My Computer Is Running Slow Windows 8.1

I bought this on the recommendation of Thom Hogan's public wish list on B&H in which he suggests the Sony G series XQD cards for use with the Nikon D500. It works well with that camera and has been 100% reliable. I have not experienced any issues of the kind reported with other brands/types of XQD cards. I like the fact that the card came with an XQD card reader, -so you know that you have a reader that works with this type of card. The reader is USB 3.0 and comes in the form of a wide dongle that can plug directly into your computer's or laptop's USB port. But it also comes with a 1 foot USB 3.0 extension cord that you can use between the reader and your computer, which is a nice touch. The reader comes with a snap-on plastic cover for its USB connector. The only complaint I have about the reader is that it doesn't have an activity LED, but this is not a big deal. The inclusion of a card reader also saved me some money as otherwise I would have had to buy one separately. A note on the kinds of transfer speeds you may get between the reader and your computer over USB 3.0: The read speeds appear to be OS dependent. I can boot Windows 7 SP1, 8.1, and 10 on the same computer. Under Win 7 I only get read speeds of around 140 to 150 MB/second. Not sluggish, but not particularly fast either. Windows 8.1 is the speed champion at around 230 - 235 MB/second. Win 10 is a little slower at around 220 MB/sec. I've confirmed the Windows 8.1 read speed on my laptop, which only has 8.1 installed. My theory is that the USB storage driver for Windows 7 is not optimized for this kind of reader and media, while the driver for the later versions of Windows is. As always, your mileage may vary....

[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] My laptop was running pretty slow. Did some research on what I could do without getting a new computer and found I could use a SSD to improve performance. Followed an online guide on how to clone my hard drive to it. It was decently easy for me and I'm by no means a computer guru. I'm running about 3x faster. Glad I did it.

Blazing fast My windows 8.1 loads in 5 sec, restart is like 2 sec. If you are thinking about getting this item GO FOR IT. This is really fast.

I use windows 8.1 quite often. On this mac, all drives (except the internal flash drive) are external. Windows runs great off Thunderbolt connected drives. You can have multiple window drives and select the one you want on boot by holding down the option key.

Little challenge to get up and running on Win 8.1, but when it got up and running - Preforms just like i thought it would.

We loaded pictures and all personal files to unload a computer that was running slow. The has given my computer a new life.

If you have a computer running Windows on a legacy hard disk, you really have to upgrade. It saved me from having to buy a new computer.

This is an internal drive, plain and simple. Starts up fast, extra thin (half the thickness of a normal 3.5 drive), runs cool (thinness allows for more heat dissapation). But... I had bought this to put in an external USB 3.0 enclosure to use with my Dell XPS 8700 which has Windows 8.1. Unfortunately, after hooking it up, it would perpetually disconnect itself during file transfers, especially with files upwards of 1gb. Thinking the drive was defective, I took the internal drive of my Dell, which was the same brand, model and capacity, and put that into the enclosure. Same disconnects occurred. Then I replaced the cable between the drive and computer with a USB 2.0 cable, and the disconnects stopped, although file transfers took 10x longer. This proved that the drives were fine, but they did not work in a USB 3.0 enclosure. I could live with that, until... After a week or so, my computer developed the same symptoms (constant disconnects) for other USB storage devices. Since it was USB 3.0, I blamed the USB 3.0 drivers which Windows 8.1 seems to have implemented so poorly. BUT THEN I STARTED GETTING READ ERRORS ON MY SYTEM DRIVE. I could not back up files without drives disconnecting every few seconds. In short, THIS HAD SCREWED UP MY OPERATING SYSTEM. After a complete reinstall of Windows, everything was back to normal and all my drives (except the Barracuda in external enclosure) could read and write properly. The next day I bought a WD Black and put that in the enclosure... BOOM ... 100gb of files transferred seamlessly. So, to summarize... DO NOT PUT THIS DRIVE IN A USB 3.0 ENCLOSURE OR IT WILL WRECK THE WINDOWS 8.1 OPERATING SYSTEM. 1 month of my life wasted, I can't return the drive since it isn't actually defective, thought I'd at least write about my experience.

Ordered this computer to replace a 27” iMac that was dated and running slow. It was a breeze to transfer all my files and all of them worked seamlessly with the new m3 chip. I am amazed at the speed including the start up of this machine. Even though the screen is 3” smaller than my former iMac it is sufficient for the every task. Highly recommend!

Replaced a hard drive on an Inspiron All-in-One that was running extra slow. It was an easy replacement and the computer is now faster than it was when it was new.