Thanks for this confirmation. I cant remember if I have individually installed some Windows components from the Control Panel..... my sistem is 2 years old now... anyplace I can check this before I conduct the repair so I can make sure to not miss anything?

I was referring to this as a caveat instead of saying, "you won't have to reinstall anything."

The main point is if you perform this procedure, which is a low-risk option, and you end up missing something you normally use, you can reinstall it easily. However, to answer your question:

>Start
->Settings
-->Control Panel
--->Add/Remove Programs
---->Add/Remove Windows Components

From there, you can see a list with sublists and sub-sublists of things that are or can be installed on your computer. You can go here any time and check or uncheck boxes that you need or don't need.

Yeah, I agree with you about the Dell rep. I'm still searching for answers. I don't think XP Pro is exactly bulletproof in any case.

If you go to windows update online, and go into preferences or configure I think, you can have it confirm what you have downloaded already. From there, you can set this up as a profile or computer name.

When you return, if you have reinstalled your system for example you can simply update the same stuff you did before, not having to sift through all the updates.

Althought, if you do a new install - which you probably don't need - then you might just want WU do run a scan and walk you through it. Dno't listen to the DELL guy, totally crazy and misinformed.

I mean the guy at dell technical support not the poster here!!

Seems like we got to the bottom of this. I secured the help of an IT guy that came over and inspected my system. First of all, let me say that without the help and kindness of all the resident FT IT experts, I would have never been able to solve this. Even the IT doode I had here found new clues and leads from the great information provided here. Most of the stuff you guys throw at me are 35,000 above my IT limit, but this doode was able to make the best of it.

1) Spybot S&D was the first tool we used. With it, we caught a ton of things that AdAware was not getting, including some Gator crap that apparently is really bad. Once we cleaned the system of those, it improved slightly.

2) The IT doode then did all sorts of diagnostics, he had a ton of CD's and other goodies in his bag of tricks. He first ruled out any major hardware issue, but did discover that an old problem of mine on this T30 is back alive and well. My second 512MB RAM chip is again not being recognized.... So much for IBM having replaced my motherboard... I need to write some bad arse letter to these people.... its unbelievable...

3) Next step was to clean up the registry. In this process, the doode used the Windows Task Manager a lot.... and discovered that my CPU usage was was over the radar screen.... for some reason my CPU was being used 100% all the time. Even with no applications running... so there was some sort of background appication or driver that was taking up 100% of the CPU resources. He thought that my headaches were CPU related, and not due to some Windows or Office software problem.

4) Finally, after a lot of looking around and usage of a registry cleanup program by some Finnish geek.... he found that the IBM Keyboard program was the one to blame. Seems like some conflict of that application and driver (the IBM keyboard has some keys that can be programmed and some other featres) was causing my CPU to be occupied all the time. He disabled all the special functions of the keyboard and removed all the drivers from the startup routine and things are pretty much back to normal.

Thanks again to all for your assistance on this.... I hope that I dont have to pester you all with this again any time soon (or until I get my next ThinkPad...?)

Has your Outlook improved?

A known culprit for CPU usage maxing out is the rundll32.exe service, used in conjunction with the ibm battery maximizer wizard. Older systems, that have updated some of all of those componants can find CPU at 100% all the time. Bad. Best choice is to just don't run the battery maximzer wizard.

Second one, is the ATI keyboard shorcut key manager, or something like that. this is pretty useless unless you are using key combos to do macros or something. that is one of the services I have always stopped.

If those were some of the items, some of the people here could have pointed them out if they could have seen the service list, or something else. that's why I recommend Hijackthis, it will show you all that in a summary.

Good to hear it is back up and running.

And, when a techy fixes ones machines it is DUUUUUUUDDDDDDEEEE!!!

Glad your computer is working for you. It's always nice to be able to fix a problem without losing valuable data.

So -- why buy another Thinkpad?

Thank you. It's about time someone else told him.

Have owned 7 ThinkPads.

Never had 1/50 of the problems that Gaucho unfortunately has had.

Service is exemplary.

My T30 is by far the best and most stable machine I've ever owned.

Sorry to disagree with Scott et al, but Gaucho's is far from everyone's experience.

I'm on my second Thinkpad, an X31 which is a strong performer except for an exceptionally long boot time. The only real problem that I have experienced showed symptoms similar to those that Gaucho100K was getting and I eventually managed to figure out that it might have been due to firewall incompatibility. It appears that first TPF and then ZoneAlarm seemed to be clashing with the Microsoft firewall in the system, causing a great deal of instability and hangng.
I was reluctant to abandon the system firewall, but was ready to do so until a friend recommended another freebie called Outpost. I don't yet know how good Outpost is since I only installed it yesterday, but right now it is working smooth as glass with the rest of the system, and if it continues this way, they can even have a few dollars for their "advanced" model whenever they come calling.

How dare you!





Attachment: really nasty virus.

I think the real answer to the problems Gaucho had is to use Unix. It's never a problem to diagnose a Unix PC. Windows just doesn't lend itself easily to system management. It has improved quite a bit over the years, but still falls short.

If you can't get away from Windows, then you should resign yourself to upgrading your PC and OS every couple of years. First it will wipe out all the bad stuff you've accumulated. Secondly you get nice new fast hardware!