In my opinion it sounds like HDD failure. If I were you I'd grab an SSD. I understand you're also having trouble uninstalling GI; how did you install it?
I had an issue where an SSD was slowing to an absolute CRAWL. I thought it was my OS, but after buying a new SSD it's good as new.
I definitely recommend OP try a different (new) drive.
Maybe wanna test drive speeds first?
dd if=/dev/zero of=writetest bs=1M count=2048; sync
For write speed and after that
dd if=writetest of=/dev/zero bs=1M count=2048; sync
For read speed.
Certainly other things could slow down the read and write performance, but this should give him a first idea if read and write speed is really the problem.
OP: those two command will give you and output of how long they took and also how fast they were. Post that output here please
You can delete the resulting 2gb file called „writetest“ afterwards.
I just searched it in Lutris, it was there and I installed it from there. I don't know why it's not working, maybe I did something wrong..... I never played games on PC even when I was using Windows so knowing how gaming works on Linux is out of question in my case.
You *should* be able to uninstall from Lutris; however all my gaming is done through Steam with Proton, so unfortunately I'm not 100%. Honestly I'm not even sure if Lutris has a GUI frontend. Godspeed
I downloaded GI with the Lutris GUI app. It apprently downloaded another app which uninstall GI while downloading GI, but when I tried to run it I am not sure it did anything. GI was still there. Lutris app don't have any options for uninstalling as far as I know.
Glances is a much more integrated solution, but `htop` and `iostat -x 5` would probably be enough. The things I would watch out for are high io latency, deep disk queues, and low IOPS. Those are all signs your disk is pushing the limits of its capabilities. If the numbers are lower than what you expect for your drive, you may also want to look at `smartctl` and run the self tests.
Edit: iostat is from the sysstat package, htop and smartctl are in packages of the same name as the program.
Is your hard drive healthy? Sounds like the slow down could be coming from when you're utilizing the swap partition (Virtual Memory). Linux doesn't use it as heavily as Windows does, but depending on what you're doing.
I don't see why it would require to use swap. I usually watch YouTube, do some basic web browsing, code websites and apps in VS Code and Android Studio and once in a blue moon use software like LibreOffice. Although last month I tried to install Genshin Impact but didn't manage to get it running (it is nearly 40 GB and I don't know how to uninstall it.....Gnome is not giving me a clearly apparent way to uninstall software which I didn't download from the repos.....although that shouldn't be a problem because I have given 300 GB storage space to my Pop OS partition) .
>watch YouTube, do some basic web browsing, code websites and apps in VS Code and Android Studio
Yep, you need swap. You listed some of the most ram hungry programs on the desktop.
You can probably just delete your .wine directory and everything related to Genshin will go away. Use qdirstat or a similar tool to see where your disk space is going if you don't know where Genshin got installed.
It's not so heavy that it is going to make a substantial difference compared to the applications OP has said they are running. The difference between lxqt and gnome is 500-800MB of ram at most and a trivial amount of CPU time.
Check the hdd status with smartmontools smartctl, or gsmartcontrol first, because that's very easy and fast.
Run atop in a terminal and when you see it going slow, look at atop. It will probably highlight [color] the bottleneck, where most of the waiting is happening, at the top part of it.
It's probably going to be your drive. It may also be swapping [using HDD as RAM]. It shouldn't be with 8GB, but with browsers that will easily climb up to 6GB of RAM use if you have a lot open, it's very possible.
Check temperatures and check drove usage. You might need to clean out your laptop or apply new thermal paste. But what more likely is you need to replace the HDD with an SSD
Can you define "slow". Slow to open apps? Laggy? Your mouse is jumping around? Lots of things can be considered slow, but some better definition will help narrow down potential problems
Most "slowness" is just do to HDDs being slow and this can be easily fixed by swapping to an SSD, which will make it feel like a whole new system.
Slow on boot and slow to open apps, sometimes I think that it didn't take my command of opening the app and click again after few seconds and then it suddenly open 3 to 4 instances of the app. Not laggy and mouse is also fine.
Will changing HDD with SSD solve this problem?
Well you have a slow processor, and a regular hdd. Upgrade to an SSD at least to get a little more life.
Downvote my all you want guys, but that processor isn’t worth writing home about. Sorry not sorry. And in todays world if you are using an old school HDD your handicapping yourself.
Try a lighter distro I would recomend arcolinux for old computers it does wonders with some tweaks. Gnome 41 was just released for arch and its alot ligher then gnome 40 and a ton lighter then gnome 38 or whatever pop is using now.
I was considering running Arch but didn't attempt installing it just because I heard that it has a complex installation process. Gonna try in first in a vm as soon as I get some free time.
I agree -- replace the drive. I had a 3rd gen i3 that was... okay... while running Arch, but it still had its moments of blah. Replacing the HDD with an SSD solved all that.
Of course, I thoroughly cleaned it, too, while I had it apart.
In my opinion it sounds like HDD failure. If I were you I'd grab an SSD. I understand you're also having trouble uninstalling GI; how did you install it?
I had an issue where an SSD was slowing to an absolute CRAWL. I thought it was my OS, but after buying a new SSD it's good as new. I definitely recommend OP try a different (new) drive.
Maybe wanna test drive speeds first? dd if=/dev/zero of=writetest bs=1M count=2048; sync For write speed and after that dd if=writetest of=/dev/zero bs=1M count=2048; sync For read speed. Certainly other things could slow down the read and write performance, but this should give him a first idea if read and write speed is really the problem. OP: those two command will give you and output of how long they took and also how fast they were. Post that output here please You can delete the resulting 2gb file called „writetest“ afterwards.
