Slow computer

[Stephen M. Webb]

On 07/26/2012 07:47 AM, David M. Pelly wrote:
> My computer slowed right down yesterday and still is slow today.

There are a number of possible causes of a sudden and persistent slowdown in a Linux system.

The first I usually suspect is that one or more processes are using enough memory that the system has started swapping
memory pages to disk.  This affects speed in two ways:  waiting for pages to be copied between memory and disk, and a
reduced amount of memory available for system buffers.  You can determine if this is the case by using the command line
utility 'top' from a terminal and viewing the stats on the top line, and then the individual process stats to identify
the hog(s).

Another possible cause of a slowdown is a failing disk.  Your system log (eg, the 'dmesg' command from a terminal) will
show plentiful error messages.

If the slowdown only occurs in certain applications, for instance in your browser, there could be networking problems.

Does the slowdown disappear, at least for a while, after a reboot?

-- 
Stephen M. Webb  <stephen at ubuntu.com>
https://launchpad.net/~bregma