Winrot

Urban Dictionary defines 'winrot' as: The inevitable creeping, pernicious degradation of the integrity of Windows systems to the point where they run slowly, behave erratically, or stop working altogether.

After working on a number of older PCs for that all exhibited symptoms of poor performance such as long boot times and sluggish application performance, the following question occurred to me:

If the users of these computers were still only doing basic tasks like email, webbrowsing, and word processing, why was a 5 year-old PC no longer adequate for these basic computing tasks when it was perfectly fine 5 years ago?

At first I was at a loss to provide a good answer, but the more I started thinking about it the more I was able to understand the answer to the question. The answer to the question is tied to two related concepts.

The first part of the answer is that a PC is in many ways a blank canvas on which almost anything can be painted. Even after a painting has been completed, one can keep applying paint in small or large amounts, different colors, and at different times. A canvas can have paint applied by different people at different times.

A PC is very much the same: A new PC will have an operating system (Windows) and some number of applications installed such as Word, Excel, Outlook, and Solitaire, for example. But over time this original painting is slowly changed and altered in different ways that are not obvious to many users. These changes are what cause the PC to run more slowly and ultimately the PC becomes inadequate for even basic computing tasks.

The second part of the answer is that because a PC is like a blank canvas, the functions it can perform are almost limitless. Compare this to a toaster or an automobile. A toaster usually just does one thing: it makes toast. As long as the toaster is kept in good repair, it will continue to make toast the same way for years and years. Its goal never changes, and we do not expect it to. An automobile, while complex and expensive, is also a purpose-built machine. It is designed to get you to work, to school, or to the mall and back. Other than needing maintenance parts, fluids, and an occasional wash, the automobile is going to always be the same and it's always going to accomplish the same goal. With the exception of possibly adding a new radio or an air freshener, most people aren't going to expect anything different from their automobile on day 1 as they do day 4000.

A PC, on the other hand, can do whatever you want given the right software and hardware. PCs are designed to be flexible and accommodate a wide variety of hardware and software. If you plug a network interface into a PC then it can talk to other computers. If you install a flight simulator game then you can pretend to fly. If you want to know what the weather is in Florida, you can install an application that will display that in the system tray. You want to print, scan, fax, and copy documents? A PC can assist with that too. In this regard, this flexibility of the blank canvas of a PC is the exact opposite of the purpose-built toaster and automobile. A modern PC is so useful because it can do so much, and the standards set fourth by Windows, Mac, and modern computing hardware allow for this flexibility. In fact, most PC users demand this functionality because they expect that a PC can be made to do different things.

The flexibility of the PC is also its greatest weakness.

How does the flexibility of a modern PC lead to its downfall? The basic answer is that over time, more and more software is piled upon the PC and this slowly increases the computing burden of the PC.

The real trick is understanding how, after a few months or a few years, a PC that was once perfectly fine can be brought to its knees and be rendered inadequate for daily computing tasks. After cleaning up many PCs and putting together a number of new systems, I have compiled a list of what happens to a PC that causes poor performance.

There is generally not one single event or item that brings a PC to its knees. Instead, most PCs have a long list of smaller things that all add up. The problems fall into several basic categories:

  1. Updated versions of existing software
  2. Installation of new hardware
  3. Add-ons installed by other applications
  4. Change of Internet service providers
  5. New software needed to perform new tasks
  6. Software that updates itself automatically
  7. Malicious software
I will address each category, however keep in mind that it is not uncommon for an event or piece of software to fall into multiple categories.

1) Updated versions of existing software

The classic example of an updated version of an existing application is Adobe Acrobat Reader. This is one application that has been used by just about anyone who uses email or the Internet. Most versions of Acrobat Reader will attempt to update themselves automatically. This automatic update feature is not bad on its own. What is bad is that each new version of Acrobat Reader will add new features, new buttons, new commands, and new graphics. This means that each new version is going to require a little bit more computing power from your PC. You may have been using Acrobat Reader version 4 back in 2001 and maybe it used 5 megabytes of RAM. Now, however, on the same PC you're running version 8 and it's using 20 megabytes of RAM. That increase isn't horrible by itself, but remember that these problems are rarely caused by a single issue.

Another kind of software that falls into this category is antivirus software. Each new version packs in more features. In 2001 you only needed to scan the file system for viruses. Now, however, you're also scanning email and you're checking everything for viruses and spyware. Your antivirus program may also bundle in a firewall program and some kind of phishing filter to help prevent attacks from bogus websites. Although the PC was running antivirus software in 2001 and still runs it in 2008, the software is likely doing a whole lot more in 2008. Another point to understand here is that your basic virus scanning application today is just going to be bigger and bulkier than it was in 2001. After all, big companies like Symantec take pride in getting the fastest, latest, and greatest computers for their software developers. These fast machines are great, but they give little incentive to the software writers to create compact and efficient applications.

Another example of this problem is something like Microsoft Office, which includes Word, Excel, and other applications. If you start out with Office 200 but end up with Office 2003 at some point in the future, is the newer version going to be smaller, lighter, more efficient, and offer fewer features? No, of course not. The newer version is going to be larger, slower, less efficient, and offer more features. But does Word, for example, still provide basic word processing functions? Sure, but be aware of the price.

One new phenomenon is that of online applications such as Yahoo mail. Yahoo mail recently introduced a new version that provides an experience more like a traditional email program. It is a good improvement over the old version that looked like a web application, however it imposes a heavy toll on the PC. The lesson here is that web-based applications do not necessarily tread lightly on the computer.

