# Why is my computer so slow? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 7, 2008, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620 "2008-02-07T01:37:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CynicalGabe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@CynicalGabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CynicalGabe)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/1 "2008-02-07T01:37:28Z")
Title says it. First of all, I am in no way new to computers, and I’ve tried all the normal stuff, including running Norton AntiVirus regularly, using AdAware and SpyBot regularly (all updated regularly), with no sign of persistent malware, cookies or syphilis, as well as removing unnecessary software/files, HD defrag and memory defrag, prefetch and startup cleaning and not running too many programs at one time. My computer is still really slow in comparison to when I bought it a little over a year ago. About 6 months ago I even reformatted the HD and did a clean install to try and fix the problem. It is still slow. I can barely even run iTunes without the music skipping because of HD access times. Sometimes there is HD activity when there seemingly shouldn’t be, but in general it just seems like the computer runs in slow motion. Along with other nonspecific slowdowns, such as taking forever to start up, even when the number of startup programs is low. Any suggestions? ---
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/2 "2008-02-07T01:54:26Z")
Check your BIOS setting for something wrong. Check that the clock speeds are correct, and the hard drives are running in 32 bit mode. L2 cache needs to be on. Look for the system hardware conflicts. One dying hard drive can really slow down a computer. I don’t know about Norton Antivirus, but some antivirus and security programs can slow down a computer. Have you tried Task Manager to see what programs are using significant CPU resources? ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/3 "2008-02-07T02:00:43Z")
What percentage of free space is left on your boot drive? ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/4 "2008-02-07T02:18:50Z")
Uninstall Norton Antivirus. It is a major cause of perfomance issues. [Try AVG Free Edition.](http://free.grisoft.com/doc/2/lng/us/tpl/v5?cid=ODc1ODIxNkB0ZXN0QDU5N2FkMDA0) Excellent protection with a very small resource footprint. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/5 "2008-02-07T02:56:57Z")
Also consider using [hijack this](http://www.whatthetech.com/hijackthis/) to see what else is running that your spyware apps might have missed. ---
**Author:** ![CynicalGabe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@CynicalGabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CynicalGabe)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/6 "2008-02-07T03:23:46Z")
[QUOTE=Sunspace] What percentage of free space is left on your boot drive? [/QUOTE] 18 out of 60GB. > [@Fear Itself](#): > > Uninstall Norton Antivirus. It is a major cause of perfomance issues. Try AVG Free Edition. Excellent protection with a very small resource footprint. I’ll give it a try. > [@ZipperJJ](#): > > Also consider using hijack this to see what else is running that your spyware apps might have missed. > Reply With Quote I’ll try that as well. I will also try to check BIOS in a min. ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/7 "2008-02-07T06:01:17Z")
[QUOTE=Fear Itself] Uninstall Norton Antivirus. It is a major cause of perfomance issues. [Try AVG Free Edition.](http://free.grisoft.com/doc/2/lng/us/tpl/v5?cid=ODc1ODIxNkB0ZXN0QDU5N2FkMDA0) Excellent protection with a very small resource footprint. [/QUOTE] Second this. And McAfee. They both eat all your machine and disk cycles looking for “problems” continuously. They once could both be dialed down to just check for viruses on a schedule, say once a week, which makes them STFU for the most part. I did see a McAfee installation that had somehow lost this capability, perhaps the mfr removed it in later versions. ---
**Author:** ![Amblydoper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/fbc32d/32.png) [@Amblydoper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amblydoper)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/8 "2008-02-07T06:14:00Z")
are all your drivers current? There could be a performance issue with your video card, or hard disk controller, or sound card which is causing problems. Update all drivers (one at a time, of course, to avoid problems). If you are running Vista, try switching back to XP. Vista is a resource hog. If you try all these great suggestions above, you may just have a computer bogged down with too many apps and windows features. Time for a memory upgrade. Maybe a faster Hard Drive. If your system has on board video (bassed on your OP, i doubt it) then a new video card will free up a lot of resources. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/9 "2008-02-07T08:51:29Z")
What OS are you running and how much memory do you have installed? Vista in particular is a memory hog and this machine has 2 GB. XP is nowhere near being such a hog but various MS updates haven’t helped. ---
