It is an old laptop and has only 125GB of SSD which I use for OS and some productivity software and as we all know Windows needs empty drive space to function. If I have less then 25 GB of available space on my OS drive it slows right down. Laptop came with 1TB of HD which I don’t use anymore, so it was just cost effective.
I though that adding better components would help as well. However, it seems like the way Daedalus is designed it doesn’t really take full advantage of top of the line hardware. I tested the same wallet on 32 GB ram machine with twice as many CPU cores and faster internet connection and results were about the same. I think the way it replays the ledger is just streamlined somehow. Note: This is just my best guess, I don’t actually know why. Also, I may be overlooking something and others could have different experiences then this. 
I was referring to wallet + full node specifically (not as a separate node function). Full node wallets (such a Daedalus) are responsible for posting and/or retrying transactions. In times of high volume and network congestion full node wallets will have to resubmit failed transactions. Light wallets, that share a node (and other resources) will obviously have to drop some transactions. So full node wallets will be holding that “back pressure” for the network as transactions clear up. There was a really good network diagram that showed back pressure, not sure where it was posted. However, here is a quote from IOHK article discussing the same thing.
" Wallets
Wallets act on behalf of end-users to submit payments and other transactions to the blockchain, and to track the blockchain status. One of the key services that a wallet provides is to submit transactions on the user’s behalf, confirm that they have been accepted onto the blockchain, and retry them on their behalf if the submission has not succeeded. That is, the wallet should take into account the effects of backpressure in the network as it becomes saturated, as well as other network effects (temporary disconnection, possible chain forks, etc). Wallets may be either:
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Full-node wallets (as Daedalus), which use local computing and network resources to run a node that connects directly to the Cardano network.
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Light wallets: these, in contrast, use shared computing and networking resources to serve a number of end users.
During periods of high demand (e.g., an NFT sale), both types of wallets may need to retry transactions. Since they share resources among many users, light wallets may need to temporarily scale the available computing and networking resources (including replicating endpoints) to ensure that user demand can be met. This demand-scaling is similar to the requirements that are placed when a company releases a popular new product, for example. In contrast, full node wallets may be essentially unaffected. Transactions may be slightly delayed, but each wallet will have the dedicated resources that are needed to retry the submission, including its own network connections. Similar principles apply to DApp providers – where specific network endpoints are provided, the system resources should be scaled to meet the demand."
Source:
https://iohk.io/en/blog/posts/2021/10/21/cardano-robust-resilient-and-flexible/
I wasn’t talking about network failure. I was referring to loosing access to ones ADA due to centralized light wallet node. Existence of full node wallets is the last bastion of " Be your own bank" philosophy. There always has to be full node wallet accessible (even if it’s not the most user friendly experience) to anyone who wants to use one, otherwise the network will slowly become centralized.
Anyone using and upkeeping their full node wallet is helping the network. Dismissing the positive effects of one individual using a full node wallet as diminutive is counter productive to health of the network. The positive effects are aggregate of many people using it and such diversification strengthens the health of the network. We can’t have everyone (except SPOs and Devs) just blindly download something like Meta Mask and hope it will be fine.
Lets give those “average users” all options available, so they can choose not be “average” if they don’t want to. 