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PC running slow

Started by Susan Cruz34 · · 👁 4 views · 22 replies

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Participants Susan Cruz34Larry Ortiz5Andrew Peterson2Elizabeth Alvarez2wearycrane15analogtiger19
Susan Cruz34 Susan Cruz34 MemberOP
10 messages
joined Jul 2017
#1 ·
Hey everyone, I could really use some help if anyone knows what they're doing. Over the last five or six days, my PC has suddenly become incredibly sluggish. Every single click takes a few seconds just to register or open anything. I even tried a clean install of Windows, but that didn't change a thing. I'm running on 4GB of RAM, and up until recently, this machine was flying. I honestly have no idea what went wrong here.
Larry Ortiz5 Larry Ortiz5 Regular
710 messages
joined May 2020
#2 ·
Susan Cruz34 said:Hey everyone, I could really use some help if anyone knows what they're doing. Over the last five or six days, my PC has suddenly become incredibly sluggish. Every single click takes a few seconds just to register or open anything. I even tried a clean install of Windows, but that didn't change a thing. I'm running on 4GB of RAM, and up until recently, this machine was flying. I honestly have no idea what went wrong here.

So, you already formatted the drive and did a clean install of Windows, and it's still crawling? You might want to check the health of your hard drive using CrystalDiskInfo—it's possible the drive itself is just dying on you. Also, could you list out your full system specs? That would definitely help us narrow things down...

http://crystalmark.info/download/index-e.html

Grab CrystalDiskInfo from this link here.
Susan Cruz34 Susan Cruz34 MemberOP
10 messages
joined Jul 2017
#3 ·
Larry Ortiz5 said:So, you already formatted the drive and did a clean install of Windows, and it's still crawling? You might want to check the health of your hard drive using CrystalDiskInfo—it's possible the drive itself is just dying on you. Also, could you list out your full system specs? That would definitely help us narrow things down...

http://crystalmark.info/download/index-e.html

Grab CrystalDiskInfo from this link here.

Yeah, I did, so what's your point?
Susan Cruz34 Susan Cruz34 MemberOP
10 messages
joined Jul 2017
#4 ·
Susan Cruz34 said:Yeah, I did, so what's your point?

http://prntscr.com/frzegx
The software just showed me this, and honestly, I’m completely lost. Is there actually an issue with my hard drive, or am I good? If there are problems, how on earth do I fix them?
Larry Ortiz5 Larry Ortiz5 Regular
710 messages
joined May 2020
#5 ·
Could you grab a full screenshot of the program window? I can't quite tell which specific error message you're seeing—if you just scroll down that right-hand sidebar until you hit the warning and then snap a shot, that would be perfect.
Susan Cruz34 Susan Cruz34 MemberOP
10 messages
joined Jul 2017
#6 ·
Larry Ortiz5 said:Could you grab a full screenshot of the program window? I can't quite tell which specific error message you're seeing—if you just scroll down that right-hand sidebar until you hit the warning and then snap a shot, that would be perfect.

http://prntscr.com/frzz7g
Larry Ortiz5 Larry Ortiz5 Regular
710 messages
joined May 2020
#7 ·
It looks like your HDD is slowly starting to give up the ghost—which, honestly, is pretty much expected at this stage. If you don't find yourself needing massive amounts of storage, I’d really suggest making the jump to a 240GB SSD instead. You'll definitely be happier with that upgrade.
Susan Cruz34 Susan Cruz34 MemberOP
10 messages
joined Jul 2017
#8 ·
Larry Ortiz5 said:It looks like your HDD is slowly starting to give up the ghost—which, honestly, is pretty much expected at this stage. If you don't find yourself needing massive amounts of storage, I’d really suggest making the jump to a 240GB SSD instead. You'll definitely be happier with that upgrade.

So, what exactly does an SSD mean? Does that mean I have to go out and buy a whole new hard drive?
Larry Ortiz5 Larry Ortiz5 Regular
710 messages
joined May 2020
#9 ·
Think of a hard drive as just the standard storage you’ve got sitting in your computer right now. An SSD, though? That thing is lightning fast. The big difference is that while a traditional hard drive relies on those little moving parts—basically a tiny needle searching through data—an SSD uses flash memory instead. Because there's nothing physically spinning or hunting around, it doesn't take an eternity to find what it needs. If you made the switch to an SSD, your PC would probably boot up in about 10 seconds, and honestly, everything would just feel much smoother overall.



I found this video on YouTube that does a great comparison between HDDs and SSDs if you want to see it in action.
Susan Cruz34 Susan Cruz34 MemberOP
10 messages
joined Jul 2017
#10 ·
Larry Ortiz5 said:Think of a hard drive as just the standard storage you’ve got sitting in your computer right now. An SSD, though? That thing is lightning fast. The big difference is that while a traditional hard drive relies on those little moving parts—basically a tiny needle searching through data—an SSD uses flash memory instead. Because there's nothing physically spinning or hunting around, it doesn't take an eternity to find what it needs. If you made the switch to an SSD, your PC would probably boot up in about 10 seconds, and honestly, everything would just feel much smoother overall.



