Eli5 why do computers get slower over times even if properly maintained?

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I’m talking defrag, registry cleaning, browser cache etc. so the pc isn’t cluttered with junk from the last years. Is this just physical, electric wear and tear? Is there something that can be done to prevent or reverse this?

In: Technology

13 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Take a look at [Bill and Andy’s Law](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_and_Bill%27s_law#:~:text=Andy%20and%20Bill’s%20law%20is,that%20new%20hardware%20can%20provide.)

Basically, software gets more complex over time to take advantage of new hardware. If you don’t upgrade the hardware, the new software will just take longer to run.

Anonymous 0 Comments

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Anonymous 0 Comments

The only real answer is that your computer does not get slower. It can’t. Aside from some actual hardware problem. It’s just becoming less capable. It’s the equivalent of thinking a pocket calculator would become slower over time.

Follow up question. Who on earth is still using a computer with a HDD? I just bought a 1TB Samsung SSD on Amazon for $109. You can get a 250GB for $30 tomorrow. More than enough to run your OS and frequently used programs.

Also. All third party Anti-Virus software is worthless for a single user home PC. Worthless. They just steal CPU crunch time and RAM with zero ROI. Windows defender is enough.

Anonymous 0 Comments

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Anonymous 0 Comments

5400 rpm hard drives. Companies love to install them in inexpensive computers. If it doesn’t have an SSD, don’t bother. Win10 updates on a spinning disk is the “death” of a computer.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Another good one nobody seems to have mentioned. Dust. Give your old pc a good Hoover out occasionally. Make sure it has good air flow, clean the fan and the filters if it has them.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Check your task manager and see are any programs hogging cpu, memory and disk.

Check the temperature of the hard drive, SMART data and temperature of the onboard components. If it is a laptop and things are hot swap out it’s thermal paste and clean it.

Anonymous 0 Comments

PC’s can slow down only a few ways.

1. Electronic failure. Parts can break, but on a PC most components that break will prevent it from working at all. The exception is a hard drive or a fan, which are the only two parts that can slow down over time.

2. Hard drives. Hard drives can slow down as they fill up, get erased, and rewritten. Your computer knows where files are, but imagine reading a book where each word is on a different page in random order. You have to flip back and forth to read it. This problem with hard drives can be fixed with a format and reinstall. A drive known as a “SSD” can also help prevent this from happening as much.

3. Heat. With the death of fans, your computer can overheat. Your computer tries to prevent this by using less electricity, and running slower. This can be fixed by cleaning, or replacing broken fans. Sometimes other measures like new paste under the cpu cooler can be required.

4. Software. Software can be added and added, slowing down your computer just like the car weight analogy. Sometimes removing the program leaves behind traces which still slow down computers. Most techies call this “bloat” or “bloatware.” A format and reinstall can fix this. This is the most common way PC’s “slow down” over time.

Edit: it’s important to note that generally PC components like processors and ram never slow down. It just seems like it over time because of other factors. A good clean, a new SSD, and your PC will run just as good as new, at least for the vast majority of cases.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Newer versions of software is written for newer faster hardware, so sometimes it asks to do a lot more stuff at once, which can be taxing on older systems. Unfortunately, there’s not a lot you can do about that other than trying to tell it to stop running so many background. So even if your computer hasn’t physically degraded at all, it’s slower than it used to be.

Anonymous 0 Comments

It’s not really really getting slower, it’s mostly the fact that new software is developed for never faster computers, so they will run slower on older computers, and as apps get updates over time, they will run slower and slower

As an analogy if your computer is a car and the road is the software, it’s not your car getting less powerful, it’s the road getting steeper