16 Comments »

• Suffice says:

  September 28, 2009 at 3:45 am

  The following is a list of ways you can improve your computer’s performance. These steps are intended to be used in order. The key is to do the simplest and least invasive thing first until your system starts responding better.
  1. Make Sure Your Hardware is Sufficient. 2. Clean Your Desktop.3. Scan Your Windows System for Errors.4. Scan for Viruses, Spyware and Adware.5. Uninstall Unused Programs.6. Adjust Visual Effects for Better Performance.7. Don’t Automatically Start Programs.8. Defragment Your Hard Drive (After you have tried everything else).
  Important Note: Before you even try this, backup all your work onto a different computer, hard drive, CD or disk. Also, you should only do this if you have a reliable source of power for your computer. Doing this when there is a brown out or power problem in the neighborhood, is not a good idea. If a computer turns off while it is defragmenting a drive, it will create more problems than not defragmenting it in the first place.
• ej105 says:

  September 28, 2009 at 4:07 am

  You can get rid of your special effects which should help your computer a lot
  -go to my computer
  -right click somewhere and go to properties
  -then under advanced go to performance settings
  -uncheck everything except background and drop shadows
  http://codebetter.com/blogs/darrell.norton/archive/2005/01/28/48720.aspx
  This is also very useful for speeding up firefox even faster
• Fish says:

  September 28, 2009 at 4:37 am

  just you to know, upgrade the ram may not speed ur pc up.
  For running slow there are many causes:
  Microsoft Registry Problems = Slow Computer!
  Spyware/Adware
  RAM
  De-Fragmenting
  Etc.
  Below can help you speed up your pc:
  Manage your startup:
  Open your Start menu -> Click Run -> In the command screen type “msconfig.exe” -> In the “system configuration utility”, click either “service” or “startup” tab -> Uncheck all programs that your are no longer using.
  De-Fragmenting
  1. Right click of C Disk.
  2. Click properties.
  3. Click tools tab.
  4. Click “Defragment now”.
  5. Click Defragment.
  Microsoft Registry Problems = Slow Computer!
  Clean your Registry can make your computer fasterhttp://top5registrycleanerreviews.com
• History says:

  September 28, 2009 at 4:54 am

  run ALL these programs, if its slow after this then you have a hardware problem.
  While your computer is in good nick you should download these programs as a Save, then install from that file. All these programs do different stuff, the end result is your computer runs a lot better. Use all of them.
  To Clean Up Computer
  1. CCleaner (about 10 minutes to install and run)
  Google ccleaner and install it.from filehippo While it installs just untick the boxes as some you dont want..Run the cleaner in windows/applications but dont tick the bottom 11 boxes in the Windows Tab.Run the registry cleaner as well, when it asks to back up the registry , allow it to do it, then clean the registry. You may have to clean the registry a few times, but you do not need to save it each time.
  2. Superantispyware (1 hour)http://www.superantispyware.com
  Has a stop homepage from being altered which is good. Download and run superantispyware. Install it and set the preferences to monitor your home page. Set up tick boxes that you want in the other tabs as you require.You don’t need to run it at startup unless you want the antispyware protection 24/7.
  Note Superantispyware has powerful reset tools that will set stuff back to windows defaults.To use these tools click preferences >repairs. There are a lot of handy repairs you can chose.Superantispyware is a good program and remember to update it before scanning. A scan may take 45mins. Just run a scan for the first attack.
  3. Spybot – Search and Destroy (1 hour) – Download spybot search and destroy. Through its immunize page and link to javacools spyblaster, spybot can manage activex problems which is extremely difficult for antispyware programs to find. Also just run the scan for first attack. http://www.spybot.info/en/download/index…
  4. MalwareBytes (1 hour) http://www.malwarebytes.org This is a neat little program to scan for annoying pop ups and adverts.
  5. Windows Live Onecare (2-3 hours)
  Onecare safety scan fixes registry and finds temp files that nothing else seems to find. Choose the Beta Edition link for vista users. It does registry, spyware , virus , disk clean up and defrag
  XP Users http://onecare.live.com/site/en-ca/defau…
  Vista Users http://onecare.live.com/site/en-ca/cente… Run the full safety scanner, it takes a few seconds to install the scanning files but when you start the scan, it takes 2 hours or more. Let it load the scanning tools, then start the Safety Scan. So once it starts to load the safety scans’ x file of x , you can leave the computer and go to bed etc. Then at the end of the scan it asks you to set it running full time.
  Think twice about setting it to run in the background as it could be another thing to slow you down. However, it may be worth while if you have no other security programs running.
  Now you should be flying and Onecare has even set up a new system restore point for you.. Add onecare to your favourites
  6. Set up IE7 /8 so it runs efficiently. (2 minutes)
  Over time IE seems to set its own (or programs do) tick boxes in the advance tab.In IE, Click Tools >Internet Options >Advance Tab. Click Restore advance settings defaults button.Then scroll the listings down to near the bottom and:
  1. Tick empty temp files when browser closes (this empties the cache, which if not empty, will stop you from going online and hassles msn)
  2. Ie7 only.- Bullet disable phishing filter (optional. Leave it on if you want that type of protection, usually for financial data like internet banking).2. Ie8 – to disable the phishing filter click Tools > scroll down to SmartScreen filter and disable it. (leave it on is preferred) SmartScreen filter will stop malicious code from being installed to your computer, specially through activex, however it may be doubling up with your internet security program so causing your browser to be a little slower.
  Then click the blue drop arrow near the search icon (top RHS corner) >manage search providers >make the one you want default >then remove all the others listed. These really slow IE8 so remove them.
  3 Then Click Tools >Delete Browser History, cookies, add ons, the whole lot. Do this regularly.Close the browser to set the settings.
  7. Ensure only one phishing filter program, and only one firewall program is used on the computer. Disable others that may be in other software, or disable the browser phishing filter.
• chezzrob says:

