99 ways to make your computer blazingly fast

Posted by Aseem on Tuesday, February 10th 2009

10
Feb

Over the last several years working in IT for various companies as a Systems Administrator, Network Administrator, and Help Desk professional, I’ve written and learned about many ways to increase the performance of not only my PC, but also of the many PCs on my networks ranging from Windows 98 to Windows Vista.

In this article, I hope to compile a complete list of all the different methods and tricks that I’ve used to get the last bit of juice out of a slow PC. Whether you are using an old PC or the latest and greatest in hardware, you can still use some of these to make your PC run faster.

Note that since I write two blogs, Help Desk Geek and Online Tech Tips, I have previously written about many performance tips already which I will link back to throughout. If I have not written about it, I’ve throw in a link to a relevant article from some of my other favorite sites. This list is in no particular order, just written in the order that I could think of them.

There are probably a lot of great tweaks and performance hacks that I’ve missed here, so feel free to chime in with comments! Enjoy!

1. Defragment your computer hard disk using free tools like SmartDefrag.

2. You should also defragment your Windows pagefile and registry.

3. Clean up hard drive disk space being taken up by temporary files, the recycle bin, hibernation and more. You can also use a tool like TreeSize to determine what is taking up space on your hard drive.

4. Load up Windows faster by using Startup Delayer, a free program that will speed up the boot time of Windows by delaying the startup of programs.

5. Speaking of startup programs, many of them are useless and can be turned off. Use the MSCONFIG utility to disable startup programs.

6. By default, the size of the paging file is controlled by Windows, which can cause defragmentation. Also, the paging file should be on a different hard drive or partition than the boot partition. Read here on the rules for best paging file performance.

7. In Windows XP and Vista, the Windows Search indexing service is turned on for all local hard drives. Turning off indexing is a simple way to increase performance.

8. If you don’t care about all the fancy visual effects in Windows, you can turn them off by going to Performance Options.

9. You can optimize the Windows boot time using a free program called Bootvis from Microsoft.

10. Clean your registry by removing broken shortcuts, missing shared DLLs, invalid paths, invalid installer references and more. Read about the 10 best and free registry cleaners.

11. One of the main reasons why PC’s are slow is because of spyware. There are many programs to remove spyware including Ad-Aware, Giant Antispyware, SUPERAntiSpyware, and more.

12. If you have a deeper spyware infection that is very hard to remove, you can use HijackThis to remove spyware.

13. Remove unwanted pre-installed software (aka junk software) from your new PC using PC Decrapifier.

14. Disable unnecessary Windows services, settings, and programs that slow down your computer.

15. Tweak Windows XP and tweak Windows Vista settings using free programs

16. Disable UAC (User Account Control) in Windows Vista

17. Tweak your mouse settings so that you can copy and paste faster, scroll faster, navigate quickly while browsing and more. Read here to learn how to tweak your mouse.

18. Delete temporary and unused files on your computer using a free program like CCleaner. It can also fix issues with your registry.

19. Delete your Internet browsing history, temporary Internet files, cookies to free up disk space.

20. Clean out the Windows prefetch folder to improve performance.

21. Disable the XP boot logo to speed up Windows boot time.

22. Reduce the number of fonts that your computer has to load up on startup.

23. Force Windows to unload DLLs from memory to free up RAM.

24. Run DOS programs in separate memory spaces for better performance.

25. Turn off system restore only if you regularly backup your Windows machine using third party software.

26. Move or change the location of your My Documents folder so that it is on a separate partition or hard drive.

27. Turn off default disk performance monitors on Windows XP to increase performance.

28. Speed up boot time by disabling unused ports on your Windows machine.

29. Use Process Lasso to speed up your computer by allowing it to make sure that no one process can completely overtake the CPU.

30. Make icons appear faster while browsing in My Computer by disabling search for network files and printers.

31. Speed up browsing of pictures and videos in Windows Vista by disabling the Vista thumbnails cache.

32. Edit the right-click context menu in Windows XP and Vista and remove unnecessary items to increase display speed.

33. Use the Windows Performance Toolkit and the trace logs to speed up Windows boot time.

34. Speed up your Internet browsing by using an external DNS server such as OpenDNS.

35. Improve Vista performance by using ReadyBoost, a new feature whereby Vista can use the free space on your USB drive as a caching mechanism.

36. If you have a slow Internet connection, you can browse web pages faster using a service called Finch, which converts it into simple text.

37. Use Vista Services Optimizer to disable unnecessary services in Vista safely.

38. Also, check out my list of web accelerators, which are programs that try to prefetch and cache the sites you are going to visit.

