If none of the above suggestions speeds up your computer to a level that you're happy with, you can try reducing animations, changing themes and toggling other Windows 10-specific settings. This gives your computer a chance to clear out memory and start fresh the next time it's turned on.

Regularly turn off your computer. Don't just restart it, but completely power it off and walk away for a few minutes.

If you aren't comfortable testing your hard drive, take your computer to a technician who can properly diagnose the issue and, if required, upgrade your storage.

It's a free app that quickly scans your drives and tells you their current health status. I use CrystalDisk Info (Standard Edition) to get basic insights into my drives. If your hard drive or SSD is running out of space or is getting old, it could be failing.

Check available storage space and hard drive health.

Pause OneDrive by clicking on the OneDrive icon in the notification tray, select More and then Pause syncing. This is something even Microsoft admits can slow down your computer. Usually, you can completely close apps that keep running with a right-click on the app icon and select quit or exit. When you close some apps, such as Slack, they keep running in the background.

Close running apps when you're done. Make sure they're not running in the notification tray (next to the volume and Wi-Fi indicators).Below are some steps to take that should, at the very least, temporarily speed up your slow computer:

There's a wide range of methods available for troubleshooting and speeding up your PC. Jason Cipriani/CNET Battle-tested solutions Pausing OneDrive sync can speed up your PC.

Speed up computer