Two year old PC slow and unresponsive

S

stufra

Member
Hi All,

I bought a PC from PC specialist two years back and for the last few months the performance has gradually deteriorated up to the point that on some days it's practically unusable. It's very slow in opening simple files through file explorer, web pages take an age to load or don't load at all. I mainly use it for editing photographs within Photoshop and Lightroom and performing any actions within these programs is becoming a bit of a nightmare. Occasionally on start up I'm presented with a black screen and can't do anything, so I need to power it off and back on.

I've no idea where to start with solving this performance issue so would appreciate some ideas on where to start. For what it's worth this is the spec:

CasePCS PRISM RGB MID TOWER CASE
Processor (CPU)Intel® Core™ i5 Six Core Processor i5-9500F (3.0GHz) 9MB Cache
MotherboardASUS® H310M-A R2.0: Micro-ATX, DDR4, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs
Memory (RAM)16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 2400MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card2GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GT 1030
1st Storage Drive480GB ADATA SU650 2.5" SSD, SATA 6 Gb (520MB/R, 450MB/W)
2nd Storage Drive4TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 5400RPM, 256MB CACHE
DVD/BLU-RAY DriveNOT REQUIRED
Memory Card ReaderUSB 3.0 EXTERNAL SD/MICRO SD CARD READER
Power SupplyCORSAIR 350W VS SERIES™ VS-350 POWER SUPPLY
Power Cable1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor CoolingSTANDARD CPU COOLER
Thermal PasteSTANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound CardONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless Network CardWIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD
USB/Thunderbolt Options2 PORT (2 x TYPE A) USB 3.0 PCI-E CARD + STANDARD USB PORTS
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Change to: MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating SystemWindows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KK3-00002]
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Change to: MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
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Look forward to hearing some of your thoughts.

Cheers,
Stu
 
SpyderTracks

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
stufra said:
I'm using Avast
Click to expand...
I would fully uninstall Avast, it's not needed, it's actually worse than windows defender and uses far more resources.

You also have quite a few updates including optional ones which are system drivers which are worth installing.

I would also open cmd prompt as administrator and run "SFC /scannow"
 
S

stufra

Member
Thanks all for your input, I've uninstalled Avast and performed all outstanding updates apart from one which won't update for some reason:

1647892124136.png


1647892086301.png


I've tried downloading this straight from the Microsoft website but it still doesn't want to install. Performance seems slightly improved, however, it's still hanging up and becoming unresponsive. Any other suggestions?


Thanks,
Stu
 
SpyderTracks

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
stufra said:
Thanks all for your input, I've uninstalled Avast and performed all outstanding updates apart from one which won't update for some reason:

View attachment 32859

View attachment 32858

I've tried downloading this straight from the Microsoft website but it still doesn't want to install. Performance seems slightly improved, however, it's still hanging up and becoming unresponsive. Any other suggestions?


Thanks,
Stu
Click to expand...
How did you uninstall avast?
 
SpyderTracks

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
stufra said:
Uninstalled using the avast uninstall utility. It's like a whole new PC, back to being lightning quick 👍

Still can't install the remaining update but I guess that's another issue.

Thanks everyone for all your input. Appreciated 😁
Click to expand...
Might be worth running the windows update reset tool from microsoft.

docs.microsoft.com

Additional resources for Windows Update - Windows Client

Describes details about to troubleshooting WSUS and resetting Windows Update components manually.
docs.microsoft.com

But also, open cmd and run "winver"

That will return your windows version. If it's 22H1 or 21H2, then that update won't apply because it's for an older version, must have got stuck in the pipeline.

If you're still on 21H1, then a windows update reset is definitely required as you're about a year out of date.
 
S

stufra

Member
SpyderTracks said:
Might be worth running the windows update reset tool from microsoft.

docs.microsoft.com

Additional resources for Windows Update - Windows Client

Describes details about to troubleshooting WSUS and resetting Windows Update components manually.
docs.microsoft.com

But also, open cmd and run "winver"

That will return your windows version. If it's 22H1 or 21H2, then that update won't apply because it's for an older version, must have got stuck in the pipeline.

If you're still on 21H1, then a windows update reset is definitely required as you're about a year out of date.
Click to expand...
Thanks again. Will give that a go tomorrow 👍
 
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