Windows 7 slow down this week?

Inquisitive Builder · Jun 11, 2015

Are there any other windows 7 users that feel their PC slowed down abnormally this week? Mine is 2 years old, and has had some acceptable slow downs, but the boot-to-password-screen time has stayed around 30 seconds or so. But this week it feels like it is booting slower, and took like 60 seconds to boot.

I could be going all conspiracy theorist here, but this seems like suspicious timing, as it started happening right around when the "upgrade to windows 10!" message started popping up. I've heard this is called "windows rot" and no one knows what causes it, so I can't help but wonder if Microsoft may have sent a message for windows 7 PCs to slow down to make a windows 10 upgrade feel more necessary.

Thoughts?

ThatVietGuy · Jun 11, 2015

Utter nonsense.

My computer is fine.

Have you tried checking for more obvious things before jumping on the conspiracy theory?

rgd1101 · Jun 11, 2015

On Tuesday? windows updates week.

Or could be summer is finally here and your pc is overheating.

johnnyb105 · Jun 11, 2015

LMAO do you have any real hard proof this is whats going on? I have 3 systems with win 7 not a issue at all.

iceblitzed · Jun 11, 2015

you might want to run combofix program

--- http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/download/combofix/

It is usually for malware but it fixes other problems automatically which cause slowdowns.

USAFRet · Jun 11, 2015

but wonder if Microsoft may have sent a message for windows 7 PCs to slow down to make a windows 10 upgrade feel more necessary.

No, it's just you. None of my Win 7 systems are any slower this week vs last week. Or last year.

Reyaz123 · Jun 11, 2015

Disk fragmentation is a major cause for this.
Use a program called defraggler to defragment your hard drive (only if you are not using an ssd)
Ccleaner cleans your temporary internet folders and fixes registry errors
Msconfig could be used to disable startup programs you don't need

Inquisitive Builder · Jun 11, 2015

Reyaz123 :

Hmm, I probably should run those, I've been meaning to. Is this the right download page?
https://www.piriform.com/products

As for everyone else, I'm glad to hear your computers are running fine

It was just a suspicion I had, as the slowdown seemed more pronounced this week than last. Glad I was wrong

Reyaz123 · Jun 11, 2015

Yep, those are the programs. It's worth a shot to try what I said earlier to see if it helps

nuffsnuff · Jul 6, 2015

I can confirm the OP's observation. Happened to me at work about two weeks ago (I use standby mode as long as possible, so updates are delayed), and right now I'm facing it at my girlfriend's laptop. She kept Vista on it for two applications with no direct Linux replacement.

The affected PCs render almost unusable as the hard drive thrashes along for hours, and there is nothing to indicate the exact cause. All you will be able to drill down to is "svchost" - which is an umbrella for all and everything MS - hogging your CPUs).

Even if they didn't do it on purpose, the problem update still being pushed a whole month after being reported makes me think they are quite happy with people thinking it's time for a hardware upgrade (read: as no one in their right mind is going to _buy_ 8 or 10, why not collect the windows tax on new hardware?). This has worked for them so many times over, it'll work again.

johnnyb105 · Jul 6, 2015

nuffsnuff :

Maybe its a older OS vISTA DID TAKE ALOT MORE RESOURCES THEN 7 BUT IM A GUY HERE WITH 4 TOTAL PCS IN MY HOME running all the time and we never saw a slowdown maybe defrag and scandisk your drive maybe reboot your system once in awhile but I myself cant confirm that there is a mysteries slow down as you 2 Op have experienced.

nuffsnuff · Jul 6, 2015

johnnyb105 :

Thanks for the pointers, but I doubt it has to do with disk fragmentation unless introduced by the updates themselves. Esp. the Vista installation doesn't get used much, as I said before, and was working acceptably before.

I get a feeling that there is just so much background stuff that gets triggered by most updates (which, IIRC usually replaces half the windows kernel plus makes full backups of everything) that it never finishes properly, if you use Windows for less than say 3 to 4 hours. Next time you boot it up, it starts all over again and thus for the casual user renders the PC unusable each and every time.

Anyhow, other operating systems just don't do that wonky stuff.

My girlfriend can't stop shaking her head on why she ever touched Windows in the first place, after I installed Linux Mint on her laptop. Web browsing, word processing, online gaming, music library - less iTunes to some extent, and hence the "Vista fallback" -, media center client, plug in your HP printer and it just prints instead of downloading gigabytes of useless stuff and still not be able to do the core thing (this is what triggered the "conversion", as she was ready to give up computers altogether at that point.). I could go on for quite a while. Now everything runs clean and fast on 2008 hardware.

For the majority of computer users there is no need for Windows anymore, if only someone really showed them the alternatives and helped with the first steps. Not only that, most of those I did this favour seem to be loving what they got.

