Forever and ever to logout....

Whenever I click Start > Logout, it takes at least 30 seconds if not longer for the actual Logout/Switch User dialog to come up.

WHY!!! Its sooo annoying!

I have a few programs running in the background, none of which take a long time to quit. Wait, thats a lie, Steam takes a while to close fully.

Anyone else have this?

I have to babysit my PC for ages every time i shut it down or restart it. It's just bad management of non-responding programs in Windows. It is microsoft after all... I often get my connection to freeze up and there is no process to shut down or control or anything, just the little frozen tray icon. Loads of things like these happen, and they all leave you clueless as to why it won't shut down or log off. I always have winamp freeze and there is nothing of it in any end-task window or anything, it's the tray again. And actually my connection has 3 programs running for some reason (ADSL controller, windows connection and some sort of firewall) they all freeze like that.

Hopefully they fix some of this in Vista but i doubt it.

Would be nice if windows was open source just for that reason, so we could fix these things that M$ is likely to never find about cos they're so specific. Not that M$ doesnt care about their customers, they're a great company... right...

hey no no just ... ignore me :)

30 seconds sounds like it might be timing out on a service somewhere... If you try to log out / shut down, do you see any errors appear in the eventviewer at all?

(eventvwr.exe)

EDIT : Ignore me, I'm a complete rambling idiot

Really? What have cookies got to do with the booting/shutdown processes? :/

yeah that sounds weird to me, but I'm willing to be educated.

I don't suffer from any windows related errors anymore since I purchased a well-priced program that cleans up my infrastructure at 3am every day.

Ever heard of windows tuneup? It's well worth the buy, and saves you from having to resinatll windows after a year or so of use. It keeps it running like it did when you first installed it. It always fixes your registry and everything else.. You'd be amazed how easy it is to completely clutter up your registry after just installing / uninstalling a few programs. The more registry clutter, the slower and more nonresponsive your pc gets. If you never clean your registry, and you install / uninstall a lot of programs, then I'm afraid you're going to completely break your OS eventually.

Windows really is a pappy design in someways, the way it gets all slow and rubbish and necessitates a reinstall eventually, but it's good in other ways, so ... sigh.

Like I said, if you use registry cleaning programs you really don't have to go through a reinstall.. ever..

I use CCleaner http://www.ccleaner.com/ as well as Spybot Search and Destroy - Freeware.

Yeah.. Grisu is right on the money when he mentioned a spyware / adware removal tool. That is a must as well, if you want your computer running like it did when you first got it or running like it did when you performed a fresh windows install...

Actually my PC is fast due to adaware and avast, but mainly because I only have two process loading in msconfig/startup + I have trimmed down my services that are automatic. Also I have defraged inc. system files and run Bootvis. Haven't cleansed my registry though, that's intrested.

Could you point me to the website/give the name of the company? I've googled it but it just throws up a bunch of other programs.

http://www.tune-up.com/

It has a lot of really good reviews, and I swear up and down on it.

TuneUp SystemControl

Expand section: Customizing the display of disk drive names

Under Windows Me, 2000 and XP, you can now specify at what position the letter that is assigned to a disk drive is shown. For example, you can change "Local Disk (C:)" to "Local Disk " or "(C:) Local Disk". This new option can be found in TuneUp SystemControl under Folder Options > Advanced > My Computer > Drive Letters .

Expand section: Log Off button in the Start menu

Under Windows XP, you can now remove the Log Off button from the Start menu. This new option can be found in TuneUp SystemControl under Start Menu > Advanced > User .

Expand section: Running Windows Messenger

You can now disable the automatic loading of Windows Messenger at the following events:

* Windows start
* Outlook Express start
* Office Outlook start

This new option can be found in TuneUp SystemControl under E-Mail and Chat > Windows Messenger.

Expand section: Security Center Warnings

The Windows Security Center, which is installed with Windows XP Service Pack 2, shows warnings, for example when an antivirus or firewall program is not found on your system, or when such a program is not up to date. You can disable these warnings in TuneUp SystemControl under Start and Maintenance > Security Center.

Expand section: Mozilla Firefox

TuneUp Utilities 2006 offers a wide range of functions for customizing the appearance and functions of the Internet browser Mozilla Firefox, as well as for customizing how web sites are loaded and displayed.

Expand section: Autocomplete for default dialogs

Enable the new option Autocomplete most similar entry to have file names automatically completed in the default Open and Save As dialogs after you type the first characters.

TuneUp StartUp Manager

Expand section: General

The new version of TuneUp StartUp Manager lets you even more effectively manage programs that start automatically. A task pane provides direct access to the most frequently completed tasks, and shows you detailed information on the startup entries that are configured in your system.

Expand section: New view

TuneUp StartUp Manager now offers an improved view so that you can more easily identify and assess the programs on your computer that are started automatically. Now, you can see which startup entries may be unnecessary or dangerous at a glance.

Expand section: Better descriptions

TuneUp StartUp Manager now shows more detailed descriptions for each entry so that you can more easily decide whether or not you wish to disable the startup entry.

Expand section: Ratings

One of the following ratings is shown for each startup entry:

* Trustworthy
* Potentially untrustworthy
* Dangerous
* Unknown

All programs that are rated as trustworthy fulfill a useful function. Depending on the type of function, TuneUp StartUp Manager will recommend under what circumstances the entry should be enabled or disabled.

