Speed up your PC

[Alpha Mule]

How to speed up your PC (Windows XP version)

 

 

First and foremost you really should (read: Must!) run a disk check to ensure the entire disk is in good condition and any bad sectors are marked as such (and won’t be used in the future).

To do this hit Start / Run and type CMD (hit enter)

This will bring up a new window in which you should type CHKDSK /F /R (hit enter)

You will get a message saying the operation cannot be carried out (bla, bla) and would you like it to be done next time the machine is rebooted.

Enter a Y and hit return.

Close this window and reboot the PC.

 

As the PC reboots you will see that the disk, files, indexes and free space is all checked. If the checks encounter problems, they will attempt fixes automatically.

NOTE: if problems are found during this, the files were to all intents and purposes unusable anyway.

There are 5 steps to the checks. If you are lucky it will only take as long as it takes to have a cuppa. If you are unlucky it can take many hours. I suggest you set this to run overnight.

If you have other disks (not CD or DVD drives) you should run the disk check on these too (substitute your drive letter(s) instead of X), type CHKDSK X /F /R (hit enter) for each of your disks. If you are warned that these disks need to be un-mounted, type a Y to proceed. You will not be able to access these disks for the duration of the checks.

 

 

Now that we have ensured that we are working with a healthy disk we can start doing some more tricky stuff.

 

Find out how much RAM you have.

START / SETTINGS / CONTROL PANEL - SYSTEM

In the General tab you should see the speed of your processor(s) and the amount of RAM you have (make a note of it).

Now select the Advanced tab.

In the performance section, select the Settings button.

Select the Advanced tab.

In the virtual memory section hit the Change button.

Depending on the amount of RAM you have fitted, you want to have up to 2.5 times the amount of RAM in Paging files.

 

 

 

I have one on my C: drive that is 1024Mb (1Gb) and 4092Mb (4Gb) on my E: drive. I have 2Gb of RAM. You are limited to 4Gb of paging file per disk. You really don’t want to go any higher than 3 times the amount of RAM you have as it will slow you down instead! 2.5 times seems to work best for me.

 

Techie blurb: This is what is used when you run out of RAM. It’s not as fast as RAM, but is a lot faster than normal file access.

 

Windows default setting is much lower than this and is also set with a low minimum and higher maximum. THIS IS BAD! The standard settings force theses files to shrink and grow, which by their nature means they become fragmented. You really do not want this as it will slow your PC down even more (RAM has to remember the physical address of every single block of the page files (which can run into the thousands – very easily)). So set the Min and Max to the same figure.

If you have more than one disk put the paging file on the disk that does NOT have your Operating System (Windows) on it if possible.

 

We now want to force the system to de-fragment this file. To do this download and run this Paging File De-fragmentation utility (found here: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinte...s/bb897426.aspx ).

Set it to run at next boot and re-boot the PC.

 

You will see that the Paging File(s) and the Registry are de-fragmented and should now be in single fragments.

 

This should help speed up your boot time and the general running of your PC.

 

Now we will address the more tedious bits of our tweak.

Windows assumes theat the ‘Desktop’ is the most commonly used portion of itself. It will load as much of it as possible into RAM. This in itself is not a bad thing, but if like millions of others you keep files on there, it’s BAD!

If you ‘need’ to have access to files or folders on your desktop, make links to them and store them elsewhere! A link on your desktop takes up about 4Kb whether the file itself is 10Kb or 10Mb or 10Tb.

If you haven’t already done so, create a folder on your disk and name it whatever takes your fancy (within reason). I have ‘Stuff’ - inspired huh?

If you need help doing this give me a shout.

Drag and drop the files from your desktop into this folder.

You should see a little box at the bottom of the cursor as you do this.

You can then drag the file back to your desktop, but press either the ALT / CTRL or SHIFT button at the same time so that you see a small arrow at the bottom of the cursor this time.

