Note that PIO hard drive modes that were unintentionally common back then would also lead to this. You used to have to go out of your way and meddle with specif

Note that PIO hard drive modes that were unintentionally common back then would also lead to this. You used to have to go out of your way and meddle with specific drivers to avoid PIO mode. You could have even ended up with a double whammy if not careful. Your hard drive and network might both have relied on the CPU for data transfer in which case the system would really have ground to a halt.