My laptop's running slow

Page may contain affiliate links. Please see terms for details.

ColinJ

Puzzle game procrastinator!
A complete reinstall is a bit of a pain if you have lots of big applications to reinstall afterwards, especially if they are tricky to set up!

Assuming that is done, however, I would then create a perfect image of the newly efficient system so I could go back to that in future, rather than back to square one.
 
OP
OP
stephec

stephec

Squire
Location
Bolton
The restore disc is one I made myself about a week ago, if I restore using this am I likely to include the same problem that I had in the first place?
 

ColinJ

Puzzle game procrastinator!
The restore disc is one I made myself about a week ago, if I restore using this am I likely to include the same problem that I had in the first place?
If you had the problem when you created the disc, and the problem is due to software then - yes - since you would just be restoring back to a system that was already faulty in some way!

Hang on - I've just reread your original post ... I hadn't noticed that your system isn't permanently slow, just often is these days. That's interesting!

After the system has booted (whether it took 1 minute or 20), does it then run at an acceptable speed?
 
OP
OP
stephec

stephec

Squire
Location
Bolton
Now it seems permanently slow, just taken about five minutes from shutdown to be able to open up the control panel when it used to take a minute at most.

I gave up trying open up internet explorer after another five.

At the weekend I uninstalled about ten programs that aren't essential, but it doesn't seem to have helped.
 

ColinJ

Puzzle game procrastinator!
If your restore disc is only a week old, you aren't going to lose much if you try going down that route - I'd be inclined to give it a go!

*** NB Before embarking on that, make extra sure that you have copies of all your important personal files! ***

(I reckon that this will not solve the problem, though.)
 
OP
OP
stephec

stephec

Squire
Location
Bolton
I did a back up straight after making the restore disc, so I should be OK for having copies of everything.
 

JoeyB

Go on, tilt your head!
If I had to put money on something I would say hard drive is dying a slow death. You could run a checkdsk (/R) which may help the situation a bit. I would also look at running Seatools hard drive diagnostics.
 
OP
OP
stephec

stephec

Squire
Location
Bolton
I've done a pre boot system check earlier, and that's come up with error codes for the hard drive and video card.
 
I'd suggest you still run speedfan and check the health readings on that drive. How old is the computer ?
 
OP
OP
stephec

stephec

Squire
Location
Bolton
After numerous emails to and from Dell support, with a try this/try that, I've done this/I've done that kind of conversation they've now come to the conclusion that my hard drive is a bit poo.

Then I was told to make sure I have my operating system disc, and my drivers disc, that came with the laptop for the engineer to set up the new HD he will be fitting. Only trouble is I have all the original packaging, but there are no discs in there. :sad:
 

JoeyB

Go on, tilt your head!
I'm sure the Dell Engineer will come prepared. All he needs is a OEM OS disk and the drivers can be pulled down from the Internet via his own laptop etc.
 
OP
OP
stephec

stephec

Squire
Location
Bolton
That's what I thought, the tone of the email suggested that it was essential though, as if they were trying to put me off.
 
OP
OP
stephec

stephec

Squire
Location
Bolton
A big thanks to everyone for the advice.

The nice man from Dell finally came round today and fitted a new HD, the difference is amazing, from shutdown I can boot up and be on the internet in about thirty seconds.
 

ColinJ

Puzzle game procrastinator!
I'm glad that you got it sorted out!

I had been having problems with my internet slowing down to a crawl, and it turned out that my wifi router was on the same channel as powerful signals from the neighbours on either side of me. I changed to a less competitive channel and my system is now back up to full speed too. Nice, isn't it! :thumbsup:
 
Top Bottom