39. Speed up Mozilla Firefox by tweaking the configuration settings and by installing an add-on called FasterFox.

40. Learn how to build your own computer with the fastest parts and best hardware.

41. Use a program called TeraCopy to speed up file copying in Windows XP and Vista.

42. Disable automatic Last Access Timestamp to speed up Windows XP.

43. Speed up the Start Menu in Vista by hacking the MenuShowDelay key in the registry.

44. Increase the FileSystem memory cache in Vista to utilize a system with a large amount of RAM.

45. Install more RAM if you are running XP with less than 512 MB or Vista with less than 1 GB of RAM.

46. Shut down XP faster by reducing the wait time to kill hung applications.

47. Make sure that you have selected “Adjust for best performance” on the Performance tab in System Properties.

48. If you are reinstalling Windows, make sure that you partition your hard drives correctly to maximize performance.

49. Use Altiris software virtualization to install all of your programs into a virtual layer that does not affect the registry or system files.

50. Create and install virtual machines for free and install junk program, games, etc into the virtual machines instead of the host operating system. Check out Sun openxVM.

51. Do not clear your paging file during shutdown unless it is needed for security purposes. Clearing the paging file slows down shutdown.

52. If your XP or Vista computer is not using NFTS, make sure you convert your FAT disk to the NTFS file system.

53. Update all of your drivers in Windows, including chipset and motherboard drivers to their latest versions.

54. Every once in a while run the built-in Windows Disk Cleanup utility.

55. Enable DMA mode in Windows XP for IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers in Device Manager.

56. Remove unnecessary or old programs from the Add/Remove dialog of the Control Panel.

57. Use a program click memtest86 or Prime95 to check for bad memory on your PC.

58. Determine your BIOS version and check the manufactures website to see if you need to update your BIOS.

59. Every once in a while, clean your mouse, keyboard and computer fans of dust and other buildup.

60. Replace a slow hard drive with a faster 7200 RPM drive, SATA drive, or SAS drive.

61. Changing from Master/Slave to Cable Select on your hard drive configuration can significantly decrease your boot time.

62. Perform a virus scan on your computer regularly. If you don’t want to install virus protection, use some of the free online virus scanners.

63. Remove extra toolbars from your Windows taskbar and from your Internet browser.

64. Disable the Windows Vista Sidebar if you’re not really using it for anything important. All those gadgets take up memory and processing power.

65. If you have a SATA drive and you’re running Windows Vista, you can speed up your PC by enabling the advanced write caching features.

66. Learn how to use keyboard shortcuts for Windows, Microsoft Word, Outlook, or create your own keyboard shortcuts.

67. Turn off the Aero visual effects in Windows Vista to increase computer performance.

68. If you are technically savvy and don’t mind taking a few risks, you can try to overclock your processor.

69. Speed up the Send To menu in Explorer by typing “sendto” in the Run dialog box and deleting unnecessary items.

70. Make sure to download all the latest Windows Updates, Service Packs, and hot fixes as they “normally” help your computer work better.

71. Make sure that there are no bad sectors or other errors on your hard drive by using the ScanDisk orchkdsk utility.

72. If you are not using some of the hardware on your computer, i.e. floppy drive, CD-ROM drive, USB ports, IR ports, Firewire, etc, then go into your BIOS and disable them so that they do not use any power and do not have to be loaded during boot up.

73. If you have never used the Recent Documents feature in Windows, then disable it completely as a long list can affect PC performance.

74. One basic tweak that can help in performance is to disable error reporting in Windows XP

75. If you don’t care about a pretty interface, you should use the Windows Classic theme under Display Properties.

76. Disable short filenames if you are using NTFS by running the following command: fsutil behavior set disable8dot3 1. It will speed up the file creation process.

77. If you have lots of files in a single folder, it can slow down Explorer. It’s best to create multiple folders and spread out the files between the folders.

78. If you have files that are generally large, you might want to consider increasing the cluster size on NTFS to 16K or even 32K instead of 4K. This will help speed up opening of files.

79. If you have more than one disk in your PC, you can increase performance by moving your paging file to the second drive and formatting the volume using FAT32 instead of NTFS.

80. Turn off unnecessary features in Vista by going to Control Panel, choosing Uninstall a program, and then clicking on Turn Windows features on and off. You can turn off Remote Differential Compression, Tablet PC components, DFS replication service, Windows Fax & Scan, Windows Meeting Space, and lots more.

81. Install a free or commercial anti-virus program to help protect against viruses, etc. Make sure to use an anti-virus program that does not hog up all of your computer resources.

82. Completely uninstall programs and applications using a program like Revo Uninstaller. It will get rid of remnants left behind by normal uninstalls.

83. If you know what you are doing, you can install several hard drives into your machine and set them up in RAID 0, RAID 5, or other RAID configurations.

84. If you are using USB 1.0 ports, upgrade to 2.0. If you have a Firewire port, try to use that instead of a USB port since Firewire is faster than USB right now.

85. Remove the drivers for all old devices that may be hidden in Device Manager that you no longer use.

86. A more extreme option is to choose a faster operating system. If you find Vista to be slow, go with Windows XP. Switching to Mac or Linux is also an option.

87. One of the easiest ways to speed up your PC is to simply reformat it. Of course, you want to backup your data, but it is the best way to get your computer back to peak performance.

88. Speed up Internet browsing in IE by increasing the number of max connections per server in the registry.

89. If you use uTorrent to download torrents, you can increase the download speeds by tweaking the settings.

90. If you have a desktop background, make sure it’s a small and simple bitmap image rather than a fancy picture off the Internet. The best is to find a really small texture and to tile it.

