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PC getting glitchy, routine maintenance reqd

S

stevec67

pfm Member
I have a 10 yr old lappy running W7. Yes, I know, but it's been fine for what I want to do, basic WP, net and email. Recently it has been getting glitchy, it won't fire up promptly and just sits there showing the login screen without allowing you to log in, stuff like that. I have had this before, I think then I ran scandisk or similar and cleared out 8 Brazilian GB of cookies and other crap. Is it still scandisk or chkdisk, or what? What's the command and how do I get to it?

Also it seems to be getting noisy. The fan is permanently on and whirring away, it was never insturusive before. Is a dusting out recommended?

Any other tips other than "Spend £500 on a replacement with W10 you tightarse". Which I will, if necessary.

Oh and yes I am backing up in case it all goes taters.
 
Certainly vaccing out is good for a desktop, at least. That often stops periods of crashing on mine.

If you can’t enter anything in the login box try booting into Safe Mode, he said as if he knew what he was talking about. God knows what you are supposed to do then.

I’m so fed up with my PC and a Win 10 installation that can’t update but insists on continually trying that I’m in the middle of moving over to a dual boot MacMini.
 
First thing you should be aware of (if not already) is that Win 7 support ended in January - "After January 14, 2020, PCs running Windows 7 no longer receive security updates."
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4057281/windows-7-support-ended-on-january-14-2020

So might make sense to 'upgrade' to Win 10 - not sure if you can still do it for free, but probably some means to do so if you want.

For checkdisk, https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/2641432/check-your-hard-disk-for-errors-in-windows-7
The other disc tool is to defrag the drive, do that too.

I'd recommend running Ccleaner (free), health check and registry cleaner - this will get rid of loads of junk and tidy up the registry.
And Patchcleaner (free) - this will get rid of any orphaned files (i.e. lost files) and these can get very large.
 
A grey version of win10, ie one that you can register on Microsoft’s website and get updates but you don’t get support, is a couple of quid on eBay.
 
I would think that whatever you do you are just delaying the inevitable - I don't think it owes you a great deal after 10 years.;)
 
@Marchbanks, have you tried Windows update troubleshooter? Settings > Update & Security > Troubleshooting > windows update.
If yes and it's still playing up, boot in Safe Mode and try deleting the SoftwareDistribution folder in the C:/windows folder. That will probably fix it (it just deletes the update data so it has to start all again).
 
Marchbanks said:
Certainly vaccing out is good for a desktop, at least. That often stops periods of crashing on mine.

If you can’t enter anything in the login box try booting into Safe Mode, he said as if he knew what he was talking about. God knows what you are supposed to do then.

I’m so fed up with my PC and a Win 10 installation that can’t update but insists on continually trying that I’m in the middle of moving over to a dual boot MacMini.
Click to expand...
I've pointed this out to you before and I have over the years recovered several Windows installations with the same symptoms that you mention https://www.wsusoffline.net/docs/

This software will download updates from M$ and then you apply them offline. If you computer is unusable you can perform the download on another computer to a USB stick and then use this to recover the faulty PC.

Cheers,

DV
 
robs said:
@Marchbanks, have you tried Windows update troubleshooter? Settings > Update & Security > Troubleshooting > windows update.
If yes and it's still playing up, boot in Safe Mode and try deleting the SoftwareDistribution folder in the C:/windows folder. That will probably fix it (it just deletes the update data so it has to start all again).
Click to expand...
Thanks Rob. My PC seems incapable of taking the very next update from the one it has. I have sat it front of it for ninety minutes while an MS agent has tried and failed to install same using Remote Desktop. I won’t go into more details as I’m aware I’m thread crapping.

Darth Vader said:
I've pointed this out to you before and I have over the years recovered several Windows installations with the same symptoms that you mention https://www.wsusoffline.net/docs/

This software will download updates from M$ and then you apply them offline.
Click to expand...
Tried it, didn’t work. I won’t go into more details, reason above.

Sorry Steve.
 
From CNet, how to get free W10


Here's how to get Windows 10 for free, if you're currently running a licensed and activated copy of Windows 7, Windows 8 or Windows 8.1 Home or Pro:

1. Go to the Download Windows 10 website.

2. Under Create Windows 10 installation media, click Download tool now and Run.

3. Choose Upgrade this PC now, assuming this is the only PC you're upgrading. (If you're upgrading a different machine, choose Create installation media for another PC, and save the installation files.)

4. Follow the prompts.

5. When the upgrade is complete, go to Settings Update & Security > Activation, and you should see a digital license for Windows 10.
 
If upgrading to Win 10, I think you'd need to actually do the upgrade on the existing harddrive to get the windows 7 license 'transferred' over to Win 10?
Then you could do a fresh install if wanted.
 
You can buy a windows 10 key on ebay for 3 quid, save yourself the trauma of windows major upgrades. Stick an SSD in it, you'll no doubt need to increase the ram from 4 to 8 gigs and put a new windows install on it.
 
garyi said:
Stick an ssd in it and out a new fresh install of windows on, none of this transferring your old system bollocks.
Click to expand...
I'd second this. If it doesn't work, you have a spare SSD kicking around which is always useful. Failing that you could also try try Ubuntu & Libreoffice whilst your about it.
 
stevec67 said:
I have a 10 yr old lappy running W7. Yes, I know, but it's been fine for what I want to do, basic WP, net and email. Recently it has been getting glitchy, it won't fire up promptly and just sits there showing the login screen without allowing you to log in, stuff like that. I have had this before, I think then I ran scandisk or similar and cleared out 8 Brazilian GB of cookies and other crap. Is it still scandisk or chkdisk, or what? What's the command and how do I get to it?

Also it seems to be getting noisy. The fan is permanently on and whirring away, it was never insturusive before. Is a dusting out recommended?

Any other tips other than "Spend £500 on a replacement with W10 you tightarse". Which I will, if necessary.

Oh and yes I am backing up in case it all goes taters.
Click to expand...
Hmmmmm. Go into Task Manager ctrl/alt/del and see if any tasks are using a lot of CPU time and make a note of them.

Cheers,

DV
 
I vote SSD, Win10 new install and possibly more memory depending on spec. Your laptop will live on for a lot longer
 
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