EliteBook very slow after driver installation

[Dent91]

Hello Board,

I have a very frustrating issue:

My EliteBook is a few months old, and was running fine. I never bothered to install the drivers mentioned by the HP assitant untill yesterday. I installed all of them (7 if i remember correctly), inculding Radeon Graphics R5 driver, fingerprint scanner driver, sound system driver. 

This completely ruined my lapotp. It is extremely slow an inconsistent (sometimes taking 10 seconds for a google plage to load). Next to having a very short battery life (3-4hrs in battery save mode) and overheating sometimes, this is the final drop that makes working on this "business laptop" completely impractical.

I have tried to deinstall the R5 driver, this does help somewhat but still not as fast as before, Also the brightness settings dont work then.

I am desperate for a solution as I need my laptop everyday for work. If this does not work I am forced to buy another laptop dat does do what is promised, never to return to HP again.

Kind regards,

Dent91

[IT_WinSec]

Hi @Dent91

Welcome to the HP Support forum.

Try to "turn back time" and perform System Restore in an attempt to fix the issue. Please, restore back to previous days (restore point) where the issue was not present, before the drivers were installed. Here is more info:

>> http://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c03327545

>> https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/4588-system-restore-windows-10-a.html

Let me know how it goes.

[Dent91]

Thank you very much for your suggestion. I tried to do this, but the option was grayed out unfortunately.

Last night I also completely reinstalled windows 10 through their website (the method where no disk is needed etc).

Unfortunately this also did not work; although almost everything was erased, the drivers actually are still there (!).

So much for a hard reset...

So the laptop is now still annoyingly slow. To describe some additional symtoms:

- When I try to watch a video clip NOT in full screen mode, and then try to do anything else like move my cursor or open voulme bar etc the video starts to lag an the sound makes weird stuttering noises. (seems something is wrong with the volume driver as well then)

- Sometimes websites take much longer to load or don't even load at all

- Boot up takes 3x-5x as long

- Browsing etc is just all aroand laggy, opening new tabs lags, typing lags usually etc

Really hope you have some additional suggestions for me, or any idea what might cause it, your help is much appreciated.

Is there some way to REALLY put a clean version of windows on it without drivers etc?

Kind regards,

Dent91

[IT_WinSec]

Hello @Dent91

Yes, you can make a clean installation of Windows, the so called vanilla installation which is the default Windows 10 installation for Home or Pro edition. It includes Microsoft drivers only, drivers built-into the Windows. However, after installation and with active Internet access, Windows 10 may automatically update your drivers to ones it finds appropriate/best to use.

However, if you don't install HP Support Assistant (HPSA), those drivers you write about will not be deployed.

Here is some general info about drivers and driver installation/updates - in Windows 10 :

>>1>> http://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c03330139

>>2>> http://www.howtogeek.com/98465/htg-explains-when-do-you-need-to-update-your-drivers/

Here are instructions how to clean install/reinstall Windows 10:

Video reference >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAvFm52IjI4

Windows reinstallation / clean installation :

- You can directly download Windows 10 ISO from MS site or download >> Media creation tool from Microsoft site, create installation DVD or installation USB  and  proceed with clean installation/reinstallation.

Download:

>> https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10ISO

Make sure you select the proper version (64 bit / Home or Pro) if asked.

Media Creation tool will always provide you with the latest Windows version/build - now 1709 Fall Creators Update.

- When download completes, you will need to write  the ISO image and boot from a bootable media. You will need a blank USB pendrive (min 4 GB capacity). Use the Media Creation tool.

When ready with the USB drive or with the DVD:

Please, shutdown the computer using the power button.

Insert the Windows USB thumdrive prepared previously

Power on the PC.

As soon as you press the power-on button, start hitting the Esc button repeatedly (like tap-tap-tap).

This should open a HP Startup Menu

Choose F9 to open Boot options. Select the USB thumb drive as a boot option.

- Follow the on-screen instructions to install Windows 10. Perform clean installation/custom installation (not repair).

