Laptop started running really slowly.....

Okell

I'm running a Dell Inspiron 15 3000 on Windows 10.

No real demands on it - just a bit of internet surfing, posting on forums, catch-up TV and Youtube channels.

Had no problems with speed etc in the nearly three years I've had it but yesterday it started running really slowly.  First noted it with breakup of video on Youtube and loss of picture definition.  Today everything running really slowly.  New tabs slow to open up, iPlayer slow to open etc etc.

Any ideas what might be the problem?  I'm wondering if it might be a software update that had a glitch in it and I need to wait for that to be fixed.

NB - You can treat me as IT illiterate so please try to keep any suggestions idiot-proof.

And I've down an up to date download and full system scan on Norton IS and no problems

Veteransaver

Probably Norton slowing it all down. I've never bothered with anti virus software, the built in windows anti virus is decent enough imo.
It could be in the middle of a windows update too, go to "windows update" in the search bar.

Sea_Shell

I had similar problems back in 2021 (I had a thread)

It turned out it was the hard drive starting to fail.  HDD.  Spinning disks.


It got slower and slower, until one day, it froze and that was it, it wouldn't restart at all. 😲

Local computer repairer changed it for an SSD.  Solid state.   They also copied all the data, luckily.

Been fine ever since.   Touch wood 🤞

GDB2222

Right click on the task bar (at the bottom of the screen) and select Task Manager.   

Is anything running at a high percentage? CPU or Disc perhaps?

Mr.Generous

worth checking how much software is running from startup - loads of stuff running slows them down.

Do what GBD222 said above or press ctrl/shift and escape together

this opens the Task Manager screen

on the left side of this screen there are a number of small icons. Run the mouse pointer over each from the top down, I think "Startup" is the 4th down from the top.

Click Startup

This shows every application (all software) that is runnning from startup

If you find loads of stuff running you know you dont use right click the word "Enabled" and select disable

This wont stop anything from working. It means when you run it it will be a bit slower because it will have to start up.

Things like iTunes Helper, or Microsoft Teams, if you don't use them disable them.

Anything else if you don't know what it is you can google it. Remember it might be computer specific, different computers will have sound software, or wifi software that IS required, but won't be on another PC / laptop if you're going to compare to another computer to see what's what.

You could always screen shot the result and ask us!

Give it a go - I've seen older computers with loads of crud running.

Okell

Veteransaver said:

Probably Norton slowing it all down. I've never bothered with anti virus software, the built in windows anti virus is decent enough imo.
It could be in the middle of a windows update too, go to "windows update" in the search bar.

Thanks.

Windows is all up to date - but according to the update history there were some "quality" updates two days ago, and as the problem has only manifested itself in the last day or so, I can't help wondering if that has introduced some bug.

The last time I had a problem with slow running it sorted itself out after the next Windows update

I'm not particularly a fan of Norton but I've had it for several years with no issues whatsoever - this problem has only manifested itself in the last 24 - 36 hours.

If - for the sake of argument - a Norton update in the last day or so had introduced a problem, how would I check when the last Norton update was?  (Or indeed check all updates immediately prior to the problem?)

Okell

Sea_Shell said:

I had similar problems back in 2021 (I had a thread)

It turned out it was the hard drive starting to fail.  HDD.  Spinning disks.


It got slower and slower, until one day, it froze and that was it, it wouldn't restart at all. 😲

Local computer repairer changed it for an SSD.  Solid state.   They also copied all the data, luckily.

Been fine ever since.   Touch wood 🤞

OK.  I've got all the backups I need so if that's the problem...

Thanks

Okell

GDB2222 said:

Right click on the task bar (at the bottom of the screen) and select Task Manager.   

Is anything running at a high percentage? CPU or Disc perhaps?

Thanks

I've already run Task Manager.  If I look at the perfomance tab I've currently got:

CPU     5%  with occasional peaks to 20%   
Memory   75%  -  80%   (Don't know if this is high or not but I think it's typical for this laptop)
Disc     0%  - 1%
GPU(?)   0%  -  1%

The problem has literally come about only in the last 24 hours or so.

First noticed it yesterday on Youtube with the stream apparently intermittently buffering (video freezes with the revolving broken circle or whatever it is...) together with very noticeable loss of quality and definition of picture.

Then today noticed lots and lots of delay in various internet pages loading which used to be almost instantaneous.

Okell

@Mr.Generous   -  thanks.  Missed your reply crossposting.

I should have mentioned in my OP that I'd already run Task Manager and I don't think there's a startup problem - but I may be wrong.

The following are enabled at startup:

1. Microsoft Edge                                   high impact
2. Microsoft Onedrive                             high
3. Waves Max Audio                              high
4. Realtek HD audio                               medium
5. Windows Security Notification icon    Low

There are two other startups enabled but they both say "Not measured".  They are Radeon Software Startup Task and Dell Mobile Connect 3.3 startup.

[Edit:  and "Last BIOS time" was 9 secs]

According to Norton Startup Manager, 1 and 2 above have "Medium Resource Usage" and 3, 4 and 5 have "Low Resouce Usage".  Norton Startup Manager doesn't list 4 or 5 at all.

Can or should I disable any of those?


(BTW - thanks for providing a step by step procedure.  I appreciate it!)

cerebus

Is it just Internet pages that are slow loading? 

Have you considered it could be your broadband?

Do you have any problems when using your phone at home?

km1500

you could have a fiddle with the Windows 10 event viewer and see if there are any critical events happening. 

notes that the events viewer normally does show quite a lot of so-called errors so don't get too panicky 

Google Windows 10 event viewer