If you have owned a laptop or desktop computer (also both known as PCs) for a couple of years or more and have recently started to notice that it doesn’t run anywhere near as fast as it did when you first purchased it, or it takes forever to start up, or there are any other annoying issues, don’t panic. We’ve got you covered.
Having a slow-running PC with various issues can be frustrating. It is especially frustrating when you have important work to do, movies to watch, online slots or live dealer games to play, payments to make or images to edit, and you don’t know how to fix those issues to make it run faster again.
With that said, let’s dive straight in to reveal five tips for keeping your home PC fast.
Why is my PC running slower than normal?
There are many things that can cause your desktop computer or laptop to run much slower than normal, and the good news is that most of these issues are relatively easy to fix and won’t cost you loads of money to get fixed.
For example, it might just be a simple case of you having too many programs/apps running at the same time, or it might be getting old and needing more memory or processing power to keep up with the times. Until you identify what the issue is and fix what you find, your PC will keep running at an annoyingly slower-than-normal pace.
PC requirements, capabilities, components and technology are frequently evolving and becoming more demanding each year, so although the system that you purchased five to seven years ago was cutting-edge at the time, some of the crucial hardware and software components compared to today’s standard ones might either be slightly less capable/powerful, or even obsolete and may need replacing/upgrading.
Your computer may have even caught a virus, which could be causing the issues. So many things can happen to a PC that causes it to run slower than normal.
What are the signs that tell me my PC has issues, and how can I fix them?
Before dumping your PC in the bin and forking out for a new one, or before spending lots of money on calling in the professionals or taking it to a store that fixes PCs, you can try fixing the issues yourself.
Let’s take a quick look at a few common issues and then reveal five tips for getting your PC to run fast again. You may have noticed that your PC frequently crashes or freezes, and you must keep switching it on and off again.
Your system might be running much slower than normal, and you can’t enjoy using any of the apps you normally need for work or play.
It’s impossible to watch movies/television shows, or it doesn’t let you perform updates, or perhaps it won’t let you install the latest operating system, or you keep getting error messages. Most of the time, these issues are fairly easy to fix.
Five tips for getting your PC to run fast again
Here are five simple and effective tips for getting your PC to run fast again, which you might like to try, depending on the issue you’re encountering:
- Sometimes, just a simple reset (switch on and off) will help. Turn it off by the plug socket at the wall, and wait for at least 15 seconds before switching back on
- Identify startup programs that could be causing your PC to run slower than normal
- Update your apps, web browsers, and other software programs to the latest version
- Run a complete antivirus scan and give it a disc clean to get rid of unwanted files that could be slowing down your PC
- See if your hardware needs upgrading or if you need more storage drive and memory (RAM)
Final thoughts
If none of these fixes seems to be working, then depending on your issues, you may also want to consider upgrading your internet package to get faster speeds, ‘defragging’ your system and upgrading other key components that may be causing it to run slow.
If all else fails, then you may need to ask for expert advice. Most of the time, the issues should be easy for professionals to fix, so don’t panic.