Do this for all the files you have created, on your desktop.

 

 

De-fragment your hard disks:

 

Hit the Windows button and E together (or START / PROGRAMMES / ACCESSORIES / WINDOWS EXPLORER)

On the left part of the window – right click on your drive (one at a time please!!!) and select Properties from the list.

Select the Tools tab and select the Defragment Now button.

You may have to run this several times to get all the files into single fragments if your disk is heavily populated.

 

You really want to have about 20% free space on the disk.

 

The above will help keep your PC running as quickly as is reasonable. There are many more things that can be done, such as cleaning out cookies, clearing down web caches, changing your web browser, bla, bla, but these take a bit more time to explain.

If I've made any glaring errors or omitted any biggies, give me a shout and I'll update.

[clutey]

Sounds a bit deep for me this, I think I'll print this off and keep it till the son comes over at Christmas and get him to do it, he's the computer buff. Thanks Alpha for the info.

Edited November 13, 2009 by clutey

[Alpha Mule]

Sounds a bit deep for me this, I think I'll print this off and keep it till the son comes over at Christmas and get him to do it, he's the computer buff. Thanks Alpha for the info.

 

Just do the checkdisk bit then. If your disk has been around (geddit??) for a while, it will love you for this.

On an older PC I saw this take 23 hours to run. You seriously want to do this before any of the other stuff anyway.

[clutey]

Might just do that, cheers Alpha.

[sapper063]

mines slow on starting up any tips cheers

[TonySmith]

Another way for disc checking -

 

Go

 

Start

My computer

Right click (C:) or what ever drive you want checking

Click 'Properties'

Click 'Tools'

Click Check Now

Click both boxes in 'check disc options'

Click Start

You will than get the message ' The disk check could not...blah blah Do you want to schedule next time you restart the computer

Click yes

 

Next time you start your PC it will check the disc for errors ( I normally run this when I go out or overnight..as Alpha says can take hours..but it well worth it)

You can also de-frag from there as well.

[Alpha Mule]

Another way for disc checking -

 

Go

 

Start

My computer

Right click (C:) or what ever drive you want checking

Click 'Properties'

Click 'Tools'

Click Check Now

Click both boxes in 'check disc options'

Click Start

You will than get the message ' The disk check could not...blah blah Do you want to schedule next time you restart the computer

Click yes

 

Next time you start your PC it will check the disc for errors ( I normally run this when I go out or overnight..as Alpha says can take hours..but it well worth it)

You can also de-frag from there as well.

 

I read that running it this way doesn't force it to check the unused areas of disk, but I have been known to be wrong

[bigred]

Slow on start up??? start.....run....type MSCONFIG into box and press enter.....In the box that opens go to the start up tab and uncheck anything you don't want to start up when pc starts up or anything you can do without till you want it to start. click apply and re-start. should be quicker as its not working as much to get you up and running.

[Cranfield]

Slow on start up??? start.....run....type MSCONFIG into box and press enter.....In the box that opens go to the start up tab and uncheck anything you don't want to start up when pc starts up or anything you can do without till you want it to start. click apply and re-start. should be quicker as its not working as much to get you up and running.

 

This is an excellent suggestion and you will be surprised what creeps into your PC without you knowing.

 

This is a link to an Index where you can check what the abbreviations in your start-up list apply to, it also has recommendations on what to remove, or leave.

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/startups/

[bigred]

Thanks I would also install C-Cleaner too this will get rid of most your unwanted reg's and is free. http://www.ccleaner.com/

[edr]

Does anyone have an xp installer as i lost the the cd, ( i can send pictures of the computer with the key panel still intact to prove; I am not trying to get a free copy i have paid for a license key just lost the cd. :s )

 

Cheers

EDR

[stokie]

I recently installed Advanced Systemcare

 

Google it . Its free and does it all for you .

