Is your computer running slow? This tends to be a common problem, especially for people whose computers are 6 months to a year old.

Often computers begin to show signs of slowdowns in the bootup process. A computer that used to boot up in seconds now takes five minutes to completely start up. Other areas include slow starting programs and slow access when users try to open My Computer or open files.

There are several reasons for these slowdowns, and each individual case is likely to be a little different. However, certain things are sure to help.

Defrag Your Hard Drive

Did you know that files on your computer can be literally scattered in pieces all over the hard drive? When you want to access these files, the computer has to search everywhere to reconstruct the file. Defragmenting the hard drive will take all the information on the hard drive and put it back together. This way your computer won’t have to waste time searching for pieces of files.

To defrag your hard drive go to Start – Programs – Accessories – System Tools – Disk Defragmenter

Then just run the program!

Clean Up Your Desktop

Too many icons on the desktop seems to slow down computers, especially if they have lower memory. Do a housecleaning and reorganize your desktop. You’ll notice a nice improvement in speed.

Clean Your Registry

Windows computers are prone to registry problems which often result in slow computer speeds. The registry is a filing system where programs and hardware store important preference and settings files. If the registry gets cluttered or corrupted (there are several reasons this can happen), the result will be a slowdown in Windows operations. Often errors and crashes also occur.

Cleaning the registry is an easy process and can speed up a slow computer dramatically as well as stop errors, crashes, and freezes.

To clean the registry you’ll want to use a good registry cleaner software program. Most reputable programs will allow users to download the full program for free and run a scan to see if they have critical registry errors. The good cleaners do cost money, but the results are often worth it.