2) Installation of new hardware

While your PC today is doing the same basic computing tasks it was 5 years ago, a typical PC user may add hardware over the years. New hardware such as a digital camera is common, but replacement hardware is also common. Printers typically don't last long and have to be replaced. CD drives tend to wear out after a few years. If a CD drive is dead, it may be more cost effective to replace it with a more fully-featured unit such as a CD or DVD burner. In any case, you're faced with prospect of installing the software that came with the new hardware. This is where the trouble begins. You typically need some amount of software to get the most features of the hardware, and the typical user doesn't have any idea about which specific features are needed or wanted. To make matters worse, if you're replacing something like a printer, who is going to think to first uninstall the software from the old printer? Not most people. At the end of the day you have cluttered your system with new software and it's still loaded down by the old stuff.

3) Add-ons installed by other applications

Every time you install software, you are faced with the potential for extra stuff to be installed, sometimes without your knowledge. Even legitimate applications will clutter your system with needless junk. Again, there is no one single thing here that brings a system to its knees. The problems are caused when you have an accumulated amount of things. So what are things installed by other applications? A typical example of this is when you install, for example, a new application such as Turbotax and you end up with the Google Toolbar installed. And of course you don't just get the Google Toolbar, but you also get the Google Toolbar Updater, which runs quietly in the background, not hurting anything, sucking up a small amount of your computer's resources. In this example you may also get the Turbotax updater which may lurk in the background to check if updates are available. So with the installation of one application, you now have four.

I recently installed a new DVD burner in an older PC for a friend. Even though I selected the advanced installation option in order to avoid ending up with any unwanted junk, I still ended up with some. In this example I ended up with a "Nero search" box on the Task Bar. It took only 3 seconds to remove this, but many PC users aren't going to know how to do this.

One place that add-ins show up is Internet Explorer. This issue is so common that Microsoft added a feature to Internet Explorer (IE) 6 that enables the easy disabling of add-ins. While malicious software commonly hooked itself into IE, legitimate programs also do the same. A typical check of IE will reveal plug-ins from Adobe and Yahoo. As usual, these don't do any harm on their own, but they're not something you'd see on a 5 or 6 y ear-old PC.

4) Change of Internet service providers

Internet service providers often offer their customers software such as antivirus, firewall, or anti-spam applications. Sometimes they offer all three. Or more. Some providers also like for you to install software that helps troubleshoot connection problems. If you change service providers and are faced with the prospect of dropping a new CD-ROM in the drive in order to install the new guys' free software, are you going to remember to remove the old software? If you do remember, are you going to know what specifically you need to remove? Unlikely. The other issue is that do you really need the software you're being offered? Maybe, but not necessarily. Again, at the end of the day, the PC is burdened with more needless stuff.

5) New software needed to perform new tasks

This is a typical situation that most PC owners face, because one of the great things about a PC is the ability to install new applications. When you buy a PC on day one, you might not have any clue about what you'll be doing with it in 5 years. MP3 players such as iPods are a good example. To use an iPod, you typically have to install iTunes. When installing iTunes, you may be asked to install Quicktime. Even if you already have Quicktime you may be asked to install a new version. Suddenly, you're falling down the same hole.

One example that works well here is online games. While one would think that online games don't require that the game software be installed on the PC, there is always some underlying technology that makes the games work. Even a simple online sudoku or solitare game will require Java or Flash in order to operate. Even if your PC already has these installed, it may need a newer version. And with newer versions you are often faced with the add-on applications that check online regularly for updates. Again you're headed down the same path.

A final example of a new application that wasn't common 5 years ago is a data backup application. With the ubiquity of USB-connected external hard drives offering tons of cheap storage space, people have discovered that backing up their data to these is a smart solution. Indeed, many of these drives are bundled with backup software. Uh-oh. More new software. More updates. More stuff running on the PC.

6) Software that updates itself automatically

This topic has been mentioned above, but I include it its own category because this is a very common item to see, and the fact that an application is checking for updates means that it not only has to run all the time but it's also using your Internet connection. One big reason for self-updating software is the prevalence of security bugs in software. If an application can update itself automatically, then the software vendor is more assured that security holes will be patched on users' computers. Yes, it's a good thing to patch security holes, but there is a trade off when your PC is running 3 or 4 different applications all designed to check the Internet at different times for new versions of different applications. As always, there is a trade off.

7) Malicious software

While this is the first thing I check for on a poorly performing PC, I listed it last here because it's the most obvious. It goes without saying that you need to check a system for viruses and malware if it's running poorly. Today, bad software won't necessaily bring a PC to its knees because the people controlling your PC need it to stay running. This means that malware may just carve out a small bit of computing performance like so many other apps.

In summary, an old PC is running slow because it has a large accumulation of software on it, and this burdons the PC greatly so that it runs slowly. The other factor is that while you may be doing basic email, word processing, and Internet browsing on your PC, the software required for those tasks has continued to become more advanced and thus burdon the PC more. So while the activity is the same, the software is not. The software has changed but the PC's hardware, and thus its computing ability, has remained the same. In the end you have an old PC running newer software, and thus a slow experience.

The next logical question is what to do about all of this. Personally, I tend to be a Luddite when it comes to technology because I do not want any extra stuff imposed upon me or my computers. I want each PC to have a long useful life. I believe that software is often written with little regard to efficiency because everyone assumes that PCs will always be faster and have more memory. That may be true, but that doesn't mean I'm buying a new PC every 3 years.

The problem is that the average PC user doesn't have the know-how or experience to spot situations where software is unnecessary and then remove it. There is always a risk of breaking something or losing some functionality that was desired. While a modern PC is fairly resilient to problems, the average user may end up in hot water that only a more experienced user can quickly undo.

My advice? Find someone who knows what they're doing and has been doing it a long time. If you need help, here are some tips:

You can try the tips from this page about Windows XP performance tweaks, but it is targted at technical users.


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