[OT] XP Trouble-shooting Suggestions?

[Rob Cozens]

All,

Over the last couple of weeks I've noticed a growing degredation in 
my TPC's disk access times, and I wonder if anyone has any 
suggestions as to how I might determine the cause.

Presently, I am setting the TPC to standby rather than shutting it 
down, because shut down and startup both tend to hang with the disk 
access light on.  A few days ago the "compact old files" option took 
several hours to complete instead of the usual few minutes.

I suspect those fixed-position disk blocks that store system info are 
going bad and many CRC errors are happening for each successful read 
or write; however it's possible that I've contracted a virus or that 
some other hardware error is at the root of this.

Can anyone suggest a trouble-shooting procedure that might help 
isolate the problem?

T.I.A.

Rob Cozens CCW
Serendipity Software Company

"And I, which was two fooles, do so grow three;
  Who are a little wise, the best fooles bee."

  from "The Triple Foole" by John Donne (1572-1631)