Windows 7 Lenovo Laptop Running Painfully Slow

[Chris Nicola]

I am repairing an old Lenovo G575 laptop for a friend and its running painfully slow.

Lenovo G575 64 bit Windows 7 SP1, 2 Gbt ram (1.6 usable). HDD 500 Gbt (300 Gbt free)

I remember working on this machine in the past and although slow, it ran better than it does now. The wifi had stopped working and windows installed an updated driver. I am sure though that is not the problem. Now just opening some folders takes a long time with a spinning cursor. Launching chrome takes about 1 minute to open the first time its launched after booting.

Here is what I have done so far.

Ran CCleaner to delete unecessary files
Defragmented the HD
Set windows to manage the scratch disk.
Disabled unecessary visual effects in performance options
Set programmes priority in performance options
Power plan is balanced
I have disabled some non essential processes at startup but that only helps marginally.
I have checked task manager and can't see any unusual activity.
I have cleaned the fan to prevent overheating


I suspect that the Hard disk which hasn't been used for a long time may be running slow. You can see the scan from Crystal Disk below.

Your thoughts and advice would be appreciated.

Kind regards
Chris

 

[samuria]

If its a sata drive putting a ssd in would have the most effect most laptop have a slow spin speed hd

 

[Chris Nicola]

Thanks for your reply. Actually I own a similar Lenovo G575 to the one I am trying to fix for my friend. On my machine I tried to install a SSD (Silicon Power SATA3, S55, 240 Gbt). Unfortunately I never got it to boot properly. When cold booting, the Windows logo would hang for 5 min before launching Windows. A hot restart booted immediately. Once into Windows it worked fine. After trying for a long time, I could not solve the hanging boot problem and came to the conclusion that the hardware or the bios is somehow not compatible with SSD's.

Kind regards
Chris

 

[SIW2]

If your similar machine is running better, it could be that your friend's win7 is due a reinstall.

Back up the activation first. SEE HERE


It would probably be better to use 32 bit win7 with only 2gb ram.

 

[Chris Nicola]

Thank you for your reply. Yes, reinstalling Windows might help. It's possible that some Windows updates have crippled it. I will also check the price to upgrade from 2Gbt to 4 Gbt Ram. I do suspect though, that something is up with the HD. I just ran Windows Experience Index again and got an error that it could not access the drive. I will do another check disk and scan for recovery of bad sectors.

Kind regards
Chris

PS thanks for the tip about backing up the activation!