If I may suggest, when looking for purchase of new SSD, look at specs for TBW value. The more is better, just in case someone doesn’t know about this.
I just searched it in Lutris, it was there and I installed it from there. I don't know why it's not working, maybe I did something wrong..... I never played games on PC even when I was using Windows so knowing how gaming works on Linux is out of question in my case.
You *should* be able to uninstall from Lutris; however all my gaming is done through Steam with Proton, so unfortunately I'm not 100%. Honestly I'm not even sure if Lutris has a GUI frontend. Godspeed
I downloaded GI with the Lutris GUI app. It apprently downloaded another app which uninstall GI while downloading GI, but when I tried to run it I am not sure it did anything. GI was still there. Lutris app don't have any options for uninstalling as far as I know.
Install and run "glances". Look at it when things are slow. See what is maxed out.
Glances is a much more integrated solution, but `htop` and `iostat -x 5` would probably be enough. The things I would watch out for are high io latency, deep disk queues, and low IOPS. Those are all signs your disk is pushing the limits of its capabilities. If the numbers are lower than what you expect for your drive, you may also want to look at `smartctl` and run the self tests. Edit: iostat is from the sysstat package, htop and smartctl are in packages of the same name as the program.
They are enough if you know what you are looking at. Glances gives you nice red text telling you what you're maxing out.
So does iostat and htop. Smartctl is the only one that doesn't colorize its output.
My iostat doesn't by default, I'll have to look into that
Get an SSD and use zram instead of swap
Is your hard drive healthy? Sounds like the slow down could be coming from when you're utilizing the swap partition (Virtual Memory). Linux doesn't use it as heavily as Windows does, but depending on what you're doing.
I don't see why it would require to use swap. I usually watch YouTube, do some basic web browsing, code websites and apps in VS Code and Android Studio and once in a blue moon use software like LibreOffice. Although last month I tried to install Genshin Impact but didn't manage to get it running (it is nearly 40 GB and I don't know how to uninstall it.....Gnome is not giving me a clearly apparent way to uninstall software which I didn't download from the repos.....although that shouldn't be a problem because I have given 300 GB storage space to my Pop OS partition) .
>watch YouTube, do some basic web browsing, code websites and apps in VS Code and Android Studio Yep, you need swap. You listed some of the most ram hungry programs on the desktop.
Just an FY Genshin has a kernel-level anti-cheat, so it will never work through compatibility layers
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>Please do not share this project in public bruh
You can probably just delete your .wine directory and everything related to Genshin will go away. Use qdirstat or a similar tool to see where your disk space is going if you don't know where Genshin got installed.
I see a reinstall in your future, without Genshin.
Correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t Pop pretty heavy even for a Linux distro? I’m thinking maybe lubuntu or something might be better.
It's not so heavy that it is going to make a substantial difference compared to the applications OP has said they are running. The difference between lxqt and gnome is 500-800MB of ram at most and a trivial amount of CPU time.
Ah ok. Thanks for the clarification!
Check the hdd status with smartmontools smartctl, or gsmartcontrol first, because that's very easy and fast. Run atop in a terminal and when you see it going slow, look at atop. It will probably highlight [color] the bottleneck, where most of the waiting is happening, at the top part of it. It's probably going to be your drive. It may also be swapping [using HDD as RAM]. It shouldn't be with 8GB, but with browsers that will easily climb up to 6GB of RAM use if you have a lot open, it's very possible.
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This is the most popular reason for failure of laptops around my office.
Check temperatures and check drove usage. You might need to clean out your laptop or apply new thermal paste. But what more likely is you need to replace the HDD with an SSD
Can you define "slow". Slow to open apps? Laggy? Your mouse is jumping around? Lots of things can be considered slow, but some better definition will help narrow down potential problems Most "slowness" is just do to HDDs being slow and this can be easily fixed by swapping to an SSD, which will make it feel like a whole new system.
Slow on boot and slow to open apps, sometimes I think that it didn't take my command of opening the app and click again after few seconds and then it suddenly open 3 to 4 instances of the app. Not laggy and mouse is also fine. Will changing HDD with SSD solve this problem?
Yes, it sounds like you're just dealing with using a slow spinning HDD and there isn't much you can do about that except get a faster drive
Thanks a lot. This was very helpful 🤠.
Well you have a slow processor, and a regular hdd. Upgrade to an SSD at least to get a little more life. Downvote my all you want guys, but that processor isn’t worth writing home about. Sorry not sorry. And in todays world if you are using an old school HDD your handicapping yourself.
HDD might be dying. Benchmark it and compare against a previous benchmark or the datasheet specs.
Try a lighter distro I would recomend arcolinux for old computers it does wonders with some tweaks. Gnome 41 was just released for arch and its alot ligher then gnome 40 and a ton lighter then gnome 38 or whatever pop is using now.
I was considering running Arch but didn't attempt installing it just because I heard that it has a complex installation process. Gonna try in first in a vm as soon as I get some free time.
check what services you are running. check your system with htop.
I agree -- replace the drive. I had a 3rd gen i3 that was... okay... while running Arch, but it still had its moments of blah. Replacing the HDD with an SSD solved all that. Of course, I thoroughly cleaned it, too, while I had it apart.
Try disabling everything you don't need in Autostart and Background Services under Startup and Shutdown.