[SOLVED] Dell laptop really slow

[kevinmul]

Hey guys, I have a clients laptop here, A dell inspiron N5040. Its only 8 months old but it hangs and slows away down.

I scanned for viruses, Found nothing.

It has 4gbs of memory, checked it on resource manager, haven't seen it go over 2 gbs.

Ran ccleaner through it, barely anything on it and it didn't help.

Do you guys have any ideas? thanks

 

[NYJimbo]

The N5040 is notorious for overheating and the motherboard eventually dying. Its a pretty new machine and we see them coming in with partially clogged fans and yet its overheating to the max.

Install a cpuid/hwmonitor and exercise it and check cpu and gpu temps.

 

[kevinmul]

Hey Jimbo, Thanks for the prompt reply. I Tested it with cpuid/hwmonitor, The temp dosent exceed 45c. I removed mc afee and that seems to have solve the problem. Dont understand what happened lol

 

[joydivision]

Have you checked the hard drive?

 

[PCX]

Hard drive may very well have a read error or the memory could be defective.

 

[compnet]

well if there aren't viruses and ccleaner didn't fix it, I'd just give up.

 

[FoolishTech]

I removed mc afee and that seems to have solve the problem.

Yep. <----------filler------------>

 

[cypress]

Mcafee can take up some resources, but I would also do what PCX suggested and run gSmartcontrol and Memtest

 

[kevinmul]

Its been running all night without issue, I also removed Dell local backup when I uninstalled mcafee. Maybe this was giving the issue.

well if there aren't viruses and ccleaner didn't fix it, I'd just give up.

I am still kind of new at this, and thus I am still learning. A constructive comment would have been more helpful.

 

[Tekguy]

I removed mc afee and that seems to have solve the problem.

I had to laugh at this. I was just at Officemax today buying a computer for a customer & the salesperson tried to sell me their optimization package along with Mcafee, "Which is the top antivirus program right now." I kindly said no thanks.

 

[PCX]

Its been running all night without issue, I also removed Dell local backup when I uninstalled mcafee. Maybe this was giving the issue.



I am still kind of new at this, and thus I am still learning. A constructive comment would have been more helpful.

Just be sure to run a diagnostic on the hard drive and memory before you rule that out as the only issue. Often times hardware failures can cause software issues.

 

[compnet]

I am still kind of new at this, and thus I am still learning. A constructive comment would have been more helpful.

Hi,

In your first post, you say "client's" laptop.. Client implies that you are charging money. If you are asking questions like, "I did a virus scan and ran ccleaner and the computer is still slow, what should I do?" I really don't think you should be charging anybody money..

 

[PCX]

Hi,

In your first post, you say "client's" laptop.. Client implies that you are charging money. If you are asking questions like, "I did a virus scan and ran ccleaner and the computer is still slow, what should I do?" I really don't think you should be charging anybody money..

He does have a point . . . I would highly suggest working for someone else for a while or at least get some certs under your belts. Also, what helped me when I first started was I bought a bunch of broken laptops and learned how to fix them, then I sold them and made some cash on the side.

 

[kevinmul]

Just be sure to run a diagnostic on the hard drive and memory before you rule that out as the only issue. Often times hardware failures can cause software issues.

Ill make sure and do this thanks for the advise.

I am only really doing this for the summer, I have fixed allot of computers and laptops over the past few months with everything from full motherboard replacements to tune up's. I never came across anything yet that slowed down the computer where defective memory or viruses wasn't to blame. Google wasn't much help so I posted here. Although I do acknowledge that my experience leaves allot to be desired lol.

 

[Rob_NNCC]

Good for you, everyone needs to start somewhere. If you want more information on some of the people taking poorly about you just look around on the other active threads in this section.

As long as you don't overpromise what you can do, and you take it slow researching things you don't know, you can learn alot and still give decent service. It might not be a bad idea to mentor in another shop, though, at least part time.

 

[Boston Pro Comp Serv LLC]

You'll find out soon enough that Mcaffe and Norton, won't only slow you down but often do plenty of other annoying things.

 

[OzzyGeek]

Mcastrofee again, please give me strength!

 

[mr m]

This same scenario happened to me the other day.

I have had numerous issues with recalcitrant software affecting pc performance but Symantec and AOL seem to consistently rear their ugly heads.

 

[BCS Head Tech]

Hey Jimbo, Thanks for the prompt reply. I Tested it with cpuid/hwmonitor, The temp dosent exceed 45c. I removed mc afee and that seems to have solve the problem. Dont understand what happened lol

McAfee and Norton are resource hogs and they slow down all machines..

 

[Alexis]

Antivirus programs always slows down the computer.Always use a safe registry cleaner to maintain your system speed.