 

On first run a had 987 errors on system 243 security alerts and 1.9 mb of unwanted files

But it then took 2 1/2 hours to defrag

 

Now this peice of techno runs like its on speed .

[wingnut]

I recently installed Advanced Systemcare

 

Google it . Its free and does it all for you .

 

On first run a had 987 errors on system 243 security alerts and 1.9 mb of unwanted files

But it then took 2 1/2 hours to defrag

 

Now this peice of techno runs like its on speed .

 

 

Juat installed this, ran all the diagnostics, even with decent security and maintenance it still detected problems, after hitting repair button my system runs like new.

 

2 spyware

89 register errors

4568 problems on privacy sweep

32.14 mb junk files

833 fragmented files

 

 

 

thanks for the link, highly recomended

[fullbore]

I recently installed Advanced Systemcare

 

Google it . Its free and does it all for you .

 

On first run a had 987 errors on system 243 security alerts and 1.9 mb of unwanted files

But it then took 2 1/2 hours to defrag

 

Now this peice of techno runs like its on speed .

 

 

AVG blocked that site for me saying it was known as a phishing site and other problems

[Alpha Mule]

I recently installed Advanced Systemcare

 

Google it . Its free and does it all for you .

 

On first run a had 987 errors on system 243 security alerts and 1.9 mb of unwanted files

But it then took 2 1/2 hours to defrag

 

Now this peice of techno runs like its on speed .

 

 

Beware Greeks bearing gifts!

Many of these things do more than they suggest and much of it not good. Seeing the following is good enough for me to leave well alone.

 

[steve_b_wales]

Thanks for putting this on PW for all to see. You helped me, via PM to sort out my PC, which is much appreciated.

I'll arrrange to take you shooting in the near future, once this weather (hopefully) gets better.

 

Steve.

Edited November 14, 2009 by steve_b_wales

[Delbert]

mines slow on starting up any tips cheers

 

 

Slow on start up??? start.....run....type into box and press enter.....In the box that opens go to the start up tab and uncheck anything you don't want to start up when pc starts up or anything you can do without till you want it to start. click apply and re-start. should be quicker as its not working as much to get you up and running.

 

I'm with BigRed especially for attention is WUAUCLT.EXEthe windows automatic update client if you allow that to run each time you boot it connects to mickey$not and runs checks on your machine looking for possible updates. It is a real thief of processor time and if allowed to play will happily give you language support for swedish chinese korean russian urdu etc etc and a whole host of other rubbish to clutter up your computer bin it and make your updates manually.

I am sad to say google have gone down the same route (monkey see monkey doo) and will slow your machine if you are using google products 'Chrome google earth picasa etc by launching Google Update and the difference being thus far you cannot disable it easily.

Edited November 14, 2009 by Delbert

[malkiserow]

I've done much of the above but it seems to me that I might have another issue. with the machine fired up, PC guard (from Virgin) running. My CPU is running between 20% and 80% I wonder if this is what is making this laptop so slow?

 

 

 

The machine has only windows XP and Office 2007 loaded onto it - Nothing else. 60% of the hard disk memory is free and it has 1 meg of RAM (Edit 1 Gig of RAM ) - Machine is about 4 years old.

 

 

 

Any ideas what to do? Thanks

Edited November 14, 2009 by malkiserow

[reddan]

I've done much of the above but it seems to me that I might have another issue. with the machine fired up, PC guard (from Virgin) running. My CPU is running between 20% and 80% I wonder if this is what is making this laptop so slow?

 

 

 

The machine has only windows XP and Office 2007 loaded onto it - Nothing else. 60% of the hard disk memory is free and it has 1 meg of RAM - Machine is about 4 years old.

 

 

 

Any ideas what to do? Thanks

 

Assume you mean 1gig of ram, otherwise 1meg may be your issue!

[malkiserow]

Assume you mean 1gig of ram, otherwise 1meg may be your issue!

 

Good spoting! 1 Gig of RAM