Deadly slow laptop

[Inversion]

I have a 5 year old laptop with a 1.65GHz AMD apu and 6 GB ram. I really need it just to operate a bit faster but don't know what to do. I only really web browse and watch DVDs on it but it takes like 10 mins to open Kodi. I've done a complete reinstall of Windows 10. I've increased the virtual ram size and turned off all the performance sucking windows animation stuff. Any more ideas? I'm gonna be disconnected for a while cause I'm going on holiday and no wifi, should I just turn off antivirus since it's gonna be offline anyway? 

[Zando_]

SSD.

[Inversion]

Just now, Zando Bob said:

SSD.

Should have said, I'm going away tomorrow and only using it for DVDs. Just need something free and easy like is there more I can turn off to improve performance?

[Zando_]

Just now, Inversion said:

Should have said, I'm going away tomorrow and only using it for DVDs. Just need something free and easy like is there more I can turn off to improve performance?

Not really. Have you blown out any dust inside it, disabled background apps, startup programs, etc?

[Inversion]

Just now, Zando Bob said:

Not really. Have you blown out any dust inside it, disabled background apps, startup programs, etc?

Background apps and startup apps yes. I don't have compressed air and I've always been told not to just blow on electronics so not blown out.

[Zando_]

1 minute ago, Inversion said:

Background apps and startup apps yes. I don't have compressed air and I've always been told not to just blow on electronics so not blown out.

Can you get canned air from an office or PC store? Blowing out old PCs can result in a massive performance boost if they were really dirty beforehand. 

[Inversion]

Just now, Zando Bob said:

Can you get canned air from an office or PC store? Blowing out old PCs can result in a massive performance boost if they were really dirty beforehand. 

Probably not. I'm in the UK and out tech/PC stores are awful. All corporate nonsense catering to the uninformed majority and over charging on the few decent things they sell for enthusiasts. All of which are components and not maintenance supplies 

[Donut417]

3 hours ago, Inversion said:

Probably not. I'm in the UK and out tech/PC stores are awful. All corporate nonsense catering to the uninformed majority and over charging on the few decent things they sell for enthusiasts. All of which are components and not maintenance supplies 

Have you considered Linux? Depending on the distro you can get some that are very light weight. 5 years a long time on a laptop. 

[Raintech]

4 hours ago, Inversion said:

I don't have compressed air and I've always been told not to just blow on electronics so not blown out

With static-free air, such as that from bottled air cans, it's perfectly fine, in fact, it's the preferred method of dusting out electronics. However, don't blow air into a closed case as the dust has nowhere to escape, you'll probably have to open the bottom of the laptop to do a proper dusting. Make sure to hold any plugged-in fans in place as if these spin, you can permanently damage the motherboard. Or you can unplug the fans while dusting to be safe, if your laptop gives access to the connectors.

 

Definitely try dusting out your laptop if its old, and never been dusted before. Thermal throttling is a very common cause of slow laptops.
Other than that, try updating drivers, defragmenting your hard drive, using a program such as CCleaner to delete redundant registry issues. Even a windows reinstall can do wonders - you can try an in-place windows reinstall that keeps all your data intact. It's not gonna give you a totally fresh OS, but it keeps your data and it's more convenient.
I'm not to experienced with watching DVD's (I don't think I've touched my PC's 5.25'' optical drives in over 2 years), but consider making digital dvd files if you can, and running them in media players such as VLC or GOM. Personally, I find that some media players can use a lot more processing power than others, for example GOM seems use quite a bit less resources than VLC.

Once you return from your holiday and wish to keep using the laptop, a cheap SSD, or a hybrid drive can be the biggest upgrade you can give to a laptop, price permitting.

 

Keep in mind that if you're after web browsing and watching movies, alot of phones and tablets are quite handy for on-the-go entertainment. Again, this is where the world of digitalization comes in; Simply load some tv shows or movies on the HDD of your laptop, and transferring them onto you phone/tablet for quick viewing may be a solid option if you don't mind the smaller screen sizes and have such a device handy.

