10 Simple Ways To Speed Up Your Computer

There’s nothing more frustrating than a slow PC grinding its cogs while you wait to check your bank balance before you leave for work in the morning. Clicking Internet Explorer and waiting 30 seconds for the application to load begs for justification as to why you spent $400 on that computer in the first place – wouldn’t it be quicker to just drive to the bank? It could certainly be less stressful.

There is an epidemic of slow computer syndrome, it’s caused primarily by the constant bulky packages we install as consumers. Buy a printer, install the drivers – and the boat load of sofware that comes with it. Even Windows is bloated full of useful tools that you’ll probably never use.

So I want to focus on how to speed up your machine, or rather stop it from running so slowly. We’ll be looking at how you can reduce your computer’s work load, and give your computer more resources to help it better manage the work load it has.

1. Defragment Hard Disks

This should be part of some kind of monthly maintenance. Running deframentation on your hard disks can be done every night, every week or every month – the more frequently you run it, the less time the process will take to complete. Disks ‘naturally’ fragment, and fragmentation causes slower disk access. You can defragment your disks easily.

1. Click Start.
2. Click All Programs.
3. Click Accessories.
4. Click System Tools.
5. Click Disk Defragmenter.
6. In Windows XP, click the C: drive and click ‘Defragment’.
   In Windows Vista, you can check ‘Run on a schedule’ to schedule the defragmentation process. Alternatively you can just click ‘Defragment now’ if you’d like to run the process manually.

2. Tidy Startup Menu

Your startup menu is a folder with shortcuts to applications that Windows loads when it starts up. Often, none of these applications are actually required and can be started manually by loading them from the Start menu. You can delete applications from the Startup folder easily:

1. Click Start.
2. Click All Programs.
3. Click Startup.
4. Right click the application you want to prevent from loading at startup, and click delete. Confirm deletion if prompted.
5. Sometimes the start menu will close after this operation, you can repeat from step 1 to delete other applications from the Startup folder.

3. Use MSCONFIG to disable hidden startup applications.

Windows has a list of applications that load at startup that isn’t readily available, you can use the MSCONFIG tool to disable these applications.

1. Hold down the Windows key and hit R. This should bring up the ‘Run’ prompt, if this doesn’t work then click Start and press Run.
2. Type MSCONFIG, and click OK.
3. Along the tabs at the top of the window, select Startup.
4. In this list, applications that are ticked will load at startup. To prevent an application from loading, simply untick it.
5. If you’re not sure what an application is, Google the name of the application. Google will usually come up with information on the application in its results where other people have disabled it.
6. If you have any problems, you can repeat the process and tick the applications to re-enable them.

If Windows doesn’t have enough disk space, your computer will grind to a halt. A simple way gain space is to use the Disk Cleanup utility.

1. Click Start.
2. Click All Programs.
3. Click Accessories.
4. Click System Tools.
5. Click Disk Cleanup.
6. When the Disk Cleanup window appears, you’ll see that it has provided an overview of the space it’s going to restore and which files will be deleted. None of these files should be any of your personal data. But just in case, you can untick anything you’re paranoid about.
7. When you’re ready click OK.
8. When prompted to confirm that you want to delete the files, click Yes.

5. Clean & Maintain Your PC With Anti-Virus Software

There are many products out there, some well known products would include Norton 360 and McAfee Internet Security. But you don’t have to spend a fortune to be well protected, there are other products out there that are offered to home users for free. Grisoft’s AVG is one such example, and comes highly recommended. To download the free edition of AVG, go to free.grisoft.com.

• You should run a virus scan with your anti-virus software to kill any infections.
• It’s also important to keep anti-virus software installed at all times, this unfortunately can slow your computer down which is the opposite of what we’re trying to achieve – but a virus would also slow your computer down and put your privacy at risk. Unless you know exactly what you’re doing, there is always the risk of infection.

6. Use Third-Party Internet Browsers

Windows comes with Internet Explorer, but you don’t have to use it. Using another browser such as FireFox or Google Chrome reduces the risk of infections because they are either 1) more secure or 2) not as targeted as defacto IE.

• I recently reviewed Google Chrome praising it for its speed and smart design – you can download it at www.google.com/chrome.
• FireFox is available from www.mozilla.com/firefox.
• Other browsers include Safari, Opera, Avant and others. No doubt I’ve missed some.

7. Shut Down Applications You’re Not Using

Just like chucking stuff out of the trunk of your car to get better mileage, shutting down applications lightens the load on your PC and helps it run smoother. If you’re not using that messenger, MS Word or any other application you have open, close it.

• Closing an application removes its footprint in memory which allows other applications to make use of that memory.
• It also frees up processing time that would have otherwise been spent processing an application that is idle.

8. Use Vista’s ReadyBoost Feature

This is for Vista users only –  there is a great feature called ReadyBoost. Buy yourself a decent USB flash stick and Vista should prompt you allowing you to use it to speed up your computer.

• ReadyBoost makes use of the space on your USB flash stick by storing frequently accessed applications there. Flash memory is much quicker than your hard disk because it has no moving parts.
• ReadyBoost can make your computer start up quicker.

 
9. Update Your Drivers

A driver is an instruction set for your computer’s hardware. Anything you buy will have drivers, sometimes the drivers are built in to Windows, but usually you’ll find an installation disc that installs the drivers for you.

Sometimes, the drivers for the basic devices in the computer such as the graphics card aren’t installed or are damaged, this causes Windows to revert to a generic driver. The generic driver doesn’t take advantage of the graphics card features because it was built specifically for compatibility.

• Check your manufacturer’s website for the latest drivers for your PC.
• Running Windows Update at www.windowsupdate.com sometimes allows you to download the latest drivers.

10. Upgrade Your RAM

Your computer has two types of memory – storage memory, and temporary memory. The storage memory is your hard disk. The temporary memory is called RAM, which stands for Random Access Memory. Adding more RAM is like giving your computer a bigger work surface, it allows it to do more at the same time without having to shuffle through everything.

RAM is cheap these days, and finding the right RAM for your computer is straight forward.

• You can contact your manufacturer for a RAM upgrade.
• CRUCIAL provide a tool called the memory advisor which will ask you questions about your computer to find the right type of RAM. You can use the tool by clicking here.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 1st, 2008 at 6:37 am and is filed under Computer Help. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.