I found this video on YouTube that does a great comparison between HDDs and SSDs if you want to see it in action.

I went out and bought a brand new hard drive, but it’s still the same old garbage—everything I click on takes forever to open. I even did a clean install of Windows, so I'm wondering if this might be the issue:http://prntscr.com/ftxevq
Andrew Peterson2 Andrew Peterson2 Active Member
148 messages
joined May 2013
#11 ·
Hard to say, honestly—it’d feel pretty weird if they weren't using that core. You’ve gotta spread those processes out more evenly, right?

Give this tool a shot since you're running an Intel processor; they've got their own diagnostic thing for this kind of stuff https://downloadcenter.intel.com/dow...iagnostic-Tool

Just throw some screenshots up here so we can actually see what kind of errors are popping up.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S series via Reddit
Susan Cruz34 Susan Cruz34 MemberOP
10 messages
joined Jul 2017
#12 ·
Andrew Peterson2 said:Hard to say, honestly—it’d feel pretty weird if they weren't using that core. You’ve gotta spread those processes out more evenly, right?

Give this tool a shot since you're running an Intel processor; they've got their own diagnostic thing for this kind of stuff https://downloadcenter.intel.com/dow...iagnostic-Tool

Just throw some screenshots up here so we can actually see what kind of errors are popping up.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S series via Reddit

http://prntscr.com/ftzn35
This was the final output; looks fine to me.
Elizabeth Alvarez2 Elizabeth Alvarez2 Newcomer
3 messages
joined Jan 2011
#13 ·
Maybe your internet connection just tanked on you?
Susan Cruz34 Susan Cruz34 MemberOP
10 messages
joined Jul 2017
#14 ·
Elizabeth Alvarez2 said:Maybe your internet connection just tanked on you?

No, my connection is sitting at over 50 Mbps, so everything is running smoothly there. It’s just that every single thing I try to open takes forever to actually load... maybe the graphics card isn't performing quite right. Honestly, I don't know; I'm certainly no expert here.
Andrew Peterson2 Andrew Peterson2 Active Member
148 messages
joined May 2013
#15 ·
You really need to double-check everything—even the GPU
So, what kind of graphics card are we talking about?? Is it a dedicated one?? Also, I was wondering if you’re running integrated graphics too? If you are, maybe try pulling the dedicated card out entirely just to see how things behave using only the integrated setup...

It probably wouldn't hurt to run a memtest, too—just to make sure the RAM isn't acting up. I'm actually in a bit of a rush right now, but I know there's a free tool out there for memtesting... just gotta track it down somewhere...
Larry Ortiz5 Larry Ortiz5 Regular
710 messages
joined May 2020
#16 ·
Just a heads-up, that Core i5 doesn't have integrated graphics. You should probably run a MemTest to scan the RAM, and while you're at it, grab Prime95 to stress test the processor. Try pushing it to 100%—see if it actually hits that ceiling and if all four cores stay pinned at full load. Just let it run for about 10–15 minutes.

http://www.mersenne.org/ftp_root/gim...2810.win64.zip

Let me know how it goes.
wearycrane15 wearycrane15 Member
17 messages
joined Jul 2017
#17 ·
But what if the bottleneck isn't actually the GPU? From what I can gather, you’re having trouble just opening basic files and folders on your PC, which doesn't really have much to do with graphics performance—it's certainly not like you're trying to run some massive, resource-heavy visual software.
Susan Cruz34 Susan Cruz34 MemberOP
10 messages
joined Jul 2017
#18 ·
Larry Ortiz5 said:Just a heads-up, that Core i5 doesn't have integrated graphics. You should probably run a MemTest to scan the RAM, and while you're at it, grab Prime95 to stress test the processor. Try pushing it to 100%—see if it actually hits that ceiling and if all four cores stay pinned at full load. Just let it run for about 10–15 minutes.

http://www.mersenne.org/ftp_root/gim...2810.win64.zip

Let me know how it goes.

There's no integrated graphics. I ran the tests, but out of the four cores, the first one stays at zero while the others just fluctuate depending on the load.
Larry Ortiz5 Larry Ortiz5 Regular
710 messages
joined May 2020
#19 ·
That’s likely why you're seeing such a slowdown on your PC. Since you already wiped the hard drive, we can probably rule out viruses—and since you upgraded to a new drive, we can check that off the list too. Did you get a chance to run a scan on your RAM? I know it’s a bit of a hassle, but maybe try finding a processor with the same socket you're currently using just to see if the sluggishness persists.

p.s. Have you swapped out the thermal paste on the CPU yet?
analogtiger19 analogtiger19 Active Member
134 messages
joined Dec 2016
#20 ·
Just list the temps for the whole system... download Speccy and copy them over from there

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