[Inversion]

5 hours ago, Raintech said:

With static-free air, such as that from bottled air cans, it's perfectly fine, in fact, it's the preferred method of dusting out electronics. However, don't blow air into a closed case as the dust has nowhere to escape, you'll probably have to open the bottom of the laptop to do a proper dusting. Make sure to hold any plugged-in fans in place as if these spin, you can permanently damage the motherboard. Or you can unplug the fans while dusting to be safe, if your laptop gives access to the connectors.

 

Definitely try dusting out your laptop if its old, and never been dusted before. Thermal throttling is a very common cause of slow laptops.
Other than that, try updating drivers, defragmenting your hard drive, using a program such as CCleaner to delete redundant registry issues. Even a windows reinstall can do wonders - you can try an in-place windows reinstall that keeps all your data intact. It's not gonna give you a totally fresh OS, but it keeps your data and it's more convenient.
I'm not to experienced with watching DVD's (I don't think I've touched my PC's 5.25'' optical drives in over 2 years), but consider making digital dvd files if you can, and running them in media players such as VLC or GOM. Personally, I find that some media players can use a lot more processing power than others, for example GOM seems use quite a bit less resources than VLC.

Once you return from your holiday and wish to keep using the laptop, a cheap SSD, or a hybrid drive can be the biggest upgrade you can give to a laptop, price permitting.

 

Keep in mind that if you're after web browsing and watching movies, alot of phones and tablets are quite handy for on-the-go entertainment. Again, this is where the world of digitalization comes in; Simply load some tv shows or movies on the HDD of your laptop, and transferring them onto you phone/tablet for quick viewing may be a solid option if you don't mind the smaller screen sizes and have such a device handy.

When i meant blow on I meant with air from my mouth. I know that canned air is the preferred method but I won't be able to get any in time. I'll try using CCleaner but really rhe watching of the dvds isn't the issue. Kodi works fine. It's getting to that point without sitting fro half an hour waiting for the laptop to load anything. It only needs to last another 13 months so I'm not paying to upgrade it and its slow even with a full windows reinstall. I actually do rip all my DVDs and I'm doing some on my desktop right now as it happens.

[Raintech]

1 hour ago, Inversion said:

It only needs to last another 13 months so I'm not paying to upgrade it and its slow even with a full windows reinstall.

This sounds like the hard drive has gotten faulty over the years, honestly. Even though you might not be able to replace the storage in time for your journey, it's well worth investing in a new HDD, SSD or hybrid drive now, as when you later decide to upgrade your laptop, you can easily unscrew the drive from your old laptop and simply transplant it into the new laptop, some minor inconveniences with windows licensing aside. 

Of course, how much you're willing to spend is up to you, if anything at all, but it's easily justifiable if you plan to keep using the laptop for over another year - The investment will end up benefiting your next laptop or PC as well.

5 years of accidental vibrations, shocks and impacts will take it's toll on any HDD, regardless of how careful the owner happens to be.

[Inversion]

1 hour ago, Raintech said:

This sounds like the hard drive has gotten faulty over the years, honestly. Even though you might not be able to replace the storage in time for your journey, it's well worth investing in a new HDD, SSD or hybrid drive now, as when you later decide to upgrade your laptop, you can easily unscrew the drive from your old laptop and simply transplant it into the new laptop, some minor inconveniences with windows licensing aside. 

Of course, how much you're willing to spend is up to you, if anything at all, but it's easily justifiable if you plan to keep using the laptop for over another year - The investment will end up benefiting your next laptop or PC as well.

5 years of accidental vibrations, shocks and impacts will take it's toll on any HDD, regardless of how careful the owner happens to be.

I'll definitely blow it out after my holiday but considering how little it's used now since I have a desktop and the laptop battery is so gubbed (not worth the money to upgrade either) I'm not going to bother replacing the HDD unless it completely dies. My next laptop will be smaller and come with a ssd so no point. Thanks for your help though.