even if only for testing purposes ensure that Windows Defender is running and updated.
Also check that Windows Firewall is running.
If you are staying with AVG although that would not be my recommendation - you have AVG2014 - if it is paid for the upgrade to AVG2015 is free within the life of the existing subscription and if it is the FREE edition the download of 2015 is also available


----------

