The figure on the right shows how battery life – due to the increased activity – plunged from 310 minutes to 240 minutes, according to the PCMark tool. This stresses the hardware unnecessarily. That’s due to the nonstop activity, as the processor and hard disks never really went to sleep, as they were constantly busy. The middle graph shows that temperature went from an average of 29☌ in idle to 35☌, according to SiSoft Sandra, a complex diagnostic application. Doesn’t seem like much, for a single task, right? But apply that slowdown to everything you do on a daily basis and you’re looking at a major productivity hog. The figure on the left shows results that the additional weight added 15% to the time needed to apply filter effects to a photo, according to PCMark’s testing tool. When loading up the game Alienware Area 52 R2 on a gaming PC and on a fully configured Microsoft Surface Book, the effect was pronounced: Less than half the performance.īut even on the highest high-end PCs, I was surprised to see the impact the basket of apps had on speed, temperature, and battery life. On an aging Sony Vaio laptop from 2011, the speed testing program PCMark (see my benchmarking post), which tests performance in Office and Multimedia applications, showed a significant slowdown: The PCMark score was at 2196 points in a clean state and only 901 points under loads. On an HP Spectre x360 ultrabook, the game Grand Theft Auto V dropped to a sluggish 25 pictures (frames) per second instead of 30. Here’s an excerpt:Īsus Zen ultrabook from 2015: Startup time went from a blazing fast 9 seconds to 39 seconds. Both devices suffered from the additional weight. In an experiment I recently performed, I installed a large basket of applications on both an older and a newer PC. Windows® slows down as it focuses on background tasks and not what you’re doing. Higher stress leading to more heat and energy consumption -> your PC runs slower to prevent overheating and your laptop runs out of battery sooner. Less memory for active processes -> your PC becomes sluggish! But the cumulative effect of adding more and more items can be a serious detriment to performance. On their own, none of these services, tasks, or startup items slows down your PC to any significant degree. They show up in your task bar and usually allow you to quickly access a program or some setting. Popular examples include Skype, DropBox, OneDrive, OneNote, and antivirus programs. But while services and scheduled tasks run mostly hidden in the background, startup items tend to be more “visible”, as they appear in your systems tray: Startup items: These are additional programs that launch every time you turn on your PC. For example, the Dropbox app on your PC uses a scheduled task to checks for updates every day at 5:50pm local time. However, these tasks are mostly used to perform actions at specific times or in certain situations. Scheduled tasks: These are usually performed by background applications, which come with Windows or other software you install. Here’s a small list of active services on my well-kept PC: Neat functionality? You bet! Should it run in the background all the time? NO!Īnd it’s not the only offender. If you own an NVIDIA graphics chips, it installs the NVIDIA Streaming Service that allows you to stream games to other computers in your home network. For example, Adobe Reader installs an Adobe Updater that frequently checks for updates. Services: Connected to the application, these provide basic functionality, like keeping products up to date. So let’s get to the real issue: many programs like iTunes or PhotoShop install software components that run every time your computer is turned on. Plus, these programs just “sit” there on your hard disk and wait for you to launch and use them. Given I have a 512 GB drive, that’s less than a half-percent of my space. Even a heavyweight like PhotoShop takes up just 1.8 GByte on my drive. For example, iTunes takes up 188 Megabytes on my hard disk (just the program, no music). On its own this rarely has much impact given today’s huge hard disks. Installing a program on your computer, in many cases, means that it occupies some space on your hard disk. So let’s start with the first misconception about PC slowdowns: Many people think that by putting something on your PC hard disk, it’ll magically slow down anything you do. It is usually long after problems arise that people start asking themselves “Why is my PC so slow?” or yell out “My Windows has just crashed again!” It does not tell users which rarely-used programs to get rid of. Windows by itself does a poor job of alerting users to digital baggage and its related issues. More digital baggage means less performance
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