After a few months of using your brand new PC, it inevitably slows down. There could be a number of reasons for this. Here are a few things you can do bring back your PC to its former glory.
Extra software
If you are a typical PC user, you install a variety of programs on your PC. You use some of them all the time, but forget about the others. Installing too much software slows down your PC each time it starts. Also, when you install some software, it installs other programs that you never asked for and which sit on your PC just taking up space and memory. This also causes a lot of slowdowns.
To get rid of this problem, identify and make a list of software you have on your PC. Uninstall whatever you do not use. You will be surprised at just how many programs you have, many of which you haven’t even heard of. When installing new software, remember to untick wherever it asks to install other software, fondly called “bloatware”.
Toolbars
Your PC can also slow down over time because of toolbars. When you install applications and Windows, many times sub programs such as toolbars are also installed. If you open Internet Explorer and find tons of toolbars installed with little space for the actual content, you have a problem with toolbars.
With so many toolbars installed your browser takes ages to start up. Once it has started up, it runs very slow. The only way to deal with this is to remove all those toolbars by uninstalling them from the control panel. If you use Mozilla Firefox, remove unnecessary toolbars from that too.
Fragmented Disk
As your PC gets older, you keep adding and deleting files from the disk. This creates a lot of empty spaces that files that spread over the entire disk. When you open such a file, it will take a bit of time to open. This used to be a big headache a few years ago. Since disks have gotten faster and Windows is getting better, defragmentation is less of a problem.
Even so, if you find that files take a very long time to open and your PC takes a long time to start, defragmenting your hard drive should give your computer a speed boost. In order to keep your disks clean, go through the defragmentation process once every two months. You can either use the disk defragmenter that comes built into Windows or third party software such as Auslogics.
Hard disk
Even after doing all the above, you find your PC to be running slow, it is probably a problem with your storage disk. Hard disks are mechanical devices that spin at several thousand rotations per minute. Although they are usually reliable, they can just as easily fail, either due to manufacturing defects or physical shock.
If your computer is under warranty, contact customer support and have it replaced. Else, you may ask a technician to replace the hard disk for you. When you do this, you have to install Windows all over again and also all programs that you had running previously.