Potentially untrustworthy is assigned to programs that are often surreptitiously installed on your computer while you surf the Internet or when you install shareware or freeware on your computer. These programs run unseen in the background and can reduce the performance of your computer and your productivity. This category also covers programs that show advertising on your computer or gather information on your surfing habits.

Programs that are rated dangerous are malicious programs such as viruses and worms.

The rating unknown is assigned to programs that are not recognized. For such entries, you have the option of reporting these programs to us so that they can be detected by one of the next updates.

TuneUp Styler

Expand section: Change the boot logo

When you start Windows XP, a full-screen picture with the Windows logo is shown. The bottom of this picture contains an animated progress bar.

With TuneUp Styler, you can replace this boot screen with one of your choosing with just a few mouse clicks. Or give your imagination free reign and create your own boot screen, for example with your favorite vacation photo.

Expand section: Support for Stardock file formats

The new version of TuneUp Styler supports the following common Stardock file formats:

* Stardock Bootskin (boot screen)
* Stardock LogonXP (welcome screen)
* Stardock IconPackager (icon package)

Many web sites such as www.wincustomize.com offer a large number of files in these formats, which you can now import and use with TuneUp Styler.

TuneUp DiskCleaner

Expand section: Mozilla Firefox cache

TuneUp DiskCleaner now also checks the size of the Mozilla Firefox cache in addition to checking the Internet Explorer cache. Empty the cache to free up additional space on your hard disks.

TuneUp RegistryCleaner

Expand section: Ignore problems

Problems that occur frequently or problems that would impair the functionality of other programs if they were corrected can be ignored in future scans. To do this, click the desired problem with your right mouse button and select Ignore Problem. To remove a problem from the ignore list at a later time, click the File menu and select Ignored Problems.

Expand section: Improved scanning technology

The TuneUp RegistryCleaner scanning technology has been expanded so that significantly more problems can be identified in the registry.

History lists for common programs such as Microsoft Office are now also scanned, and any problems are shown in the category History lists.

Information on the ActiveX and COM object type libraries is now scanned. If missing or incorrect files are found, this is shown in the category ActiveX and COM .

Shortcuts in the Start menu that point to known programs are now scanned to verify that their parameters are correct. For example, when the shortcut "explorer.exe C:\Test Folder" is scanned, TuneUp RegistryCleaner first looks for the program Explorer.exe (Windows Explorer), and then for the folder "C:\Test Folder". Any problems found here are shown under the category Start Menu.

1-Click Maintenance

Expand section: Detailed information

TuneUp Utilities 2006 1-Click Maintenance now allows you to view details on the problems that it finds. To do this, click the Details link beneath the results of the desired scan. Detailed information for every problem is shown in the window that appears. You can exclude individual problems from correction by clicking the check box next to the desired problem.

TuneUp System Optimizer

Expand section: System Advisor

The System Advisor can now identify further weaknesses in your computer's software and hardware configuration and shows tips and information on adapting and optimizing your computer and improving your computer's security.

Expand section: Mozilla Firefox support for Internet optimization

The Internet optimization function now automatically detects when the Internet browser Mozilla Firefox is installed on your system and analyzes its configuration. When you click the Mozilla Firefox link after the analysis, you will be shown a list of suggested changes to accelerate surfing with this browser.

TuneUp Process Manager

Expand section: More details

The process details now contain more information on the currently running processes. For example, you can now see which processes are shown in the notification area on the taskbar, which modules (DLL files) the process is using, and at what time the process was started.

The new details bar at the bottom of the Processes panel shows more information on the currently selected process, including the product name, the manufacturer, the file name and the folder in which the executable file of the process is located.

TuneUp Registry Editor

Expand section: Intelligent key navigation

--- And its only 39.95 - It has a lot of good reviews from PCWorld, etc.

Windows Tuneup was the best thing I've ever bought for my computer.. hands down.

Really, there are freeware alternatives that do exactly the same stuff. Probably not all implemented in one app. But sure for the same results.

Grisu is right. But I'd rather put it all in a box, under one company, but that's just me :P

Windows is typically designed so that it can boot up quickly, I don't think Bill Gate$ realised that when users logged off/shut down that they'd still sit there until it actually did it... When I log off/shut down.. whatever, that means I get up off my chair and walk away! :)

I have seen many digs at Microsoft for this in magazines, but I cannot see why???

Sounds like a TCP/IP timeout or program exit hang to me. I'd be checking the network settings and the active task list for unwanted junk.

Well, I just click Start > Log off, it hasn't actually started to log off. So no programs are being closed.

It doesn't happen when the computer is only on for one hour or so, its when its on nearly all day.

> It doesn't happen when the computer is only on
> for one hour or so, its when its on nearly all day.

This is because Window's bloatware and memory mismanagement has accumulated throughout the day.

Seriously, windows has suffered from this problem from the days of 95. You'll never get rid of it, some days my PC shuts down in 2-3 seconds, other times it's 5 minutes.

When I shut down my 2 PCs at the end of the day I have a race with them, see which one shuts down first. Between 98 and XP, it's a lottery who'll win.