If lack of RAM isn't the reason the PC is slow

In my last post I discussed how to check to see if your computer is running low on memory (RAM), causing it to use the harddrive (Virtual Memory) and slow down. If you have established that your computer has plenty of RAM, but the computer is still slow, then the next step is to find out what is taking up your processing power.

I've come across a few things that can make computers slow down. Here are some examples and a hint to figure out what is going on with your own computer.


Firstly, Anti-Virus and Anti-spam. I run AVG for anti-virus and Windows Defender for anti-spam on my computer. On start up, one or both performs some kind of test that slows everything down. This is only temporary. Sometimes, the anti-virus or anti-spam is set to do a test of the files on your harddrive. This will slow down the computer while it proceeds as the computer is busy reading files from the harddrive and checking them for malicious code. Depending on the settings of the anti-virus or anti-spyware and the power of your computer, this can be more of a problem on some systems than others. Everything returns to normal once the test is complete. If you intend to play a 3D game on your computer, it is sometimes a good idea to make sure no automatic test of this kind is likely to begin. Playing a game on some computers when the anti-virus kicks in can cause a sudden drop in frame rates while the two battle for system resources.

Harddrive defragmentation program and other house keeping software is another possible cause of slow down. I did some work on an Acer once, that was preinstalled to do a defrag of the harddrive on every startup. This made the computer pretty sluggish for the first five minutes. The option was to turn the defrag program off, or simply to leave the computer for the first five minutes after startup to do the housekeeping. As the computer was just for home use, the owner opted to leave it as it was.

If your not sure what is causing your computer to go slow, here is a suggestion for getting a hint. Start the task manager program by clicking the "start" button (on Windows XP) and click on "Run...". Type "taskmgr.exe" in the box that opens and click "okay". In the task manager window that opens click on the "Processes" tab. Click on the letters "CPU" at the top of the third column. This will order the processes (programs) that are running by the amount of processing time they are taking up (as a percentage). Clicking on "CPU" again will order them in the opposite direction.




















If you're not doing much, "System Idle Process" should happily be taking up most of the CPUs time. If something else is at the top of the list, it might be worth having a google to see what that process belongs to. Unfortunately, a certain amount of experience can be needed to diagnose a problem from this result, but at least it gives you a place to start.