**Author:** ![Ximenean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/aca169/32.png) [@Ximenean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ximenean)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/10 "2008-02-07T10:58:10Z")
Have you tried monitoring processes in Task Manager (including processes from all users)? That can be useful for identifying CPU- and memory-hogging applications. Not so useful if the problem is disk I/O - you can monitor total I/O reads and writes but not the rate at which they’re occurring. For that, tools from SysInternals might be better. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/11 "2008-02-07T12:37:01Z")
[QUOTE=Usram] Not so useful if the problem is disk I/O - you can monitor total I/O reads and writes but not the rate at which they’re occurring. [/QUOTE] Actually, you can easily do it in Vista - it’s one of the default views in Resource Monitor - and you can set up Resource Monitor in XP to do it too. ---
**Author:** ![Flander](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8c91f0/32.png) [@Flander](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flander)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/12 "2008-02-07T15:08:21Z")
You may also want to run a CheckDisk. Right click on your C: drive and click properties-\>tools-\>error checking. Check both boxes about fixing errors and scanning boot sectors, click ok. It will tell you it will schedule one on restart. click ok. Then restart, sit back, and go get lunch. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Jinks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dec6dc/32.png) [@Captain\_Jinks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Jinks)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2008, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/13 "2008-02-07T17:38:13Z")
Some other problems that I’ve seen correct oddball problems in the past… Uptate your BIOS (mfr’s website) Memory has disappeared due to a faulty RAM chip (Start • Run • winver) Hardware acceleration properly set? Stuck print job in a virtual printer (pdf printer) Failed install Just what is slow… Bootup? (lotsa drivers and programs?) Starting an app? General running? Internet starting? (use Firefox/Opera?) General Internet? (Slow connection speed?) ---
**Author:** ![CynicalGabe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@CynicalGabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CynicalGabe)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2008, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/14 "2008-02-08T17:25:22Z")
I’ve run checkdisk. All drivers are updated. Running XP with 512MB of RAM (that could be the problem). BTW, this is a Dell Inspiron E1505. Uninstalling NAV helped, but startup is still a bit slower than it should be. I will try updating the BIOS. Thanks for the suggestions so far. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2008, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/15 "2008-02-08T17:44:02Z")
Ah, a notebook? There’s another possibility: is it getting too hot? Intel processors have a technology called Speedstep to help with this by - tada - slowing the computer down. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2008, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/16 "2008-02-08T23:47:26Z")
If you need to cool and calm down your notebook, you could try this. It’s revolutionaire! [http://www.mensup.fr/usbwine/usbwine.swf](http://www.mensup.fr/usbwine/usbwine.swf) , , , , , , , It’s a funny, short video, in spoken French, and completely SFW. ---
**Author:** ![Iggins](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Iggins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Iggins)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2008, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/17 "2008-02-09T00:18:45Z")
I’ve fixed two laptops with speed issues by carefully cleaning out the CPU fan and exhaust path. As **Quartz** said, Speedstep will really slow the cpu down if overheated. Sometimes compressed or canned air will be enough, or you may have to disassemble the case to get all of the dustbunnies out. ---
**Author:** ![drachillix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/48db29/32.png) [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2008, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-my-computer-so-slow/436620/18 "2008-02-09T00:33:02Z")
[QUOTE=CynicalGabe] Title says it. First of all, I am in no way new to computers, and I’ve tried all the normal stuff, including running Norton AntiVirus regularly, using AdAware and SpyBot regularly (all updated regularly), with no sign of persistent malware, cookies or syphilis, as well as removing unnecessary software/files, HD defrag and memory defrag, prefetch and startup cleaning and not running too many programs at one time. [/QUOTE] As much as it pains me to say it, spybot has become a little more resource intensive of late and could be a small part of the problem. Try grabbing something like eusing registry cleaner and giving it a once over. might also consider downloading and running the manufacturer diagnostics tools for your hard drive from seagate, western digital, whomever makes the drive. Last but not least, remember laptop and speed are pretty much mutually exclusive terms unless you want to drop quite a bit of money. Unless you need a laptop, a desktop is always going to give you more bang for the buck.