For some odd reason, I was just playing a game, running at a fine 60 fps, when suddenly it slows to a meager 8 fps. And not just the game has been affected. My whole system has. It no longer plays audio or video files properly, instead it’s skipping alot and making static noises everytime I try and play them. I’ve tried system restoring, Defragging, Disk cleanup, Startup alterations, Registry Cleaning, and no malware, viruses, or anything like that is there, and none of it has worked. I’m at the end of my rope, here. What do I do?
For some odd reason, I was just playing a game, running at a fine 60 fps, when suddenly it slows to a meager 8 fps. And not just the game has been affected. My whole system has. It no longer plays audio or video files properly, instead it’s skipping alot and making static noises everytime I try and play them. I’ve tried system restoring, Defragging, Disk cleanup, Startup alterations, Registry Cleaning, and no malware, viruses, or anything like that is there, and none of it has worked. I’m at the end of my rope, here. What do I do?

EDIT: I’ve only had my com for 6 months, and I haven’t really pushed it all that much. It’s a Vista, with a 3.00 GB RAM, AMD Turion X2 dual-core mobile technology RM70 (2.0 GHz, 1 MB cache), and up to 1408 MB ATI Radeon HD3200 Graphics HyperMemory. Maybe this helps some more.
EDIT: Well, I have over half my memory available, about 81.5 GBs. I’ve already done a registry cleanup, and there`s only 2 programs that start at startup. Used to be 4… Anyway, the only possible thing I think there’s left to do is reinstall Windows. Programs are slower, though. Like I said, my whole system has slowed down. Even when I download something, it`s slower, and I have high-speed internet. Even moving or copying programs to different spots is WAAAAY slower than what it used to be. A while back, I do believe this happenef to me before, but only visual effevts were affected, and not the speed of the com. I think it was cause of ‘Windows Silverlight’. So, I did a system restore, and everything went back to normal. This is different, though.

I somehow have 13.67GB of memory that is almost gone and I don’t know where it went. I need to free up space…but not by deleting system32! I have had some people tell me that system32 is vital but others say that it is crap.
Disk cleanup did not do much and I don’t even have enough space to defragment.

so i’m trying to get internet explorer 8 to run faster. i’ve got my computer running pretty good, but IE is being a pain. i have an HP dv6000. it’s a 32 bit. windows vista. i was down to about 35% free space left on my hard drive, so i went and bought an external 500 gb hard drive and put my music and pictures and other crap on there. and i’ve defraged. ran disk cleanup, ran a registry check, scanned for issues on disc C, now i’m at about 62% free space. i was hoping all that would help with IE but it hasn’t. i don’t have any virus software so i dunno if i have one or not, but random music will sometimes play in the background even when there isn’t any programs open. so i’m thinking i may have a virus? so now i’m looking at the programs running in the background, i read on someone elses question to use http://www.sysinfo.org/startuplist.php?filter=application+experience this site to go by for the programs running, but i’m still confused, so i’m looking for someone who can actually tell me
"yes – keep it"
"no – it’s a virus or something unnecessary"
"maybe – depends on if you want to or not"
"? – i don’t know"

so here’s a list of things running in the background

Application Experience
Application Information
Background Intelligent Transfer Service
Base Filtering Engine
CNG Key Isolation
COM+ Event System
Computer Browser
Cryptographic Services
CyberLink Background Capture Service (CBCS)
CyberLink Task Scheduler (CTS)
DCOM Server Process Launcher
Desktop Window Manager Session Manager
DHCP Client
Diagnostic Policy Service
Diagnostic System Host
Distributed Link Tracking Client
DNS Client
Extensible Authentication Protocol
Function Discovery Resource Publication
Group Policy Client
HP Health Check Service
hpqwmiex
Human Interface Device Access
IKE and AuthIPsec Keying Modules
IP Helper
IPsec Policy Agent
KtmRm for Distributed Transaction Coordinator
LiveUpdate Notice Service Ex
Multimedia class Scheduler
Network Connections
Network List Service
Network Location Awareness
Network Store Interface Service
NVIDIA Display Driver Service
PIXMA Exteded Survey Program
Plug and Play
Portable Device Enumerator Service
Print Spooler
Program Compatibility Assisstant Service
ProtexisLicensing
ReadyBoost
Remote Acess Connection Manager
Remote Procedure Call (RPC)
Secondary Logan
Security Accounts Manager
Security Center
Server
Shell Hardware Detection
Software Licensing
SSDP Discovery
Superfetch
Symantec AppCore Service
Symantec Event Manager
Symantec Lic NetConnect service
Symantec Settings Manager
System Event Notification Service
Tablet PC Input Service
Task Scheduler
TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper
Telephony
Terminal Services
Themes
UPnP Device Host
User Profile Service
Viewpoint Manager Service
WebClient
Windows Audio
Windows Audio Endpoint Builder
Windows Defender
Windows Driver Foundation – User-mode Driver Framework
Windows Error Reporting Service
Windows Event Log
Windows Firewall
Windows Image Acquisition (WIA)
Windows Management Instrumentation
Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service
Windows Mobile 2003-based device connectivity
Windows Mobile-based device connectivity
Windows Search
Windows Time
Windows Update
WLAN AutoConfig
Workstation

does anyone have any idea how to get the random music to stop playing? and any recommendations for free virus software? thanks!
the music is like a radio playing. sometimes it’ll be a commerical, sometimes it’ll be just music and sometimes it’ll be like radio dj’s talking. i haven’t downloaded anything yet except avg, it detected quite a few things including a trojan horse. and i contacted hp and they suggested reseting IE so i’ve done that. it helped a very very small amount. i’m thinking of testing out firefox

I have windows xp. I use ccleaner,using registry cleaner,advanced windows care v2,norton,spybot,windows defender, anymore programs I need to keep it clean and run faster it seems like its running slow i have dsl net.I ran disk cleanup and defrag. my drive.

Computer protection????????

I’m building a computer. I’m spending a lot of money on it. I want to know ALL protection needed to keep my computer clean and healthy.

What is the best program for the following? (Preferably NOT free)

Anti-Virus
Anti-Spyware/Malware/Adware
Disk Defragmenter
Registry Cleaner
Disk Cleanup

And if I missed any other cleaning/health program, please specify!
And I don’t necessarily mean one program for all.