Something is gradually slowing down my computer

Scannerman · 2025-02-12T14:11:10-0500

haku100 said:
Please help me out with this ridiculous situation, which is plaguing me - if only because I see no end in sight. Most users, at this point, believe their device has silted up hopelessly and buy a new one. But I don't believe that a machine is programmed to do such shenanigans. So...

It's your processor. 1 GHz is generally not enough processing speed to run an extensive OS and I'm surprised you could even run Win 10 on it well. I'm guessing Win 10 was well-tweaked BUT there is another problem with Lenovo that could be slowing your down laptop. Lenovo was slapped with stiff fines twice for embedding fishingware in the BIOS of some of their PCs. Personally, I would get rid of that laptop.

Superfish - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Lenovo - Sotos Class Actions

The Lenovo Class Action class action alleges that Lenovo (Canada) Inc. breached certain implied warranties and invaded consumers’ privacy by pre-installing a potentially malicious software called Visual Discovery designed by Superfish Inc. on several Lenovo laptops.

www.sotosclassactions.com

Topic: Do Lenovo Laptops Pose a Security or Privacy Risk? @ AskWoody

kelper · 2025-02-12T14:13:41-0500

The current requirements for Windows 11 are:

Processor: 1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster with at least 2 cores on a compatible 64-bit processor or System on a Chip (SoC).
RAM: 4 gigabytes (GB) or more.
Storage: 64 GB or larger storage device.
System Firmware: UEFI, Secure Boot capable.
TPM: Trusted Platform Module (TPM) version 2.0.
Graphics Card: Compatible with DirectX 12 or later with WDDM 2.0 driver.
Display: High definition (720p) display that is greater than 9" diagonally, 8 bits per color channel.
Internet Connection: Internet connectivity is necessary to perform updates and to download and use some features. Windows 11 Home edition requires an internet connection and a Microsoft Account to complete device setup on first use.

So please stop saying 1GHz is not enough!

krism · 2025-02-12T14:17:25-0500

I offer no proof. I suggest you d/l and install the free version of BitDefender and try things for a day or 2. This is starkly similar to exactly what I experienced is it now a year or 2 or more ago? (bitdefender_avfree . exe ) It auto replaces WD.
Night and day.

Scannerman · 2025-02-12T14:18:51-0500

It's not enough.

Those are the bare butt minimum requirements. If you don't mind crawling through your apps and waiting for programs to open and and you happen to enjoy sluggish performance, by all means it is suffice. But I'ma say it again:

It's not enough.

kelper · 2025-02-12T14:25:19-0500

My laptop works perfectly FOR ME. I do not play computer games as I am an adult. Telling people that 4GB and 1GHz is the cause of their problems is not really helpful. Just my opinion.

krism · 2025-02-12T14:27:27-0500

In addition to installing BitDefender, and having gone (slowly!!!) through 4 Lenovo laptops and loved them, they should have a flap on the bottom which you can open and add more memory. Though 4GB may be the recommendation, I have found that literally as much as I can give it, it uses. I believe that while the memory would help your problem, getting rid of WD is the solution.

andrew129260 · 2025-02-12T14:28:49-0500

Just want to offer besides the already good suggestions here.......

SSD's become slower overtime as it fails.

Sometimes they just die in one fell swoop.

So its possible the ssd is failing with it being an older machine.

Based on the specs I would recommend a new laptop.

krism · 2025-02-12T14:33:07-0500

"I do not play computer games as I am an adult"
HEY, I resemble that incineration!!! (I do still rarely play the 25 year old BIOWARE and Interplay ones. )

And I definitely agree - properly tuned (for me that's pretty much Out of the Box) win11 24H2 is excellent.

Tester · 2025-02-12T15:01:02-0500

kelper said:
My laptop works perfectly FOR ME. I do not play computer games as I am an adult. Telling people that 4GB and 1GHz is the cause of their problems is not really helpful. Just my opinion.

You do know that your Pentium Silver N6000 1.10GHz runs at 3.30 GHz at boost with 4cores. Thats not the same as a cpu with max speed of 1ghz at 2cores. Thats like 12Ghz total calculation power vs 2Ghz if you count all cores and speed together..

OP's its cpu boost to 2.7ghz.

Tester · 2025-02-12T15:03:31-0500

Can you post CPU-Z printscreen, lets see if you cpu still boosts or is throtteling.
Can you also check CrystalDiskInfo to see if you ssd/hdd is still healthy.

Do you see any errors in eventvwr?

How big is your pagefile.sys
Can you show a printscreen of ResourceMonitor of the Memory, and the Disk Tab.

kelper · 2025-02-12T15:13:57-0500

Tester said:
You do know that your Pentium Silver N6000 1.10GHz runs at 3.30 GHz at boost with 4cores. Thats not the same as a cpu with max speed of 1ghz at 2cores. Thats like 12Ghz total calculation power vs 2Ghz if you count all cores and speed together..

OP's its cpu boost to 2.7ghz.

Yes, but Intel Pentium Silver N6000 1.10GHz processor is compatible with Windows 11 24H2. This processor is listed among the supported CPUs for Windows 11.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/design/minimum/supported/windows-11-supported-intel-processors.

You are being disingenuous!

kelper · 2025-02-12T15:17:13-0500

The OP's processor is also approved by MS!

krism · 2025-02-12T15:19:30-0500

Yes, this is NOT a processor problem.

Actually it is pretty easy to suss this - just spend some time looking at Task Mgr/Processes and notice how often WD is there on the top. That's how I spotted it.

