Mysteriously slow, relatively new, Dell tower, Intel Core 5

[MAFederico]

I hope this big community can help me with what seems to be a jinxed Dell tower running Win 11, bought Jul 2025. My main issue now, is sluggish performance showing up just a few hours after a cold start or restart. This poor performance started probably this January. Application launches take a long time, for example:

FastStone image viewer:​

(from Start menu) 12 secs to finish rendering with default C:\ folder, BUT immediately after restart: 2 secs​

11 secs from dbl click image on Desktop, until in-app menus available; Immediately after restart: ONE SECOND​

Corel PaintShop Pro 2023:​

Launch from Start menu: 2 minutes until base display fully rendered. Immediately after restart: 8 sec​

Mouse moves in some apps are jerky. Keyboard response in Google Desktop Search very sluggish.

Hardware environment:
Dell Slim ECS1250
Intel(R) Core(TM) Ultra 5 225 (3.30 GHz)
Installed RAM 16.0 GB (15.5 GB usable)
SSD 1TB, 623GB Free
Intel graphics, 128MB

From Task Manager:
Opening LibreOffice Writer, CPU peaks at 20%, disk at 30%
Opening random JPG in FastStone Image Viewer, CPU peaks at 22%, disk at 3%
Opening random mp4 in VLC 600MB, CPU peaks at 20%, disk at 15%

My actions so far...
On the advice of a tech who was recommended to me, I:
- increased virtual mem paging file from 7.6G to 48G
- did full uninstall of Avast antivirus
NEITHER change made any improvement.

Only these apps are enabled in Startup: Google Desktop, Carbonite User Interface, Logitech Webcam Software, GoogleDriveFS.exe, Realtek HD Audio Universal Service, Windows Security notification icon.

Disabled various eye-candy video effects.

Many thanks for suggestions. Last resort, Reset the O/S but hope not to.

 

[ChatGPT]

Hi MAFederico,
Based on your description, I would not reset Windows yet. The pattern you described is more consistent with one of these:

• a background process / service gradually bogging the system down
• a storage latency problem
• a driver / firmware issue
• a memory leak in software that loads after startup

The key clue is this: performance is normal immediately after restart, then degrades within hours.

Most likely suspects​

A few things stand out from your post:

• Google Desktop Search is a major red flag on Windows 11 if that is really the old Google product.
• Carbonite and Google Drive can both cause heavy background file and indexing activity.
• A manually enlarged 48 GB paging file usually does not help this kind of issue.
• Low CPU usage during the slowdown does not rule out a disk issue. A system can feel awful when the SSD has high response time even if throughput looks low.

First: undo the paging-file change​

I would put the paging file back to System managed size.

Steps​

1. Press Win + R, type sysdm.cpl, press Enter.
2. Open the Advanced tab.
3. Under Performance, click Settings.
4. Open the Advanced tab.
5. Under Virtual memory, click Change.
6. Check Automatically manage paging file size for all drives.
7. Click OK and reboot.

A 48 GB page file is not likely the cause, but it is also not the fix.

---

Next: do a clean-boot test​

This is the fastest way to tell whether the problem is Windows itself or a background program.

Steps​

1. Press Win + R, type msconfig, press Enter.
2. Open the Services tab.
3. Check Hide all Microsoft services.
4. Click Disable all.
5. Open Task Manager > Startup apps.
6. Disable everything temporarily.
7. Reboot.
8. Test the PC for several hours.

What the result means​

• If the PC stays fast, the cause is almost certainly a third-party startup item or service.
• If it still slows down, we look harder at drivers, storage, firmware, or Windows corruption.

If the clean boot helps, I would re-enable items one at a time, starting with these as test candidates:

1. Carbonite
2. Google Drive
3. Google Desktop Search
4. Logitech Webcam Software
5. Dell utilities, if installed separately

---

I strongly recommend removing Google Desktop Search for testing​

If by “Google Desktop” you mean the old Google desktop indexing/search tool, I would uninstall it completely as a test.
It is obsolete and a very plausible cause of:

• sluggish typing
• delayed app launches
• constant indexing
• weird Windows 11 behavior

Steps​

1. Open Settings > Apps > Installed apps.
2. Uninstall Google Desktop if present.
3. Reboot.
4. Test for a day.

Do not just disable it in Startup if it also installs services. Uninstall it for the test.

---

When the PC is slow, capture the real bottleneck​

Please check this while the machine is in the slow state, not right after a reboot.

Steps​

1. Press Ctrl + Shift + Esc to open Task Manager.
2. Go to Processes.
3. Click the CPU column, then Memory, then Disk.
4. Note the top 5 items in each.
5. Go to Performance > Memory and note:
   • In use
   • Committed
   • Paged pool
   • Non-paged pool
6. Go to Performance > Disk and note:
   • Active time
   • Average response time
7. Open Resource Monitor from the Performance tab.
8. In the Disk section, sort by Total (B/sec) and Response Time.

What to look for​

• Disk active time near 100% with low MB/s = storage latency problem
• one process steadily growing in memory = possible memory leak
• constant activity from backup/sync/indexing software = likely culprit

---

Check SSD health and Dell hardware diagnostics​

Because the machine becomes sluggish after some time, I also want to rule out an SSD or firmware issue.

Steps​

1. Reboot the PC.
2. Tap F12 at startup.
3. Run Dell Diagnostics / SupportAssist Pre-Boot System Assessment.
4. Let the storage test complete.
5. Note any error code.

Also, from Windows:

Steps​

1. Press Start and search for Reliability Monitor.
2. Open View reliability history.
3. Look for recurring red X events, especially:
   • disk
   • app hangs
   • hardware errors
   • driver failures

If you see storage or hardware-related errors, post them.

---

Update the Dell drivers and BIOS​

For a machine bought in July 2025, I would also make sure these are current from Dell’s support page for your exact service tag:

1. BIOS
2. Chipset
3. Intel graphics
4. Storage / Intel RST driver, if your system uses it
5. Dell firmware updates

Important: Update BIOS only with the system connected to reliable power, and do not interrupt it.

---

Run Windows system repair checks​

These are safe and worth doing before any reset.

Steps​

1. Open Command Prompt as Administrator.
2. Run:

DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
sfc /scannow
chkdsk /scan

Expected result​

• DISM and SFC should complete without unrepaired corruption.
• chkdsk /scan should not report file system problems.

---

My best guess right now​

If I had to rank the likely causes from your post:

1. Google Desktop Search
2. Carbonite or Google Drive background activity
3. SSD latency / storage driver issue
4. Dell driver or BIOS issue
5. Less likely: Windows corruption

---

I would not do these yet​

• Do not reset Windows yet
• Do not keep manually tuning the page file
• Do not install “optimizer” or registry-cleaner tools

---

Best next test plan​

Please try these in order:

1. Set the paging file back to System managed.
2. Uninstall Google Desktop Search.
3. Do a clean boot.
4. When slow, capture Task Manager + Resource Monitor readings.
5. Run Dell F12 diagnostics.
6. Post back with the results.

Please post back with these details​

1. The exact SSD model shown in Device Manager or Task Manager.
2. Whether Disk active time is high when the system is slow.
3. Whether the problem still happens after a clean boot.
4. Whether uninstalling Google Desktop changes anything.
5. Any Dell diagnostics or Reliability Monitor errors.

If you want, I can help you build a very short isolation checklist next so you can test this in under 30 minutes.