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Question from Judy:  Late last year I decided that I needed a new laptop and since it was to be used for work I wanted one that was really fast.

Based upon the recommendation of a friend I ended up buying a Dell with an Intel Core i7 CPU, 16GB of RAM and a 1GB hard drive.

For a couple of months the new laptop was lightning fast, but then it slowed down to a crawl. And it happened virtually overnight.

I just turned it on one morning and it took forever to boot up and the hard drive seemed to be working itself to death.

I think it might have caught a virus but I can’t get Norton to load so I can run a check.

I’ve never dropped this laptop and I’m pretty sure it hasn’t been damaged by a power surge because I only use it on battery power since I’m always on the move when I’m working. I also plug it into a surge protector when I charge the battery overnight.

What do you think could be causing this? If it’s a bad hard drive or some other hardware problem I need to get it fixed before the warranty runs out in September.

If it’s a virus how can I get rid of it when Norton won’t load?

Rick’s answer:  [Read more…]