Uh oh

[Avaris]

Yesterday while playing Dark Crusade (new Warhammer RTS expansion, and it's really good), my computer started giving off weird clicking noises (that's inside the case). The performance had a tremendous slowdown, and it's been like that since. Everything has started performing like it's on a Pentium 2... Where it normally takes Windows 30 seconds to load, it's taken up to 2 minutes. Any ideas of what could be wrong?

[Porkinator]

Clicking usually means your hard drive is failing.
Backup now and use Windows to check your hard drive for errors.

[Yrrek]

Yep, it's probably hard disk failure. Good luck!

[nonstop]

Bump... and bump on the warhammer game. It's a good one. I played the original, not the expansion that you have there but same mechanics/engine.

[myxxplyxx]

or may be a bad fan on the graphics card...we've had some machines in the labs that make clicking noises...figure its the hardrive and it's been the fan on the graphics card a couple of times...

[Avaris]

Is a system-wide slowdown also a problem with the hard drive?

[nonstop]

Could be but it could also be a fan not working and your video overheating like rom said. I have had that before too.

[BeerNut]

A clicking hardrive is normally unreadable... The fact that your machine can still operate would suggest something else.

I would guess that it is a fan... probably the one on your CPU. Newer CPU's (especially Intels) will detect higher temperatures and automatically lower the clock speed to prevent overheating. Take a look at the fan on your power supply as well. If it is not being cooled properly, many units reduce output.

I would guess that it is probably not the fan on your vid card, simply because a hot video card usually will only take a dump when it is stressed. If basic features like booting up are slowed (which doesn't push the GPU), then it is most likely something else.

Only way to know for sure is to crack'er open and have a look inside.

[Avaris]

Well, I dusted everything out yesterday, including the CPU, which hasn't been cleaned in at least 3 years. Took all the dust out, reconnected everything, and it seems to be fine. However, once I boot it up, all goes to hell. Plus, my mouse icon will sometimes just freeze, but you'll be able to click on other stuff (you just can't see exactly where). This is becoming really annoying...

[BeerNut]

What O/S are you using Av?

A temporary fix to the invisible mouse problem, is to go into the mouse properties and enable pointer trails.
I've encountered this before, and it turned out to be my display driver... I rolled back a version, and all was well.

[Avaris]

Aha, ok. Currently using Windows XP verions 2002 Service Pack 2. I'll go and try cleaning out the CPU again (as I didn't remove the heatsink, and probably a lot of dust would've gotten in there. Dust has killed at least 3 power supplies here). Thanks for the help, guys.

[law.of.averages]

Your #1 priority should be as Pork has said... get your data backed up if you don't already have backups, make em now... right now....

[Avaris]

Alright. As I found out not too long ago, that was my hard drive indicating it's nearing it's end. Unfortunately for me, that particular hard drive has windows and all the crucial stuff put onto (mind you, this computer's gone through a number of changes, but the software itself has always stayed the same). I suppose I have to do a back up at this point.

[nonstop]

Alright. As I found out not too long ago, that was my hard drive indicating it's nearing it's end. Unfortunately for me, that particular hard drive has windows and all the crucial stuff put onto (mind you, this computer's gone through a number of changes, but the software itself has always stayed the same). I suppose I have to do a back up at this point.

Why don't people just listen to 'the law.' Life would be easier.

Your #1 priority should be as Pork has said... get your data backed up if you don't already have backups, make em now... right now....

[Porkinator]

Just be grateful it isn't a 7900 video card.