so...after you deleted AVG?...everything going smoothly?...
have you tried back installing Mcafee?...me,thought of installing AVG...
any other open antivirus to recommend to install?...

You're using XP rite? If you re-format according to the guidebook, I guess they'll have you do a recovery using the built in system... I don't think you'd want that, as the bloatware that Dell bundles are gonna be installed too...

You have the Windows XP CD with you, right? Okay, now... Just like the Vista reformat StepByStep I just did a coupla pages back, here we go:

1) Save every single thing that you need on DVDs or external HDD or whatever.

2) MAKE SURE THE BLUETOOTH IS TURNED ON UNDER WINDOWS - THE ICON IS BLUE AND WHITE (very important, I lost my BT for a few days just because Windows thought it was dead).

3) Download all the drivers you need from the Dell website (the recovery driver disk contains old drivers, remember).

3) Restart and insert the XP disk at startup.

4) Press any key when prompted.

5) Select your main partition (the one that contains Windows) and wipe it clean (delete partition).

6) Re-select the unused space, create a new partition (make sure it's C:), and format it with NTFS.

7) Windows will take care of the rest (but make sure you get the region info right. Select America for language, tune the measurements to metric, change the currency to RM and the date format to local. Make sure you select America/USA for the language because anything else will screw up the Keyboard. Selecting Malaysia for location is okay though).

8) After finishing, install the drivers from the recovery driver disk. Restart.

9) Update the drivers with the new ones (the bluetooth one requires the old drivers to be uninstalled first... I'm afraid of losing my BT again).

10) Install the Dell utilities that you need (I only installed the Dell resource CD, uninstalled QuickSet as soon as I could).

11) Install everything else.

If you do it this way, nothing should happen to the MD partition OR the recover partition...

And another thing... Make sure you install the SigmaTel audio drivers BEFORE you install the SoundBlaster Audigy HD whatever (if you have it)... You'll screw up the sound drivers if you don't... 

And if you plan to reformat often, keep in mind that the SoundBlaster Audigy thingy CAN ONLY BE REINSTALLED 3 TIMES before the serial number becomes void... 

About the PF, hmm... The coldest I can ever get out here in the Motherland is around 19c with aircond, so I wouldn't know... But actually, isn't it better for computer electronics to work under cold temps, that's why they have heatsinks and all, rite?

And another reason why PF can be so huge (and your available physical is so low) is background programs, check your SysTray... I only have 9 icons (Switcher, Samurize, Avedesk, Bluetooth, I8kfanGUI, Battery, Networking and Sound), any more then 15 icons and you're in trouble... And check for spyware/malware/adware/viruses, they tend to eat up phys and bloat the PF as well....

Other then that, Windows services... But that's a bit techie to talk about...

But the PF would not grow that large unless it NEEDS to grow that large... And for it to NEED to grow that large, I'd say you're either pushing (knowingly OR unknowingly) the programs into the pagefile from the main memory (memory optimization programs tend to do that, and it's not really good... that's why I STAY AWAY from such programs) or you're not running with enough memory to begin with... :peace

Check your startup folder (and use msconfig... tell me if you need a tut for that) to see what you're running at startup... My pagefile hovers at 800MB so 2GB is quite a problem...
Thanks man, and dun shy-shy to PM me or anything if you got any problems... I'll try my best to help!

What I'm worried now is you have some sort of malware/virus running in the background and eating up RAM/PF... Check task manager, folder options and regedit... If one or all three fail to start, than it's confirmed...

hi54ever,

have u try what i suggested ? I already suggested at my previous post. I'll post it back here just in case if u missed it.

1)Let me know ur gpu temperature (how-to)

2)PC-Clean and Hitman Pro(HP will have box to "do in Safe Mode", check that box) and tell me if ur seeing anything. (I include this bcoz i taught it could be possibly a malware/adware problem)

3)Let me know about the screensavers or long-idle things. U will have more option for this but i wouldnt want to give u too much burden so ill come back if both 1) and 2) works fine but only 3) cause u problem.

keep us posted. For more details on above, click here:step-by-step

@hi54ever,

Its ok. First of all have u tried the spyware-removal and have u seen any change so far ? U will want to run Hitman Pro during overnight or long-idle bcoz it will takes awhile as it will do a thorough scanning thru out ur system and remember to do it in Safe Mode (there's a box to check to run it in Safe Mode; dont worry HPro will do it for ya)

U can follow these step-by-step tutorial that i've made earlier: GPU temp monitoring

About the screensaver, dont worry about it till u let us know ur gpu temp.