Why is My Acer Laptop So Slow and How to Fix it

It may seem a mystery as to why your Acer laptop started slowing down out of nowhere. But only three things can cause a laptop to slow down — hardware, software, and user habits. 

By the end of this guide, you’ll have learned the basics of troubleshooting Acer laptops. And you’ll be able to answer why your Acer laptop is running so slow. 

Then, we’ll discuss quick-and-easy tweaks to restore performance.

Let’s dive in.

8 times out of 10, your laptop’s troubles are related to its hardware

Common Symptoms

Like all electronics, laptops have expiration dates. Check out our guide on how long laptops last for more details.

But the basic idea is this: the closer a laptop gets to that limit, the slower it feels. And there’s little we can do to prevent it.

The age-related slowdowns don’t happen overnight, though. 

If your Acer laptop suddenly feels slow, it likely has nothing to do with its age. 

You may notice:

• It takes forever to boot and lags a lot just after starting up.
• The performance is choppy and inconsistent.
• Apps run slowly, freeze, or crash.
• Overheating or excessive fan noise.

Next up, we will follow these symptoms to their root causes.

Why is My Acer Laptop So Slow

The first question we must answer is what could be slowing down your laptop. Here are the few usual suspects. 

1. Faulty or underperforming Hardware

8 times out of 10, your laptop’s troubles are related to its hardware. So that’s where we’ll begin our investigation. 

Lucky for us, Acer has pre-installed a helpful diagnostics tool in your laptop to test those exact problems.

1. Type “acer care center” in the search box. You can download it from the Acer website if it doesn’t appear.
2. Click the Acer Care Center tile.
3. Click System Checkup to run system checks on hardware components.
4. Click Check Now under the Hard Drive health and Battery health icons.

A battery or hard disk drive in poor health can seriously hurt your laptop’s performance. Unless both results are Good, take note of the underperforming hardware component. 

2. Outdated or Corrupted Software

The second most common culprit behind a slow Acer laptop is software. The software — the installed apps or Windows itself — may be outdated or corrupted. 

Software updates for Windows and its drivers keep everything optimized. So if your updates are lagging behind, your laptop will too.

Secondly, malware may have infected your device, which (depending on the type of malicious software) can bring your system down to its digital knees.

3. Too Many Programs 

This one is self-explanatory. Too many apps, games, and browser extensions will bog down your laptop’s performance. 

The more tabs or applications you have open at any given time, the more strain you put on your laptop’s resources. Use the Task Manager for a detailed report.

1. Look up “task manager” in the search box.
2. Open Task Manager.
3. Under the Process tab, you’ll find how much resources each app is consuming in real-time.
4. Click the Performance tab to view how each hardware component is performing.

4. Insufficient RAM

If you only want your laptop for light web tasks (browsing or emails), you probably don’t need more than 4GB of RAM. 

But anything beyond that, you’ll need a minimum of 8GB of memory. For heavy multitasking users or gaming with Acer, 16GB of RAM is a no-brainer. 

You can find all your RAM-related information on the Acer Care Center dashboard.

5. Insufficient Storage

Our dedicated guide talks about how much storage you need on your laptop. But as a rule of thumb, it shouldn’t be less than 256GB — your laptop will start to feel slower as junk files build up.

You also want to know if your laptop has SSD or HDD storage. HDD is cheaper and slower; SSD is faster and more responsive. You’ll find SSDs in the large majority of modern laptops.

Again, all this information is available at the Acer Care Center.

6. Overheating 

Are the fans in your laptop constantly whirring or rattling? Does it often feel hot (not mildly warm) to the touch? If so, your laptop is overheating.

Overheating slows down your laptop for one simple reason: system throttling. 

Your laptop automatically minimizes CPU/GPU performance until it cools down. 

And it’s a cascading effect. Overheating leads to even more overheating if the hardware isn’t in perfect condition (say, the thermal paste wearing off or the fan vents are clogged).

