8 Reasons why Computers Slow Down Over Time

One thing that you are likely to notice while using your computer is that it will, as the years roll by, gradually begin to slow down. And, as many have found out, a slow computer is not much fun. That reliable machine, which zipped along when you bought it, begins to show signs of fatigue and you are at a loss as to how this could ever have happened. There are a number of reasons why computers slow down with use, and here are a few of them;

Your Computer Becomes Bloated

Soon after buying you computer, you begin installing all your favorite programs, which contributes to the bloat that, over time, tends to slow down your PC. Everything that you put on your computer takes up resources, which, over time, contributes to a noticeable performance lag.

Although there is ongoing debate over their usefulness, you can optimize your computer’s performance through the use of PC optimization utilities. Here at network bees, we use Iolo System Mechanic, which, we have found, does a great job of keeping our PCs zipping along. 

Too Many Start-up Items

If you notice that your computer has, over time, begun to take longer to boot up, this may be due to the fact that you have too many startup programs.  You can resolve this issue, either by uninstalling the culpable software, or by stopping  them from starting up when you launch Windows. This can be done in System Configuration (Windows XP, 7), and through Task Manager for Windows 10. Disabling startup items will greatly boost the performance of your slow computer.

Your Slow Computer May be the Victim of  Malware

Computers also slow down over time due to malware attacks. You will be surprised at the number of people who do not bother with having an antivirus on their computers. There are also others who never bother to update the antiviruses that are on their computers.

Attacks by viruses and other forms of malicious software can greatly reduce the performance of your computer and will make it noticeably slower than it was when you bought it.

Even if you have had an up to date antivirus all the time, there is always the possibility that malicious pieces may have gotten past your defenses, one way or the other, contributing to the slowing down of your computer.

You can read this article on how you can protect your computer from the malicious software that can potentially degrade its performance.

Panda Security

Here at Network Bees, we use Panda Security, a great program that you can use to, once and for all, get rid of malware.You slow computer can be given a major boost through the use of this wonderful antimalware program. Research by several independent bodies have shown that Panda, by far, exceeds of its competitors when it comes to the detection of malware.

Problems with Drivers

All the hardware components that are on your computer depend on drivers, a special form of software that facilitates basic communication with the Operation System. Without them, computers would not be able to, as an example, recognize printers, keyboards, mice or even Central Processing Units (CPUs).

Having corrupted or incompatible drivers is one of the reasons why you may end up having a slow computer. For this reason, it important for you to make sure that you keep all the drivers that are on your computer updated.

While it is possible to do this manually, there are a number of programs, which you can download, that automatically do the job on your behalf.

Registry Problems

The Windows registry is a huge database where all the information about most of the things that are on a computer is stored. The data that is contained in the registry includes; system settings, software and driver information, hardware information and profile information. Your PC’s registry can become corrupted in a number of ways;

Damage to a computer’s registry may occur as a result of malware attacks. In this regard, it is important that you always have an antivirus that has all the latest virus definitions on your computer.

The registry also tends to get damaged as you install and uninstall programs on your computer. The process of uninstalling programs from a computer leaves behind orphaned registry keys (keys that were once associated with other programs), which contributes to the slowing down of your computer.

Improperly Shutting Down a Computer

Despite receiving countless warnings, some people still shut their down by unplugging them at the power source. However, there is a high risk that, by doing so, not only will you lose important data, but you will also damage your computer’s registry.

Most of the information that you are working on is temporarily stored on Random Access Memory, which, while providing faster access, is volatile. (All data is lost when power is turned off.)

That is why it is important to follow the laid down procedures when shutting down your computer; to give the CPU time to properly save everything onto the hard drive. Improperly shutting down a computer poses risks to the registry, as it does not give the processor time to properly save all important settings.

Registry problems, as we have already mentioned in the previous section, are another of the many reasons why your computer may end up slowing down. Fortunately, there are programs out there that you can use to fix problems with your registry.

Save Your Data to the Cloud

Although there are a lot of things that you can do to stop your computer from slowing down, we, at Network Bees, advise you to take precautions to protect yourself in the event of a computer crash. You can do this by saving all important details to the cloud.

You are Running Resources Intensive Programs

As computers have continued to improve in terms of performance over the past decade or so, the programs that people run on them now also use more computing resources. What this means is that if you purchased your PC a few years ago, it will have, in terms of hardware, been overtaken by the programs that you trying to run on it.

As an example, you may have bought your computer with 1GB of RAM, which would have been considered groundbreaking a few years ago. Today, when computers are now routinely rolling off the production line with an average of 4GB of RAM, this is only enough for, more or less, basic computing.

That processor which you were so proud of when you bought your computer six or so years ago may also have become too antiquated to cope with the demands of today’s computing environment. Your slow computer may, therefore, be simply a victim of these changes.

Disk Errors

Hard Drive errors are another reason why computers tend to slow down with use. Bad sectors on hard drives contribute significantly to performance degradations. They may be caused by either physical damage to the Hard Drive or software errors that make some sections of the drive unreadable. While there is nothing much that can be done to repair the physical damage, logical bad sectors can be repaired through Check Disk.

A final word

The good thing is that it is not a given that your computer should slow down over time. There are a number of things that you can do in order to make sure that your slow computer continues to perform as it did when it was new. These include having an up to date antivirus, keeping your drivers updated, cleaning your PC’s registry and periodically running the internal system optimization tools, such as Check Disk and Disk Defragmenter. You can read this article to find out more on how you can boost the your PC’s speed.