Why do computers start to slow down over time?

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Why do computers start to slow down over time?

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Anonymous 0 Comments

The speed of the processors and electronics stays the same, but software in general gets “more and more bloated” over time. Software gets patched almost weekly, so “more features” and/or “more exceptions to check” keep getting added on, making the software require faster / more processing power over time. The computer doesn’t “improve” like the software, so what you observe is that “it’s getting slower.”

Anonymous 0 Comments

>ELI5: Why do computers start to slow down over time?

They do not. The only things that constantly change are the **software’s demands** and the **user’s expectation**.

If you still have an old XP machine from 2004 standing in your basement, untouched for 18 years, then it will still function the same way it did all that time ago (technical failure like corrosion notwithstanding).

You may no longer be *used* to waiting minutes for the booting process to be finished but that’s just how long it has always taken if you were using an HDD. And if you try to run modern software on the device you will also be disappointed, because it has been created with more modern systems in mind.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Two reasons.

On the one hand, parts degrade slowly but surely over time, especially if not properly maintained. Dust coats connectors, corrosion hits exposed parts, mechanisms wear down from use. This causes those parts to work a little less efficiently over time.

On the other hand, computers are made obsolete by progress. When a computer is made, its hardware is pretty much set. It processes things at a certain speed, is capable of certain things, can store a certain amount of data, so on so forth. Unless you change out the parts, that is all that particular computer will be capable of. But newer computers are designed to be more capable. And new software is designed to use what those newer computers are capable of. Over time, software needs more and more resources, and eventually it needs more resources than an old computer is capable of providing.

Anonymous 0 Comments

There’s many different things at play here, but here’s just a few.

First and foremost, your software programs become more demanding over time, while your computer’s physical hardware stays the same. As software is updated and made more complex, your hardware falls behind because it’s still the same old hardware running new and more complex software.

Another major factor is *how much* software you’ve installed over time. Lots of programs run automatically when you start your computer, and many users have a tendency to install many programs over the years and never uninstall them. They build up over time, and eventually your computer will have to launch a couple dozen programs every time you turn it on, and keep them all running in the background while you use your computer.

There’s other more subtle factors as well.

Battery powered devices like cell phones are often designed to intentionally slow down as the battery ages, to prevent situations where the old battery can’t supply enough power to drive the phone. If you’ve seen an old phone that randomly turns off even though it still has some battery remaining, that’s what happens when the battery can no longer support the device at its full speed.

Devices with cooling fans such as laptops, computers, and gaming consoles also fall to another culprit — dust. Over time, dust will pile up on the cooling vents and block the flow of air through your fans. This makes it harder for your computer to stay cool. Over time, as your computer gets hotter and hotter, it will start to slow itself down to prevent heat damage to its components. This is especially common with gaming; cooling is very important because the computer is working very hard.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Software moves on. Day 1: ‘Add 1+1’. Day 2000: ‘Add 1+1, but do it with a liquid glowing background and have the answer fly in on a rendered flying carpet that accurately accounts for ambient air pressure and wind effects. Don’t forget accurately rendering each of the tassles’.

Also, software gets bigger / storage gets slower and fragmented. Day 1: ‘Move this brick over here’. Day 2000: ‘Move this atlas stone, the first of 300 that also need to be moved, from here to here; and by now someone has left a mess in the pit so you have to pick your way more carefully across the ground to not disturb anything. Also, in some places the ground is actually a thinly covered abyss, so if it falls through, leave a flag there, go get an identical stone and put it someplace else.’

More stuff is happening at once as all the applications (that have background operations) you’ve installed over time add up. As above, but ‘And also there are 15 other people moving through the same tunnel to get to the pit. Wait in line.’

Anonymous 0 Comments

It’s a Windows thing.

(And MacOS)

Linux computers get faster over time, because Linux gets faster. Updates incrementally improve the code, and my laptop is faster now than it was when I got it, 2 years ago, if only a little.

On Windows, it gets slower and slower because Microsoft. I don’t think I need to explain. PS: they made Internet Explorer.

On MacOS it gets slower because Apple adds features and eye candy to each version of MacOS.

PS: The MacOS thing happens on Linux too. Sometimes, there’s big overhaul, and everything gets prettier and slower. But it happens a lot less often.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Reality is that if you were to wipe your computer fresh and reinstall everything you had on their previous, it would seem much faster. Your registry gets bloated over time with new program, and often it leaves remnants. Temp files, fragmented data, over time.. it just slows down.

While sure.. newer versions of software are more demanding, we have taken older 4 + laptops, rebuilt from scratch and installed current version AutoCAD LT for example.. and it runs great.

Now if you rebuild from scratch and everything still runs dog slow.. yea, probably time to upgrade. : )

Anonymous 0 Comments

* Softwares deteriorating with more and more processes running, caches filling up, indexes and maps gettings saturated etc
* Batteries dying and losing power
* Dust overheating the computer because air cannot circulate properly
* Thermal paste degrading over time on both GPU and CPU, despite a clean, dust-free system, bad thermal paste can deteriorate up to 10-20°C the working temperature of a component.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Bloatware. Or just another update. Maybe some left over files from a bad uninstallation. Old Versions of apps that did not get deleted. All kinds of stuff really.
Also programs need more power as time goes on. Newer PCs have resources to spare, so efficiency or compatibility with old systems just isnt important anymore.

Anonymous 0 Comments

If you buy a computer and never update any of the software, and don’t completely fill the hard drive, it will run the same as when it was new. Websites may slow down overtime because they become more resource intensive, and that’s out of you control, but each iteration of software generally requires more processing… Hence slowing down as years go by.