Does a computer with linux mint get slower over time

Linux Mint
1

Had a client round this morning complaining her linux mint computer was getting slower. Had that experiance with windows but never with mint.

Trouble is this client is an expert ! (Ha ha ha)

Anyway she is going elsewhere as I have not upgraded her computer, she never asked and never brought it round to do. No idea if she has done something or not. Must be at least 5 years since I installed it.

Dont mind looking clients like this, its just for my own knowledge I ask.

If ste has done updates as instructed from the update gui it does clean up automatically its self

2

Many things are possible

  • the disk is filling up
  • the user is looking at more complex websites
  • the computer is getting old for modern operating systems
  • there are daemons running that are not needed
  • hardware has been added
  • one rogue application is consuming resources
  • the screen is full of junk … every icon uses resources
  • the disk is failing
  • there are memory faults
  • the network interface or its drivers are flakey
  • the owner is getting more impatient
  • the power supply is marginal
  • it has malware
3

To be honest, I never experienced any of the problems with Linux Mint I had with Windows.

Windows would eventually mysteriously get slower and slower as time passed. I have yet to experience this with any Linux distribution.

That being said, KDE/Plasma, while very customizable, is not particularly known for its stability. In the performance area I have been mystified by some of its behavior as well.

Mind, it’s been a while since I last tried Plasma, but I still have a bad taste of it in my mouth.

4

Mt wife is the expert of how to keep Windows from slowing down.

Delete all files in the download area and dump the trash bin.

5

I blame her…

Last year she swapped printers, because it stopped working, her real computer expert (because he sells new computers and printers with windows) sold her a new one because the old one did not work with linux, although it had been for over 4 years, I claimed the old one, put a new cartridge in and its been with another linux client for the last 2 months no problem.

Neither have I

But I take on board what Neville says tye computer issues over 10 years old came with windows 7 then upgraded (???) To windows 8, finally I upgraded it with more memory to linux mint.