Right Click is slow to respond

[#1]

I use "right click" on my mouse a lot....
lately  (possibly since my re-install of Windows Vista Home Premium).. ( and all the Dell drivers I can muster !) (including the ALPS touchpad driver which is disabled when the mouse is plugged in { opttion on the settings panel } )
I have just timed it... from click to the menu apearing.. is ...15 seconds...      It used to be almost instant...  Double clicking also takes a while to action.. )
This is not just on Windows files and folders... but also on the Icons on the desktop for accessing Thunderbird and Firefox, and other progs...
Anyone got a solution? Please ?

[#2]

have you tried another mouse ?  to rule out the one you use

[#3]

Don't MS "cripple" the system with the last "windows update"?
(Well, it seemed like that with 98SE and XP, both suddenly became slow for me  )
Am I cynical  --  of course 

[#4]

Quote from: rongtw

have you tried another mouse ?  to rule out the one you use

The mouse is working fine... it double clicks.. and then I get the hour glass showing up, which means that something is taking it`s time doing something... before the pop up menu appears.
Interestingly... i have tried another mouse... and.. if I click on an icon.. it has the same delay.. if I then click again, it comes up quicker... mostly desktop icons for progs... and so I repeated the test with the original mouse, and similar happens... "sometimes" it seems to forget the location of the item I am clicking on and I have to wait,.. but then it will "remember" and activate quicker next time... the Firefox and Thunderbird icons are the one`s that seem to have the delay in their action... I suppose it is "just one of those things" ...

[#5]

Right-clicking causes a set of lookups in the registry that might then invoke other programs which can do almost anything.  A poor program that registers itself for a right click can cause very significant slowdown like that.
Try ShellExView http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/shexview.html to test turning right click programs off and on, you might be able to track down the rogue program.  A bit confusing, but much easier than trying to edit the registry directly.
There may be better similar utilities, but I have always found NirSoft ones very small, simple and reliable.

[#6]

@sjptd..... Thanks for your input....have downloaded that... and followed the instructions on this page  http://windowsxp.mvps.org/slowrightclick.htm

Quote

Method 2 - Using ShellExView to determine the Context-menu causing the problem

And I think I have found the culprit..... possibly.... AVAST ... after disabling that context menu... the delay between the right click and the menu appearing was down to about half a second...
Will see what happens after I re-boot... but .. if I still have this problem, at least I know how to try and sort it, and have the tool to do it...
Many Thanks. 

[#7]

Quote from: shutter

And I think I have found the culprit..... possibly.... AVAST

That evil shit is also responsible for locking up many systems at run time. You just get logged on and then the avast service kicks in to do an auto update and sends the cpu up to 100%. Utter madness. I certainly wouldn't buy the paid version to suffer that. Granted it's not as bad on a multicore machine but it does still have a noticeable effect.

Quote from: PeeGee

Don't MS "cripple" the system with the last "windows update"? (Well, it seemed like that with 98SE and XP, both suddenly became slow for me  )

I wouldn't know as I never bother with updates anyway - they're a pain in the grass and lets face it, MS have been known to leave millions of people with BSODs after updates. Thats why I never bother with them. It's also a pain when you need to reinstall windows (rare with win7) as you then need to spend hours reinstalling them all again. Pointless time consuming exercise if you ask me and all it does is allow MS to introduce all sorts of unknown back doors to your system that the FEDs might want etc.

[#8]

Quote from: 7up

if you ask me and all it does is allow MS to introduce all sorts of unknown back doors to your system that the FEDs might want etc.

your tinfoil is showing again,
updates fix as yet unexploited problems on vulnerable systems and cause problems on infected ones (yes its often a deliberate tactic) that cause the user to suffer a few hours of reinstall pain for a few days of not yet vulnerable bliss, of course the safer you are the lss likely you are to get nasties but they can happen to anyone especially the things delivered via drive by ....

[#9]

Quote from: nanotm

Quote from: 7up if you ask me and all it does is allow MS to introduce all sorts of unknown back doors to your system that the FEDs might want etc. your tinfoil is showing again,

From the person who has theories on everything..     

Quote from: nanotm

updates fix as yet unexploited problems on vulnerable systems

But how do you know that some of these updates don't include a little tcp server or client that phones home or allows remote access? - you don't. Yes I agree that in theory the updates are supposed to fix problems but you've actually got no real idea at all what is being done to your computer.

[#10]

Quote from: 7up

But how do you know that some of these updates don't include a little tcp server or client that phones home or allows remote access?