How to Fix a Slow Acer Laptop

Now that you know what’s troubling your laptop, we can address the problem.

1. Run the Acer Care Center

Acer Care Center has a System Tuneup utility that optimizes your system’s overall performance quickly. It also helps you free up storage.

1. To open the app, type “acer care center” in the search box. You can also download it from the official website if it’s not installed.
2. Open Acer Care Center.
3. Click the System Tuneup tile.
4. Select Delete junk files.
5. Click Clean.

Next, select Startup applications.

1. Disable apps that shouldn’t be loading on start-up using the drop-down menu.

Now select Clean Disk (skip this step if you have plenty of free storage).

1. Click Start Scan.
2. It finds large files you can delete to free up some storage.
3. Delete unnecessary files.

2. Quick Wins

It might sound too good to be true, but a few easy-to-follow steps can dramatically improve your laptop’s performance. Our in-depth guide on speeding up a Windows laptop covers these steps in greater detail.

Quick Win #1 – Reboot your laptop

It seems absurdly simplistic at first, but turning your laptop off and on can actually speed it up, especially if you rarely shut it down.

Quick Win #2 – Debloat Windows

Even a fresh copy of Windows has enough bloat. Telemetry, built-in apps, and a whole lot more are always running in the background. And it all gets in the way, sapping performance.

It’s why tech enthusiast Christ Titus Tech developed a utility to debloat and speed up Windows quickly. His Ultimate Windows Utility lets you tweak and debloat your Windows 11/10 with just one click! 

Install the utility with one command, click the Laptop button, and click Run Tweaks. Your laptop will feel instantly faster.

Quick Win #3 – Clean vents and fans, or use a cooling pad

For an overheating laptop, the easiest fix is to clean the vents and fans. Use a can of compressed air and lint-free cloth to clear up the debris and dust in your laptop’s vents. 

If the issue persists, your laptop may need advanced thermal management from an official technician. In the meantime, you can mitigate the problem with a laptop cooling pad.

3. Free Up Storage Disk

You’ve already cleaned junk files and large files you don’t need. But we can get even more creative to free up extra storage. 

Use Disk Cleanup

1. Search “disk cleanup” in the search box.
2. Select your preferred drive 
3. Click OK.

Move or archive large files 

Transfer non-critical files to the cloud or a removable drive.

Uninstall heavy programs 

Uninstall resource-heavy games or apps you no longer use on your laptop.

4. Run a Virus Scan

If viruses slow down your Acer laptop, running a virus scan should speed it up immediately. Acer recommends using Windows Defender.

1. Search “windows security” in the search box.
2. Open Windows Security.
3. Click Virus & Threat Protection.
4. Click Quick Scan.

Resolve any threats it finds. 

Now click Scan Options. 

1. Select Full Scan.
2. Click Scan Now.

The deep antivirus scan runs in the background and takes over an hour to complete.

5. Update your laptop

Acer Care Center is also an excellent utility for updating drivers and software from official Acer support. 

1. Search “acer care center” in the search box.
2. Click the Acer Care Center tile.
3. Click the Update(s) tile.
4. Click Refresh.
5. Click Update all.

For Windows updates,

1. Search “windows update” in the search box.
2. Open Windows Update.
3. Click Check for updates.

Ideally, Windows Update should read, “You’re up to date”.

6. Upgrade or replace hardware

Unfortunately, there’s not much to be done about underperforming hardware. Except to replace or upgrade it, of course. 

If the Acer Care Center tells you that your HDD is in poor health, consider getting it replaced with an SSD.

The same goes for adding more RAM if you need better multitasking.

FAQs for Slow Acer Laptop

Conclusion

Restoring your Acer laptop’s speed can be simpler than you think. Remembering the trio of suspects — hardware, software, and user habits — will help you identify the culprit. From there, you usually need to perform a few easy-to-follow tweaks and adjustments.

There’s a whole bunch of other tips and tricks for laptops maybe you didn’t know about — that will make your machine the superstar it is.