Device runs extremely slowly and feels unresponsive.
Device runs extremely slowly and feels unresponsive.
He had an older laptop he bought a while back, only used a little over a hundred hours. It's been stored in the bag for a year now and he's finally getting it back. The performance is extremely slow—task manager shows 23 seconds per boot. The processor is an i7 with 8 cores at 1.8GHz, but the RAM is only 20GB at 1333MHz. The GPU is an MX130 and the hard drive is a 1TB Kingston NVMe SSD. Mostly it's meant for connecting to another virtual machine, so the specs aren't crucial. Windows barely runs, and pressing the Windows key takes around ten seconds to launch the start menu. After some research, it seems the OS is installed on the HDD instead of the NVMe drive. Moving it over should be straightforward. The dual-channel RAM setup is okay since both channels run at the same speed, though one channel is 16GB and the other is SODIMM. Using it for a year hasn't harmed performance much, but the slow boot times suggest it's still in a weak state.
These unusual specifications need attention. The base clock should be 1.8, and the RAM at 1333 seems inconsistent. Are these details from CPU-Z? If yes, then the RAM frequency should reflect half of what you typically see due to DDR memory behavior. That would suggest 2666, which makes more sense. The 16 + 4 configuration also appears odd. Verify the RAM speed using Task Manager. The presence of an mx130 GPU released in 2017 suggests your laptop should be from around 2020-21. Double-check the exact model listed. It’s quite strange overall. I’d suggest a fresh Windows installation, or if you prefer, a clean file transfer using software like Drive clone. If you’re comfortable with Linux, you could use dd for data transfer, but a clean install is still the best option. Of course, don’t treat a computer like an old car—regular maintenance is essential. The most you can do is replace the thermal paste and thoroughly clean the interior, even for an HDD. Just a few seconds is enough. Check Task Manager for confirmation.