Delete all existing partitions and install Windows on Disc 0 Unallocated space

- After successful Windows installation, install drivers taken from HP web site or via Windows Update/Device Manager >> http://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c03330139

- Make sure Windows is Activated by going to Start > Settings > Update & Security > Windows Activation

- You might want to stop some of the Windows Telemetry by using free tools such as Spybot AntiBeacon or DWS Lite

Hope this helps. Let me know how it goes

[Dent91]

Thank you very much for your suggestion.

I completly reinstalled windows 10 from a USB flash drive, and then deleted the old version. 

This solved the issue, and my laptop was very fast again.

However, one day later, I start up my laptop and it is slow once again. I did not install HPSA or download anything else, but it looks like my computer downloaded old drivers all by itself. Evidence for this is that I currenlty have AMD Radeon software on my laptop (which I did not intall myself). I got this sofware for the first time AFTER I installed the driver package that caused all this trouble to begin with.

Do you have any advice on how to avoid this? I am thinking to somehow reinstall windows again, disable internet and then cherry pick the drivers that are absolutely nessecary afterwards?

Thank you for your help.

Dent91

[IT_WinSec]

Hi @Dent91

Which Windows 10 edition you use - is it Home or Pro ?

You can see it in Control Panel -> System

Yes, Windows 10 can automatically update itself with drivers, updates, anything from Microsoft as long as Windows Updates are running - and by default they are configured this way.

Can you try to uninstall AMD software from Control Panel -> Programs and features and see if this will make any difference ?

Based on your reply, I will guide you how can try to fix the issue

If you want to avoid reinstall Windows again, just try using System Restore in attempt to "turn back time". Restore back to before Windows 10 update itself with the drivers :

>> https://support.hp.com/bg-en/document/c03327545

AFTER reinstalling Windows OR AFTER using System Restore:

1. You should disable automatic Windows 10 driver updates - from Control Panel > System > Advanced System Protection > "Hardware". Here are details >> https://www.laptopmag.com/articles/disable-automatic-driver-downloads-on-windows-10

2. Stop Windows Updates by using this tool >> http://www.novirusthanks.org/products/win-update-stop/

Hopefully, this way it will not update itself automatically.

If you use Windows 10 Pro, you have more official choices of controllong what comes in.

[swwillia50]

Did this work for you?  I am having the exact same issue! I haven't been able to isolcate the specific driver or update that is causing the problem.  I have done a clean windows 10 install on this 745 G4 three times now. 

[Dent91]

Thank you very much for the suggestion. I reinstalled windows 10 (pro) once again because restore option was not available (I created a restore point directly after installation this time). The laptop was fast again like before.

I blocked internet, disabled automatic driver update as per your suggestion and disabled automatic windows update as per: https://www.easeus.com/todo-backup-resource/how-to-stop-windows-10-from-automatically-update.html (solution 2). Then I turned on internet.

It then started to once again reinstall old drivers, including the once that were in the package that seemingly messed it up. However, my laptop did not become slow again so far!! (2 days). This seems to indicate that it is not a driver problem but some windows update thing that was present in the package.

So far so good. Thank you very much for your help. Swwillia50, hope this works for you too, let us know how it goes!

Kind regards
Dent91

[IT_WinSec]

Thank you for your update. I am glad it works for you. Hope the problem doesn't return.

[ebri_85]

Hello

Let me say, I has the same problem, reinstalled several times my laptop, but the problem is not the pc, is the Windows, I install an older version of Windows 10 and now the pc is running without problem. I Deactivated Windows Update trough gpedit, and the pc is working great!... i'm going to wait some time to try with other released of W10.

Right now i'm using this version> Windows 10 Enterprise 64-bit (10.0, Build 10240)


the problem was with these other version (Windows 10 (business editions), version 1803 (Updated Jul 2018) (x64)), i don't try with other version previous this one.
Some problems I verified, was the the procesor was at 70% or more almost all the time and memory no, always at 20% a litle bit more but never on red, the browser was working very slow and presenting "script slow error", and when I try to change to different apps the computer freeze, something in these released is not working fine with the AMD procesor, with Intel no problem, I made the test with an Elitebook 840g1 8gb ram and works fine.


May be this reply can be usefull to somebody else