How to make my laptop run faster or time to replace

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silvercar
silvercar Posts: 46,960 Ambassador
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Not sure if my Toshiba laptop is worth spending money on, or whether I should buy new.

Current spec (according to CCleaner) is:
Windows 10 64-bit
Intel core i3-2330M
CPU @220GHz
6.0 GB RAM
Intel Graphics HD 3000

Hard drive 600GB (300 on C and 300 on D, both less than 50% full)

Problem is that the machine is very slow, and has been getting worse over the last few months.

We have internet speed of over 50MB, so that isn't the issue.

Any advice gratefully received.

(First question may be why 64 bit, and the answer is that is what I bought, don't know why, probably a special offer)
I'm a Forum Ambassador on The Coronavirus Boards as well as the housing, mortgages and student money saving boards. I volunteer to help get your forum questions answered and keep the forum running smoothly. Forum Ambassadors are not moderators and don't read every post. If you spot an illegal or inappropriate post then please report it to forumteam@moneysavingexpert.com (it's not part of my role to deal with this). Any views are mine and not the official line of MoneySavingExpert.com.
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  • greyteam1959
    greyteam1959 Posts: 4,576 Forumite
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    I presume you have done a the relevant malware etc scans ??
    Sometimes it's simple things that can cause major slowdowns.
    HTH
  • agrinnall
    agrinnall Posts: 23,344 Forumite
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    What speed is the hard disk? You'd probably see a big improvement by replacing it with a SSD.
  • onomatopoeia99
    onomatopoeia99 Posts: 6,964 Forumite
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    It's the 64 bit version of Windows because the 32 bit version can only address 4GB of memory.

    You can use task manager to check if any part of the system is running at or close to 100%. You haven't stated what you do with it, what sort of demands you place on it. Do you have a couple of tabs open in your browser, or 30? etc etc
    Proud member of the wokerati, though I don't eat tofu.Home is where my books are.Solar PV 5.2kWp system, SE facing, >1% shading, installed March 2019.Mortgage free July 2023
  • EdGasketTheSecond
    EdGasketTheSecond Posts: 2,558 Forumite
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    use msconfig (Run->type in msconfig) to see what is running on the Startup tab and uncheck anything not required.
  • Ant555
    Ant555 Posts: 1,569 Forumite
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    I recently managed to speed up a colleagues really S L O W Windows 10 lap top to an acceptable/usable speed by doing the following...

    I think it was downloading updates in the background so I spent almost a whole day just forcing it to search for updates, install, restart, repeat. *whole day= just left on a desk and going back to it occasionally.
    Uninstall the pre-loaded McAfee AV checker that was not being updated as it had expired.
    Download and run free Malware Bytes
    Dowwnload and run free Glary Utilities
    Download and run free Defraggler
    Run Windows defrag

    As it was a similar processor to yours, it didn't fly but it was usable and way better than before I started.

    Hope this helps.
  • Stoke
    Stoke Posts: 3,182 Forumite
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    SSD if you haven't got one. Start from there.
  • Debbie_Savard
    Debbie_Savard Posts: 430 Forumite
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    It's never going to be a rocketship, but a 512GB SSD would make a heck of an improvement.

    PLus usual advice to remove Norton, Kapersky and similar bloatware and use Windows Defender Security Centre
  • armchaireconomist
    armchaireconomist Posts: 370 Forumite
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    Spec is perfectly fine for W10. Start in the task manager and see what load is like on CPU/RAM/HDD and go from there.


    If there's nothing of note on it, a full reinstall is always the best solution.


    And to answer your question, it's 64-bit because 32 can only handle 4GB of RAM. You won't (and shouldn't) see many 32-bit machines nowadays. Should've been phased out years ago.
  • motorguy
    motorguy Posts: 22,473 Forumite
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    A full reinstall will help but i'd be sticking in a 500GB SSD and a fresh Win10 install - budget for around £90 or so and keep an eye on HotUKDeals for offer.
  • silvercar
    silvercar Posts: 46,960 Ambassador
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    agrinnall wrote: »
    What speed is the hard disk? You'd probably see a big improvement by replacing it with a SSD.

    Hitachi HTS547564A9E384 (TurboPC EX)

    google suggests that is effective speed 141%, average bench 37.9%

    Rotational speed 5400RPM.

    I have outlook open and run 3-4 tabs in chrome. There is also something running in the background from the HP printer (wireless) as that flashes up on the screen in a DOS window occasionally.

    I have Avira as the virus checker, mcafee was removed ages ago. Also Avast icons on the desktop - is that part of avira.

    Thanks for all your advice. The problem is that I am sometimes typing characters ahead in chrome waiting for it to catch up. Then wait eons for the page to refresh. I often get the "not responding" greyed out view until a page updates.

    Task manager tells me that disk is at 99%.

    4 apps running.

    93 background processes. (I can see dropbox, icloud, turbo PC, microsoft windows...)
    86 windows processes. (most are "service host...")


    Thanks for your help.
    I'm a Forum Ambassador on The Coronavirus Boards as well as the housing, mortgages and student money saving boards. I volunteer to help get your forum questions answered and keep the forum running smoothly. Forum Ambassadors are not moderators and don't read every post. If you spot an illegal or inappropriate post then please report it to forumteam@moneysavingexpert.com (it's not part of my role to deal with this). Any views are mine and not the official line of MoneySavingExpert.com.
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