Older pavillion running slow

[retiredIBMer1]

I have an older (2013) Pavilion PC with a 500GB SATA drive. It has been taking longer and longer to load up, but now It has got to the point where it will take about 10 minutes for the initial Windows desktop screen to load. The drive activity light is on solid, and it won't load further (I left it on overnight, still solid this morning)

I tried running a stand-alone program from the DVD drive, that loads up fine, so I'm pretty sure its the HDD. Is there a way to revive the drive so I can recover some vital, unsaved files? If it can't be fixed, would it be possible to load the O/S onto another HDD, then slave the damaged one so I can pull the files off it? I'm probably gonna replace the SATA with a 7200model one anyway.

Any advice appreciated!

[BeemerBiker]

Upgrade to an SSD, not an HDD.  The problem might also be lack of memory.

I do not know if this is laptop or desktop model.  Please provide the Product ID or Model name for better assistance. Preferably the full product ID including the characters after the # symbol.

[retiredIBMer1]

Thanks; The model # isMXL318151K, it is a desktop. I don't know if it supports an SSD. In any case, if possible, I would like to recover some files from the original drive

[retiredIBMer1]

I forgot to mention, it has 2 4Gb RAM sticks, 2 spare slots. I don't know what the max is for this model, but until a few weeks ago everything was working; not stellar speed, but sufficient for my purposes.

[BeemerBiker]

---

@retiredIBMer1 wrote:

Thanks; The model # isMXL318151K, it is a desktop. I don't know if it supports an SSD. In any case, if possible, I would like to recover some files from the original drive

---

If your HDD is 500gb then you get a 1TB SSD drive and clone the HDD to the SSD.  Typically the SSD is attached to the desktop using a USB-3 adapter such as this one. If you have only USB-2 then you will need a powered hub since USB-2 may not supply enough power to run the SSD.  USB-2 can supply 0.5 amp maximum.  

That part number you gave me, MXL318151K, is not recognized by HP nor even google.  

What does the HP support assistant give for your model name or product ID?  I cannot recommend any SSD unless I now your model or product ID.   What is the size of your "C" drive?

I think you need to clean up your disk drive as discussed at windows 10.

be sure to select the system file option and remove all but the latest restore point

[BeemerBiker · Accepted solution]

---

@retiredIBMer1 wrote:

I forgot to mention, it has 2 4Gb RAM sticks, 2 spare slots. I don't know what the max is for this model, but until a few weeks ago everything was working; not stellar speed, but sufficient for my purposes.

---

8gb of memory is good.  If it is in your budget you could double the memory by obtain another pair of the exact type.

Please bring up the windows command prompt and enter the following commands to get memory and disk drive info and post the results

wmic memorychip get devicelocator, capacity, speed, MemoryType, formfactor, partnumber, manufacturer

wmic /namespace:\\root\microsoft\windows\storage path msft_disk get Model,BusType

for example:

[retiredIBMer1]

Thanks for your help. As the PC will not boot, I cannot get the the Windows command prompt. I ordered a Windows recovery disk online, it tells me the kernel is corrupted. So I'm ordering another SATA drive on which I'll load my O/S, then slave my original drive so I can pull off the files I need.