Toshiba Laptop running slow and becomes unresponsive while surfing the web

[neoxblu]

Hello everyone,

My moms laptop runs incredibly slow and becomes unresponsive randomly when surfing the web, task manager will take forever to open and windows lags. She mainly uses it to surf the web/watch videos, I'll use it every so often and I too experience the lag shes complaining about, not really sure what the culprit is.

Laptop: Toshiba Portege R30-A
BIOS: 4.80
CPU: i5-4210M @ 2.6GHz
GPU: HD4600
RAM: 4GB DDR3 @ 1600MHz (single stick)
HDD: 500GB 5400RPM 8MB
OS: 8.1 64bit

I've factory restored the laptop and at first it seemed to help but quickly becomes slow again. Barely any space is taken up on the HDD.

Windows updates are recent, Kaspersky and Malwarebytes scans are clean.

Any ideas guys?

All help is appreciated,
Thank You.

 

[TMTOWTSAC]

What's Task Manager and Resource Monitor say the CPU and Disk usage are at when it's going slow? Which processes are using the most?

 

[13thmonkey]

temps?

 

[neoxblu]

What's Task Manager and Resource Monitor say the CPU and Disk usage are at when it's going slow? Which processes are using the most?

Whenever its going slow, CPU usage is at 10% or less and Disk usage is at 100% with Google Chrome, System, Service host local system and local service using the most.

 

[neoxblu]

temps?

CPU: 43 C
HDD: 37 C

 

[TMTOWTSAC]

The disk usage sounds promising. First off I would run a SMART check and drive self test with whatever your HD maker recommends. WD has Data Lifeguard Diagnostics and Seagate has Seatools. If those both come up clean, start investigating the services to see which one is hanging up. Usually I'd suspect Windows Update of being the culprit, older versions routinely cause a runaway process when they can't finish. But that usually persists rather than being intermittent.

 

[neoxblu]

The disk usage sounds promising. First off I would run a SMART check and drive self test with whatever your HD maker recommends. WD has Data Lifeguard Diagnostics and Seagate has Seatools. If those both come up clean, start investigating the services to see which one is hanging up. Usually I'd suspect Windows Update of being the culprit, older versions routinely cause a runaway process when they can't finish. But that usually persists rather than being intermittent.

DLGDIAG

I performed a WD Data Lifeguard Diagnostics and it passed the extended test

 

[neoxblu]

So heres the HDD in the laptop:

https/www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA67S2154312

It has poor reviews with people complaining about its speed, you think this is the culprit?

 

[TMTOWTSAC]

A slow hard drive vs a fast hard drive isn't a hugely dramatic difference. It's noticeable but it isn't the difference between snappy vs unresponsive. I'd still focus on figuring out what processes are using the most resources, especially on a system with 4 GB of RAM.