I'm not talking power users, one way or the other locked into the Windows infrastructure (I'm one of them at work), I'm talking about those who do everyday stuff. They're really better off looking elsewhere. Hardcore gaming is another thing, but nothing housewives and grandpas are that much into, aren't they?

pauldorset · Aug 20, 2015

i have to agree with you since window 10 upgrade came on market I have notice all my window 7 pc's started to slow right down, all around the same time if I do a fresh install or use a recovery disk then all is ok till I do a few update then back to being slow. so I do believe Microsoft are messing with update to try and force people into getting window 10 where they can have more control with your computer's

Jose_3 · Aug 24, 2015

I manage many different business's computer system, all of them also around last week were reporting me about feeling really slow specially when processing credit card transactions which occurs at the pccharge server pc,

I tried everything I could and nothing it just became really slow or freeze for no apparent reason I checked memory and cpu usage and temperature HD usage... Everything looked very fine it just stall if I wanted to do anything

I had to reinstall windows from scratch and disabling updates from day 0 and only that way was possible a solution

All that happening at the same time different locations and everything seems pretty suspicious for me

Joshua_11 · Sep 21, 2015

Inquisitive Builder :

This isn't just you. It happened to me and my computer hasn't been the same since July.

chiedu · Dec 8, 2015

I noticed that my windows 7 slowed down a couple of weeks back.

Joshua_11 :

Inquisitive Builder :

This isn't just you. It happened to me and my computer hasn't been the same since July.

LadyShadow · Jan 22, 2016

You are right on. MS sends out updated that help us all get tired enough to move on to the upgrade they are pushing. Get rid of update KB3112343 and then see how it runs.

Good Luck

chiedu :

I noticed that my windows 7 slowed down a couple of weeks back.

Joshua_11 :

Neur0nauT · Jan 22, 2016

IT engineer here. I get countless calls from customers using Windows 7 that complain of major slowdowns with their PCs/Laptops. It's always not long after the 2nd Tuesday of each month. (MS update Tuesday) This usually entails looping updates, reverting updates, and background update services clogging up the the RAM.

I can place a vast majority of Windows 7 slow down issues to this. Especially if your system becomes usable again after a period of time, when it finishes whatever it is attempting to update.

Forcing the update hand much MS?

jimmysmitty · Jan 22, 2016

Neur0nauT :

Updates have always been automatic unless otherwise defined by a IT department. In most cases IT departments have updates set to automatic but have a WSUS server that delivers the updates instead of the updates being gotten directly from Microsofts servers this way they can test them first then deploy them out to the end users.

The issues your people experience are probably because they never reboot or allow the system to reboot, and with 7 it is pretty common to be able to delay rebooting indefinitely. At my work we utilize Dell Kace that will notify people to reboot 5 times and if by the 5th time they have not rebooted it will reboot the system for them. We have it set to do this on Friday only.

Neur0nauT · Jan 22, 2016

jimmysmitty :

The company I work for only provide adhoc support for small commercials. Unfortunately, we do end up taking on a lot of legacy hardware and infrastructures that do not have the running start of solutions like Kace. With new customers/hardware we always implement Due Diligence to prevent things like this. However it's a running battle with the legacy customers.

christianvigh · Jan 29, 2016

Inquisitive Builder :

Hi,
I have the same "feeling", despite the "utter nonsense" comments. I have blocked several updates related to Windows 10 and I noticed, since the beginning of january, that my computer significantly slowed down.

Not only during the boot process, but also after. Every new task takes a huge amount of time : launching a Visual Studio instance takes more than 10 minutes ; executing a simple php script takes ten times the duration it normally does. Launching the first instance of IE takes more than 3 minutes.

Processor activity software denotes low activity but however everything turns slows. I do really agree that this is a highly suspicious timing.

SecureSelfStorage · Feb 19, 2016

Inquisitive Builder :

Are there any other windows 7 users that feel their PC slowed down abnormally this week? Mine is 2 years old, and has had some acceptable slow downs, but the boot-to-password-screen time has stayed around 30 seconds or so. But this week it feels like it is booting slower, and took like 60 seconds to boot.

I could be going all conspiracy theorist here, but this seems like suspicious timing, as it started happening right around when the "upgrade to windows 10!" message started popping up. I've heard this is called "windows rot" and no one knows what causes it, so I can't help but wonder if Microsoft may have sent a message for windows 7 PCs to slow down to make a windows 10 upgrade feel more necessary.

Thoughts?

SecureSelfStorage · Feb 19, 2016

Has anyone found a solution? Our work computers updated on 2/16/16 and this very same issue is happening. We tried to rollback to a previous restore point, but the updates wiped out all restore points before 2/15/16. One of our CPUs is useless...the wheel just spins and spins and spins....until the CPU locks up.

ruudattom · Feb 21, 2016

SecureSelfStorage :

In my case, the slowdown seems to have been the result of (1) the fact that I didn't update for a long time, and/or (2) the Windows Update Service itself. I checked what was eating the processor power, and it appeared to be the windows update service (taking some 25% all the time).
I have disabled it and now the computer (laptop) runs smooth again. I will update manually from now on., on a regular basis.

rgd1101 · Feb 21, 2016

Also could be windows 10, they just change it from optional to recommended update this.

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