  September 28, 2009 at 5:46 am

  If I were in your shoes I’d do a “clean-up” to get rid of unnecessary files and applications, then I would defrag.
  People don’t seem to get the concept that extra junk does little but slow down the computer.When you’re accessing a file on a “clean” computer it takes a lot less time to find the file that you’re looking for if it doesn’t have to sort through all kinds of junk to get to it.
• john n says:

  September 28, 2009 at 6:20 am

  If your virus/spyware free, there are a couple things you can do get your computer working faster. If you using your computer for normal stuff and not gaming. You don’t always need more RAM you just need to perform a few maintenance task.
  First, if you haven’t cleaned your registry in a while. This is necessary. Your registry holds all the information regarding updates, installs, un-installs etc. Each one of those events produces a key. That key needs your PC’s resources and free space. So, if you clean your registry, you make more resources available for speed. Do a registry scan if you got more than 20 errors you should clean it.http://www.delete-computer-history.com/w…
  2. Clear your Windows cache files, this is your temporary file. It can grow up to a large volume and stop your computer from using RAM properly. In a sense slow it down by preventing it from using free space.Here is how:
  1. Quit Internet Explorer, Firefox, or any other web browser
  2. Click Start, click “Control Panel”, and then double-click “Internet Options”.
  3. On the General tab, click “Delete Files” under Temporary Internet Files.
  4. In the Delete Files dialog box, click to select the “Delete all offline content” check box , and then click OK.
  5. Click OK.
  3. Manage your startups. Your excess CPU usage is due to too many programs running in the background. You can cut these to barebones by altering your msconfig. Here is how:
  1. Open your Start menu.
  2. Click Run
  3. In the command screen type “msconfig.exe”
  4. In the “system configuration utility”,click either “service” or “startup” tab
  5. Uncheck all programs that your are no longer using.
  6. Click “OK”
• Mickey L says:

  September 28, 2009 at 6:33 am

  scan it for worms and viruses. Check the hard drive space to see if near capacity, remove old programs no longer using. Upgrade your ram.
  If it starts up slow, go to start, run, and msconfig to remove programs set to run at startup.
  As for slow, is it slow surfing the net, or just using everyday programs. Slow playing games? Slow opening email?
  Could be a lot of things, just trying to narrow it down.
• Bella says:

  September 28, 2009 at 7:10 am

  first of all uninstall that vista theme.
  then check your sys for viruses with an updated antivirus which you can fully download at p2p softs like “Ares”.
  then check your startup folder C(or other drives of windows):Documents and Settings{user name}Start MenuPrograms
  and from run>msconfig in startup and services tab,
  delete your temporary and temp folders in system root{C(or other drives of windows):Documents and Settings}.
  uninstall unwanted softwares.
  defragment your hard disk from start>all progs>sys tools
  press ctrl+alt+delete and end unwanted proccesses
  if you want more speed simply re instal your winXP.
• mohammad says:

  September 28, 2009 at 7:36 am

  It’s the crapware. Crapware is stuff that is running in the background. For example when you installed your CD Burning software, it is sitting there checking to see if you have installed a blank CD into your drive. When you do, the program starts in 2 seconds. If the CD background software wasn’t there you would have to click on the program to start it, and it will take perhaps 10 seconds. The 8 seconds penalty? Not worth it!! How many times a second do you put in a blank CD?
  It’s the same with Printer (checking to see if there is enough ink) and nearly every other piece of software you’ve installed.
  A good tool to check what programs autorun is available from Microsoft
  http://download.sysinternals.com/Files/Autoruns.zip
  Good luck!
• skris88 says:

  September 28, 2009 at 7:54 am

  Well to be honest it can be a lot of different things that can affect a computers performance. And I think the best way to know if your PC is corrupted with errors is by giving your computer a free diagnostic scan. Open this url and have a try:http://www.fix-system-error.info
  It’s great and efficient too!! It’s very easy to use, fast at scanning and it speeds up your computer a lot.
  Hope it helps.
• Adamaris says:

  September 28, 2009 at 8:48 am

  the problem was you didn’t mention how many ram modules or ram type you have got.what is the ram type DDR1? or DDR2?
  have you added another only 512ram to get 1Gb? then you won’t feel the speed. coz there isn’t a ram speed increase.also hard disk free
  space is important on speed.
  better way is,use 1Gb ram only.
  weak part is mainly affect on pc’s speed.in your case is Ram or hard disk
• Sherlock Holmes says:

  September 28, 2009 at 8:52 am

  yes defrag –clean out ur cookies (ccleaner) does a very good job
  dump ur junk files —folders to cd –flash drive or external drive
  maximum pc june issues had article of good tips
  was called better stronger faster
• Mark says:

  September 28, 2009 at 9:07 am

  Throw it out of the window. If you live in an apartment it will make your laptop go really fast.
• John p says:

  September 28, 2009 at 9:26 am

  Running themes on Windows has been known to use a lot of resources. However, I would recommend Bella’s suggestions.
• EB says:

  September 28, 2009 at 9:56 am

  its the registry. try registry mechanic or ccleaner.
• HK says:

  September 28, 2009 at 10:05 am

  defrag it.