My system is a Toshiba laptop from 2009, not a beefy one as you can imagine:
CPU: 2 GHz
RAM: 4 GB
HDD
It will work, but will always be slow. Unless there's a reason you don't want Electrum, I wouldn't use Bitcoin Core on this hardware.
I have now switched the HDD to an HP Elite 8300 SFF and it seems to be working better:
CPU: 3,4 GHz (boost up to 3,9 GHz I think)
RAM: 16 GB
HDD (same as before)
Do yourself a favor: get an SSD
It's the best upgrade you can get. In case you already have an SSD and just use the HDD for block storage: move your
chainstate directory to the SSD. It makes all the difference!