You could disassemble and analyse the new files and compare them against the old versions, or you could use another computer to capture and inspect all the network traffic going to and from the Windows box. So the same way as you know that there aren't any secret backdoors or things "phoning home" already there then. Most people probably don't really know what exactly a Windows computer is doing anyway, updates don't change that. If you don't trust the updates that Microsoft release, then you probably shouldn't trust nor use any Microsoft software then.

[#11]

I know for a fact that my pc contacts Microsoft servers 24/7 when its switched on, how do I know this you might ask, well I use Hotmail (had the same account since 1996) I use one drive, I use automatic updates and I subscribe to the user experience program, then I have a firewall that only allows those bits of the OS through the firewall I wish to allow through it (because I don't use Microsoft firewall).
years ago I had a problem when an update bricked my pc, the reason that happened was because I didn't at that time have a decent security product running and that left me vulnerable and the patch was late getting to me so my system was already corrupted.... the fix was to format the hard drives and start from scratch re-installing windows, since then I have only had fairly minor problems having learnt my lesson I regularly perform system image backups as well as having a decent security product, I also utilise a backdoor free router with firewall, now all I need to worry about is when the kids do something stupid and I am required to "fix" that mess, of course no matter how much I tell them to do things a certain way they will do whatever they like and to hell with what the old man says, until they learn the hard way that is ....

[#12]

Quote from: nanotm

I know for a fact that my pc contacts Microsoft servers 24/7 when its switched on,

But are you happy with the idea of people poking around your personal files? - I wouldn't be.
I have nothing to hide and don't see why I should be judged as guilty just because I don't want the snoops snooping however these days the excuse is "if you've got nothing to hide you shouldn't be worried". I don't accept that. I don't want my stuff snooped through because it's private. It's been proven time and time again that governments cannot be trusted with peoples data - look at the CDs that went missing years agom the government trying to sell NHS data etc. You of all people nanotm are the one i would least expect to be happy about them rifling through your PC! 
I've committed no crime, I'm not even under suspicion by the police, I've had no caution. Why should any government or software company be allowed to snoop through peoples personal files just "because" they want to be "sure" ? They can already monitor in/outoging emails, tcp traffic, udp packets, social networks etc and as far as i'm concerned thats where the line should be drawn.
You don't see them coming round every week inspecting every house in your street "just in case" do you! Likewise they don't go looking for computers that aren't connected to the internet just incase they have bad plans saved on them.
I'd be pretty sure Win7 already has something onboard that most of us don't know about but at least by ignoring the updates i limit their ability to get new stuff on my system (though they can probably do forced download anyway  )

[#13]

if there was anything I wished to remain private I would keep it on one of the other pc's, I have a necessity to keep stuff synced between several devices so I utilise certain options, I like Cortana but want her to be better so I allow regular usage data to be collated, I am aware some of that collected data might give off personal info but most of it could be collected readily by authorities anyway without needing to dig through Microsoft servers, you forget that those of us in the unenviable position of being invalids necessarily singed some documentation specifically permitting snooping on our every move by various groups such as the council (part of the housing benefit documentation) the DWP (again part of the detail of the application for benefits) and also for me a few other state agencies and groups, getting worried that the feds might be collecting the same data themselves about me would be totally pointless given the unilateral information exchange agreement with both sides of the Atlantic anti terror agreement .....
if reading my appointments makes them happy then so be it its no skin off my nose, hell I don't have a very busy life most of the things in there are about school clubs and medical appointments (which my pension provider gets anyway) and my emails largely revolve around public information such as my purchases or forum contributions so again nothing to be bothered with.
if you want things to remain private then you need to keep them on an unconnected (standalone) system or better yet have them in hardcopy only because anything digital can be copied remotely so long as you look at it on screen .......

[#14]

It's not just software. IIRC the BT supplied router allows BT (with permission I'm told) to check what's attached to the system by probing the network, in a manner similar to NMAP I would assume, and is one of the reasons I don't use supplier provided hardware.
What I object to more than anything is a vendors assumption that if they collect enough data on you they'll be able to target you with ads for stuff you want to buy. When I use google and I get results returned that have been paid for I never click on them. I simply note who it is and go direct.

[#15]

yeah all that consumer hardware like TV's/ dvd players with online features / set top boxes with on-demand / games consoles / isp branded network gear of all sorts including homeplugs and routers, and a soon a whole new range of IoT connected stuff will be spying on your every movement and interaction with the electronic world (and physical world in some cases) it all snoops on everything you do and reports to somewhere about it, but most people don't think about that they retain the blinkers about the horrible nasty M$ and ignore any hint of wrongdoing by all the other commercial entities vying to sell your particulars .......
but I didn't want to drag this too far off topic by discussing any of them