Creating Restore Point and Monthly Patches now take a long time

Ok have got an idea of what you have now and there would be a way of opening the machine either top or bottom - otherwise how would they be able to service it or replace parts. The grill at the front I am going to guess is the air intake for cooling and if you have a really bright light - one of those cheap little multi LED torches is ideal - then look in there and see what if any dust and crud is stuck there you may be able to see the fan but never having to have worked on one of these I am not sure.

Now whoever built this machine would have put an OEM copy on the device (I very much doubt it was a retail one unless you specified that) and there should be a sticker on the bottom indicating at least what OS you have. If that machine was built in 2013 it might be likely the OS was 8 or 8.1. If it was 7 then it should have a code on the sticker. I personally always am concerned about refurbished machines as that term can be just about anything - as you say they could have just taken any case and put in whatever they thought enough or it could have been as simple as changing a GPU or sound card (examples) and doing some general tidying up. Having said all that the case may be somewhat older than a 2013 model machine. An idea to do is to go to that store and ask just what they did put in the machine components and software.

So just while I am thinking of it have a good look at the bottom and see what stickers there are attached to the case and let us know what they are I am attaching a pic of what those two system stickers would look like and the 8 sticker could possibly be the same as the 7 sticker.

The blurb that you say another customer quoted is simply ( I am fairly sure) all about keeping the Windows updates to date because quite a lot of them are security patches for software either system files or Microsoft security features.

Look I am really sorry this is dragging things out but sooner or later we shall get to what the problem is.

debodun said:

Are these the "stickers" you wanted to see? I noticed one of them says "Vista" on it, but I have Windows 7 - 64 bit as the OS.

BTW - why was a computer with 2 MB RAM adequate 5 years ago not now? What's changes? I'm an old lady that doesn't know much about technical issues or troubleshooting.

Yes well that is the very original install someone has put an OEM on your machine but has not put the sticker on the bottom of the machine. Oh and when you send pics of the sticker you need to obliterate the code somehow as someone could possibly use it for illegal purposes

The RAM well because the systems are now more involved than ever and programs you add will use up the RAM real quick so usually it is recommended that 3GB minimum is used preferably 4GB especially for a 64bit system as you have there now.

How did you go with Roy's advice the system protection and disk cleanup??

Hello again now you mention Norton do you have that AV installed?? I ask because I am not a great fan of it and if it were me I would change it to something better.

Now we both have mentioned the specs are minimal for the machine and the OS you are running I would at least up the ante to 4GB of RAM that tutorial Roy linked is extremely good too this is what I wrote up in advance to using that tutorial - no offence Roy.
Just a little something that will make your machine a little faster and more efficient is this Optimize Windows 7
It is my bible when installing an OS on my machines and also when I am fixing friends and family machines too.
Now if you go through it slowly you will find lots of tweaks and they are all really thoroughly done by the authour Brink a fellow who is in my mind brilliant and if you need to ask questions he is just the most obliging person around.
The other thing is that you may lose some of the "bling" such as transparency (you don't have to I find it unnecessary) and all the tweaks are reversible.
If you do get stuck just post back in that tutorial and you will get help. Another bonus using this tutorial is that it helps you find your way around your machine and Windows 7!
Just one tip I would say you start with is do this Registry - Backup and Restore do this and it will save you a lot of grief if you are ever doing things in the registry and even if you don't it is a good back up to have if your system ever gets corrupted.
(pretyped to save time)