Posted: 2/25/2026 8:11:16 PM EDT
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I know almost zero about this stuff. I know how to plug the thing in, turn it on, and that's almost all I know. I have a Lenovo Ideacenter that's quite old. Originally bought I don't remember how long ago. Running Win 11. Intel i3-8100 CPU @ 3.60 GHz. 8 GB RAM. It's been running slower and slower. It takes forever to start up. When I bought it, it came from Best Buy with Webroot already installed, and I've just been keeping that subscription updated ever since. It really lags when I try to videochat with friends and family. A friend suggested I upgrade the RAM, so that's what I tried. I was very careful in looking up the specs of the RAM and I bought the exact same thing. 8 GB, DDR4, 2666 MHz, PC4- yadda yadda yadda. When I opened up the machine to install the 2nd memory module, guess what? It does have 8 GB RAM but it's 2 separate 4GB modules. I figured WTF and took one of the 4GB modules out and installed the 8GB module. Plugged everything back in, powered it up, and it just went beebeebeebahhhhhh... beebeebeebahhhhh... So I took the 8GB module out and put the 4GB module back in, and it's running now. How can I speed this up? Keeping in mind that if you say "fresh reboot of a clean version of (insert operating system here)" I'll just pour another bourbon, nod wisely, and go to sleep. |
Don't piss off old people. The older we get, the less "Life in Prison" is a deterrent.
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Go here and chose Upgrade Center. Select your PC make and model or select System Scanner. It will tell you what the correct RAM modules are to order. Usually they must be matching pairs, that's why what you did, didn't work. Get at least 16GB. You may need to upgrade the HD if it not an SSD to get a real performance boost, but that more complicated that just plugging in some RAM memory. Or just go buy a new PC. |
I don't need therapy. I just need someone to rob me at the gas station so I can let it all out.
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Originally Posted By ceetee: I know almost zero about this stuff. I know how to plug the thing in, turn it on, and that's almost all I know. I have a Lenovo Ideacenter that's quite old. Originally bought I don't remember how long ago. Running Win 11. Intel i3-8100 CPU @ 3.60 GHz. 8 GB RAM. It's been running slower and slower. It takes forever to start up. When I bought it, it came from Best Buy with Webroot already installed, and I've just been keeping that subscription updated ever since. It really lags when I try to videochat with friends and family. A friend suggested I upgrade the RAM, so that's what I tried. I was very careful in looking up the specs of the RAM and I bought the exact same thing. 8 GB, DDR4, 2666 MHz, PC4- yadda yadda yadda. When I opened up the machine to install the 2nd memory module, guess what? It does have 8 GB RAM but it's 2 separate 4GB modules. I figured WTF and took one of the 4GB modules out and installed the 8GB module. Plugged everything back in, powered it up, and it just went beebeebeebahhhhhh... beebeebeebahhhhh... So I took the 8GB module out and put the 4GB module back in, and it's running now. How can I speed this up? Keeping in mind that if you say "fresh reboot of a clean version of (insert operating system here)" I'll just pour another bourbon, nod wisely, and go to sleep. First step, make sure everything's blown out (including inside the power supply), fans are spinning, yadda yadda. Second step, watch task manager and see where you're struggling. It's at least a 90% chance it's in memory usage, but there's a tiny chance that something funky like "all of the thermal paste migrated out or evaporated and the CPU is thermal throttling" or "some process or virus is going crazy and eating CPU and/or RAM" could also be happening. Assuming that it doesn't have something unexpected, your next step is to go through the "startup" secion of task manager and disable all of the startup processes that don't need to be there. Then, upgrade to 16GB, or even 32GB if your pocket book can stand it in today's depressing times. The "icing on the cake" step would be to replace the spinning hard drive (if it has one) with an SSD. Given your CPU, that really should get you to a very workable position for basic day-to-day, including video calls. If it's still struggling, it's 100% time to dig deep with the malware/virus cleaners, or just reinstall the OS. For reference, one of my kid's computer is an i5-6600k, which is honestly fairly comparable to your CPU. With 16GB and an SSD, it does video calls, online school, and casual gaming just fine. |
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Originally Posted By CoyoteGray: Go here and chose Upgrade Center. Select your PC make and model or select System Scanner. It will tell you what the correct RAM modules are to order. Usually they must be matching pairs, that's why what you did, didn't work. Get at least 16GB. You may need to upgrade the HD if it not an SSD to get a real performance boost, but that more complicated that just plugging in some RAM memory. Or just go buy a new PC. Interesting. I'll do that when I get home. I never thought about the matching pairs thing. Originally Posted By GlutealCleft: First step, make sure everything's blown out (including inside the power supply), fans are spinning, yadda yadda. Second step, watch task manager and see where you're struggling. It's at least a 90% chance it's in memory usage, but there's a tiny chance that something funky like "all of the thermal paste migrated out or evaporated and the CPU is thermal throttling" or "some process or virus is going crazy and eating CPU and/or RAM" could also be happening. Assuming that it doesn't have something unexpected, your next step is to go through the "startup" secion of task manager and disable all of the startup processes that don't need to be there. Then, upgrade to 16GB, or even 32GB if your pocket book can stand it in today's depressing times. The "icing on the cake" step would be to replace the spinning hard drive (if it has one) with an SSD. Given your CPU, that really should get you to a very workable position for basic day-to-day, including video calls. If it's still struggling, it's 100% time to dig deep with the malware/virus cleaners, or just reinstall the OS. For reference, one of my kid's computer is an i5-6600k, which is honestly fairly comparable to your CPU. With 16GB and an SSD, it does video calls, online school, and casual gaming just fine. Thanks. I did blow everything out, the fan has freeplay but of course since it's all unplugged when I have my ham fingers in it I don't know if it's working or not. I have gone through the startup menu. Being a Best Buy machine I'm sure it's chock full of "bloatware", but I wouldn't know how to do a clean install. |
Don't piss off old people. The older we get, the less "Life in Prison" is a deterrent.
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Don't worry about fan free play. Take the machine outside and blow it out with compressed air. Don't over spin the fans, hold them with a finger so they don't spin while you blow each out. One post above mentioned thermal paste. Thermal paste does dry out. I've seen old stuff that I had turned into glue and I had to use a small plastic hammer to remove the heatsink from it. That machine was having thermal issues on the CPU as well. |
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Originally Posted By cruze5: 8gb of ram and 11. ouch! have you confirmed if the device has a SSD drive yet? if you decided to keep it a ssd drive would help alot I ordered a 2-pack of 16 gb memory modules from Crucial. 16gb because it was only a few dollars more than 8 gb and I figure 32 gb will be twice more better than 16. lol |
Don't piss off old people. The older we get, the less "Life in Prison" is a deterrent.