Korean Job Discussion Forums

[zeppelin]

I have a 3 year old laptop. Pentium 4, 1GB RAM. I haven't used it for ages as it became chronically slow.

I suspect this is mostly due to the build-up of dust and/or other crap inside and the accumulation of spyware and adware on the hard drive.

Would it be worthwhile taking it to a repair shop to have it cleaned out and formatted, or possibly replace the processor with something that runs less hot? Or should I just dump it?

Does anyone know a shop that could do this and approximately how much it would cost?

Thanks in advance.

[sojourner1]

Typically any computer A/S shop will service Korean made laptops while each international brand has an authorized A/S shop, usually located in Seoul.

You probably need to reformat the hard disk and re-install windows which is fairly easy, but takes a couple hours. I have had to re-install windows a few times during the past 2 years with my 2 year old laptop due to malware, corruption, and memory hogging who knows what. I notice though that I have not had a problem in Korea with my computer slowing down as the internet seems to be very secure here.

[Giant]

Typically, its usually a software issue that you are describing.

A physically dirty computer will run just as fast as a clean one unless its getting hot (due to the dirt clogging fans etc.) in which case it will 'slow' down but only to crash due to heat.

Just re-format it, then if its still mis-behaving then take it to an AS shop and have then check it.

Also, if you want more speed, get a new 7200RPM drive, it makes a difference.

[xenok]

laptops aren't like desktops where you can upgrade modularly.
the only three components you can upgrade fairly easily for a laptop are memory, hard drive and optical drives (cd/dvd). you probably won't be able to upgrade your processor.

but the other posters are right, the slow down you're noticing is probably a software issue that a format reinstall shoudl fix. a physically dirty computer should not have any impact on your software performance but might cause your comp to crash more as pointed out by others.

[zeppelin]

Thanks for the info guys. I'm pretty sure software is the main issue for slowing the machine down, what I forgot to mention was that the damn thing crashes due to overheating at the slightest thing, even opening a folder to view.... I'm sure the overheating issue comes from the amount of dust and crap inside the machine.

Anyway, I'm going to format it. The problem is, the internal CD/DVD drive is broken and I'm using an extrernal CD/DVDr drive, will this pose problems for reinstalling windows?

Thanks again.

[Giant]

It just depends on the BIOS of the system if it has the ability. But if it does support USB booting devices it will be no problem.

If it does not, then take it to the AS center and ask them to fit a new optical drive.

[rocklee]

[Giant]

Ity depends on what you do to get the most benefit. But generally it should be faster overall. I noticed it immediately when I installed my 7200RPM.

It also stands to reason battery life will shorten, but whatever, eating ones cake know what I mean...