I can't believe the sheer incompetence of good ol' Microsloth. In their infinite wisdom the patch that was supposed to mitigate the Meltdown security problem has made things even worse if you're running Windows 7.
Windows 7: To patch or not to patch
Scroll down a bit to read the article I'm referring to. These people are like meteorologists -- they only need to be right half the time to make a six figure income.