Laptop extremely slow

[captainpungent]

Hello,

I am experiencing serious problems with my laptop. Booting up, logging in and running programs. My wireless connection frequently drops and the browsing/streaming music and videos is also a lot slower than it used to be.

I have tried anti virus programs etc. however I haven't had much luck.

Would any of you be able to assist and tell me where to start in terms of clearing it out?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Bobbye]

Welcome to TechSpot, Captain. There are many reasons for a slow system. In this forum, the only 'slow' troubleshooting we do is finding and removing malware.

But what you describe> dropped connections and video/music problems doesn't sound like malware. Please give me this basic information about your system:
1. Operating system? 32bit or 64 bit?
2. RAM installed
3. Number of processes that are checked on the Startup menu: Start< Run> msconfig> Selective Startup> Startup tab.
4. Number of processes running in the Task Manager: right click on Taskbar> Task Manager> # of Processes on lower left corner.

I will know better what to recommend when I have that information.

 

[captainpungent]

The laptop has a 32-bit operating system; 3 GB RAM. There are 24 processes on the startup menu and 124 processes running in Task Manager.

 

[Bobbye]

Can I 'assume' you have Vista? If I told you that I only have 4 processes checked on the Startup menu and I only show 35 processes in the Task Manager with my email open and Firefox open with 7 tabs loaded would that suggest anything to you?

 

[captainpungent]

I am on Vista. Yes; I need to uncheck some processes on startup and look to remove programs fro the hard drive. Is this right?

 

[Bobbye]

That would be my suggestion. If you need specific information on any of the processes, check into the Windows OS forum.