Tester · 2025-02-12T15:21:12-0500

Correct, thats why i am asking for more info about the system. Like if the cpu is throtteling, to see if it has a heat problem, or anything else.

krism · 2025-02-12T15:23:36-0500

Common - just spend 5 minutes and install BitDefender. Can be easily removed if you don't like it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! All this talk!!!!! FREE!!!!!!!!

Hazel123 · 2025-02-12T15:25:30-0500

Ok can you upgrade the ram? That would make a big difference I think. I may be wrong but I thought Pentium Silver IS supported for Windows 11 - wasn't it one of those quirks? That some pentiums and celerons were supported despite their age, but some core i7's weren't?

I have an even lesser powered netbook with only 2gb ram, and if set up well it doesn't lag. It's not fast but it's useable. So I think you can improve the current one. But the first thing I would do is

1) Upgrade the ram (if possible - what is the laptop name/number? Median xxxxx?)
2) Check to see how full the ssd drive is - if it's more than half full, put a bigger one in.
3) Reinstall windows fresh and set up again.
4) After reinstall, uninstall one drive, set "never" for most background apps.

If you can't upgrade the ram then a fresh install and a few tweaks might help. With low powered laptops I find one drive is one of biggest resource hogs and always uninstall it. Also if you have a "heavy" antivirus program it might slow it down. Defender and malwarebytes free should be enough (on demand).

What size SSD is it? If it's getting a bit full that will slow things down. You'll probably still be limited to not running too many programs at the same time. With more ram though they would be zippier opening. Or a bigger/ faster ssd maybe.

Also - what version of Windows 11 are you running? Could it possibly be since an upgrade to 24H2? Some people have had issues. But a clean install might fix those too.

haku100 · 2025-02-12T16:07:30-0500

Hemimax said:
Assuming you have not made any mods, might try a complete virus scan and look deeper into the startups and background apps with System Internals Suite.

Thanks. Deep virus scan is done on a regular, weekly basis.

haku100 · 2025-02-12T17:10:07-0500

Hazel123 said:
Ok can you upgrade the ram? That would make a big difference I think. I may be wrong but I thought Pentium Silver IS supported for Windows 11 - wasn't it one of those quirks? That some pentiums and celerons were supported despite their age, but some core i7's weren't?

I have an even lesser powered netbook with only 2gb ram, and if set up well it doesn't lag. It's not fast but it's useable. So I think you can improve the current one. But the first thing I would do is

1) Upgrade the ram (if possible - what is the laptop name/number? Median xxxxx?)
2) Check to see how full the ssd drive is - if it's more than half full, put a bigger one in.
3) Reinstall windows fresh and set up again.
4) After reinstall, uninstall one drive, set "never" for most background apps.

If you can't upgrade the ram then a fresh install and a few tweaks might help. With low powered laptops I find one drive is one of biggest resource hogs and always uninstall it. Also if you have a "heavy" antivirus program it might slow it down. Defender and malwarebytes free should be enough (on demand).

What size SSD is it? If it's getting a bit full that will slow things down. You'll probably still be limited to not running too many programs at the same time. With more ram though they would be zippier opening. Or a bigger/ faster ssd maybe.

Also - what version of Windows 11 are you running? Could it possibly be since an upgrade to 24H2? Some people have had issues. But a clean install might fix those too.

Hi,

Thanks for your suggestions.

Can you upgrade the ram? I think so. Inquiring now.
For your information: installed processor is Intel(R) Pentium(R) Silver N5000 CPU @ 1.10GHz 1.10 GHz
Check to see how full the SSD drive is - if it's more than half full, put a bigger one in. The SSD C: drive has 2/3 free. The separate HD has an enormous amount free, distributed over several partitions.
Reinstall windows fresh and set up again. I fear this is too drastic a measure, compared to the annoyance. Moreover, it would delete all my tweaks I did over the years.
Uninstall one drive, set "never" for most background apps. I uninstalled OneDrive since a long time, always did since its inception, many devices ago. I am a contended user of Google Drive...
Antivirus program is Windows Defender.
Main SSD = 172GB + 58GB reserved for Windows
Size HD = 1700GB.
ALL drives are much less than half full.
Windows version: 23H2 build 22631.4751(waiting for upgrade to 24H2 until Microsoft gets into good working order in good working order).

HK

Hazel123 · 2025-02-12T17:17:41-0500

Ok I'd still put a bigger ssd drive in

It maybe you're having some issues because of two drives and partitioning. Others would know more about that than me.

I would get these issues solved before upgrading to 24H2 personally.

Hard drives are slow - even if Windows is on the SSD. You could have a bigger ssd with everything on and no hard driver maybe.

A clean install isn't that big a task! What tweaks have you done? Ok it means copying and pasting all files onto an external drive, and making a note of all your programs any activation codes, and exporting bookmarks. But that isn't a huge task.

Sometimes things just need a refresh. When reinstalling programs you can see if one is causing any issues or compatibility issues with others.

How much storage space do you have filled overall - more than 1tb? 1tb drives aren't that expensive these days and there are 2tb ones as well.

I may not be correct in this but I believe the more space on an ssd drive, the faster it tends to be. But that might be outdated info. I always went with needing a drive double the size of the amount of storage needed.

I think it's the computer model itself that determines how much ram, rather than the processor.

haku100 · 2025-02-12T17:25:41-0500

Too many infos from too many sides. My thanks to all of you, all the same.

Going to sleep.

Bye

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