silly Windows clock problem

[private joker]

This is bizarre. I have a PC with Windows XP. The system clock in the lower right corner of the taskbar is running slow. When I reset it to the correct time, within 2 days it is almost 5 minutes behind. After a week it will be 10-15 minutes behind.

Has anyone encountered this random problem and is there a quick solution?

Easy fix. Right click the clock, choose "Adjust Date/Time", click the tab that says "Internet Time" and change the server to another time server.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v415/acme401/clock.png

Or just turn off internet time.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

[mattw]

the computer's internal battery may be dying. how old is cpu?

[BluffTHIS!]

[ QUOTE ]
the computer's internal battery may be dying. how old is cpu?

[/ QUOTE ]

This is what you need to be concerned about, and before it totally goes in the middle of something. But the computer normally would have to be 4-5+ years old before it would happen in my experience, which is replacing batteries a couple times over the years.

[smoore]

clock doesn't matter for our purposes of reliability. (unless you're running a datamiming group)

if it's REALLY bad, have it sync the clock with an internet time server every 5 minutes... if it's just a little bad then every hour should be fine.

[private joker]

[ QUOTE ]
Easy fix. Right click the clock, choose "Adjust Date/Time", click the tab that says "Internet Time" and change the server to another time server.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, this didn't work. I waited a couple days to make sure. After I did this (shortly after the post), I left it alone until now, when I just reset it -- it was 3 minutes slow by now.

Someone asked how old the CPU is -- it's almost 2 years old. Could it be the battery already?

[smoore]

AFAIK, the battery doesn't do anything while the computer is powered on. I've had machines with completely dead CMOS batteries that worked fine as long as power was never removed.

[cgwahl]

Windows only updates its clock once a week if you have it checked off.

If its really a concern then just do a search for a windows clock updater.

Or go here...this place has a free one: http://www.worldtimeserver.com/atomic-clock/


Or here: http://www.hsinlin.com/software/time_sync.html