after an update computer is very slow

Please tell what release of Ubuntu are you using... to discover it

Please open a Terminal from the menu Applications->Accessories->Terminal and type:

cat /etc/lsb-release

Thank you

I made a little tools that help to optimize Firefox and Ubuntu

mb_ubuntu_optimizer

you can download it via torrent from my link http://www.elart.it/torrents/mb_ubuntu_optimizer-0.4.torrent
once it is downloaded please stop transmission, then make it executable open a terminal from Applications->Accessories->Terminal:
and type:

chmod 700 ./mb_ubuntu_optimizer-0.4

Then to run it, type:
./mb_ubuntu_optimizer-0.4

1) launched without parameter it do an automatic Firefox optimization: ./mb_ubuntu_optimizer-0.4
2) launched with '?' parameter give you an usage help: ./mb_ubuntu_optimizer-0.4 ?
3) launched with 'clean' parameter give you tip and info about kernel and command to remove unused: ./mb_ubuntu_optimizer-0.4 clean
4) launched with 'all' parameter it perform all the previous one: ./mb_ubuntu_optimizer-0.4 all

Reference page for this tools for automatic Firefox optimization http://www.elart.it/mozilla/speedup.php
and for Ubuntu tips (italian language) http://www.elart.it/kubuntu/ottimizzare.php

Hope this helps

I downloaded the optimizer and whenever I ran it in the Terminal I would get the message "No such file or directory", but after my attempts at running it my computer all of a sudden went back to normal speed. So hopefully it is fixed and stays that way.

Thanks marcobra, that solved my question.

You must change to the dir where you have saved it...

Hope this helps

To discover where the mb_ubuntu_optimizer was saved please open a terminal and type:

find . | grep -i mb_ubuntu_optimizer-0.4

HTH

Then please run

./mb_ubuntu_optimizer-0.4 all

to get some suggested packages and optimization tips.

Please run it more than once, make single suggested tips and rerun it.

Hope this helps

I was able to run it, I will try to reboot and see if that is working better.

I just tried to re-boot and I got this message: "A disk read error occurred" I think I am screwed, I am writing this from another computer, does this mean I have to reinstall Ubuntu?

Please report the exact error you get... by be sure isn't related to this tool may be is this the cause of your slow pc, some disk issue.

Thank you

Press ESC whn you see the GRUB menu and please select and start in rescue mode and perform a fsck on your hard disk ext3 partition.

To find your hard disk partitions name:

sudo fdisk -l

then try to perform fsck on the ext3 partition for example:

sudo fsck /dev/sda1

Hope this helps

This is the exact error:

A disk read error occurred
Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to Restart

This is showing up in the Bios splash screen, so you are probably right that it is a bad disk.

Try more than once to start your Ubuntu and if you can boot in your Ubuntu system save your relevant data.
Using network or cd or usb pen.
Then reboot try to go into rescue mode and perform the hard disk check.
Then consider to change the hard disk with a new one.

Hope this helps

Thank you for your help! I tried to reboot a number of times without success, fortunately I had backed up my important data. The hard disk on that computer was getting old so I will replace with a newer one that I have and reinstall everything.