91. For the Virtual Memory setting in Windows (right-click on My Computer, Properties, Advanced, Performance Settings, Advanced, Virtual Memory), make sure the MIN and MAX are both the same number.

92. If you search on Google a lot or Wikipedia, you can do it much faster on Vista by adding them to the Vista Start Menu Instant Search box.

93. If you have a custom built computer or a PC that was previously used, make sure to check the BIOS for optimal settings such as enabled CPU caches, correctly set IDE/SATA data transfer modes, memory timings, etc. You can also enable Fast/Quick boot if you have that option.

94. If you have a SCSI drive, make sure the write cache is enabled. You can do so by opening the properties of the SCSI drive in Windows.

95. If you have a machine with an older network card, make sure to enable the onboard processor for the network card, which will offload tasks from the CPU.

96. If you are using Windows Vista, you can disable the Welcome Center splash screen that always pops up.

97. If you already have anti-spyware software installed, turn off Windows Defender protection.

98. If you are running a 32-bit version of Windows and have 4GB of RAM or more, you can force Windows to see and use all of the RAM by enabling PAE.

99. Buy a new computer!!! Pretty easy eh?

I’m sure I have missed out on lots of performance tweaks, tips, hacks, etc, so feel free to post comments to add to the list! Enjoy!

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134 Comments Already

Pliggs Said,

February 10th, 2009 @1:37 pm

Wow, that’s a long list, better get started.

Thanks for compiling.

Binny V A Said,

February 10th, 2009 @3:22 pm

Nice list – but you missed one – hide the common tasks in the explorer window.

Deyaa Addeen Fahmy Shedeed Said,

February 11th, 2009 @11:22 am

Thank you both, welldone.

Will Said,

February 11th, 2009 @7:37 pm

Wouldn’t it be much easier and faster to just back up all your data and then reinstall windows?

Of course if you have a lot of software installed, try this:
1) Resintall windows
2) Install all the software just the way you like it
3) Make a backup image of the hard drive

Now whenever Windows starts to get slow, you can restore from the backup image and it’s as good as new!

Brian Said,

February 12th, 2009 @12:15 am

#98 is incorrect. Doesn’t matter what you do, any 32-Bit OS will only see about 3.2-3.4GB, not the full 4GB.

Syahid A Said,

February 15th, 2009 @7:19 am

New blog Aseem? Cool post!

benevolent anarchist Said,

February 15th, 2009 @1:36 pm

please explain how removing files from a hard disk improves speed? (you can’t) and this is the sort of misinformation that causes people to delete files or even un-install software for no reason. please study CS101 before posting garbage like this. hint: everything occurs in WS.

christina Said,

February 15th, 2009 @9:29 pm

I think many of these are becoming less true the better of an OS you get. If you are still working with Windows XP- These things will make a WORLD of difference. It will feel like a new computer. If you are running OSX then many of these are either pointless or well automated. (or, Windows 7, I find that they took care of many of these issues BEAUTIFULLY in the update… This list is why Windows 7 will be the best Windows yet… but it’s still in beta)

TechnicalBard Said,

February 15th, 2009 @10:55 pm

You have the incorrect link in #65 – it’s links to the same URL as #64.

edwest Said,

February 15th, 2009 @11:19 pm

I would like to see hard evidence on whether defragging for today’s hard drives (large) for the average user (not a whole lot of data) is truly helpful. Techs in my computer shop argue it is not under those circumstances.

Aseem Said,

February 15th, 2009 @11:54 pm

@Will – I wrote reformatting the computer as one of the tips, however, I think it’s also something not a lot of people know how to do. These small little tweaks can go a long way for a non tech-savvy computer user.

@Brain – Are you sure? Then what is PAE exactly for?

@Syahid – Thanks man! Two blogs going now!

@benevolent – What exactly are you talking about! Are you saying that installing 100 apps on a computer will not slow it down? I don’t know what kind of computer you have been using, but getting rid of junk temp files and useless programs has worked wonders…why do you think people uninstall all the preloaded software from a new PC (hint: to make it fast!)

@christina – I agree with you…these tips are mostly for Windows XP and Vista…which still can have loads of problems in terms of performance. Windows 7 should be a lot better…

@TechnicalBard – Thanks, I’ll fix that.

@edwest – Well if you are a user without a lot of data and have a huge hard drive, then you are correct. It’s really only useful if you have a lot of files (small or large) and your hard drive is not that big.

Mike Said,

February 16th, 2009 @3:09 am

I use Linux, so I don’t have to do any of this crap.

bob Said,

February 16th, 2009 @6:51 am

You could just condense this to one item. Get Linux.

Dan Said,

February 16th, 2009 @10:34 am

Re benevolent anarchist’s post – I agree that removing programs from your hard drive will not in itself make the PC faster. I use the analogy that the hard drive is like a bookcase, putting more books on it doesn’t affect the speed at which you can read a book once you’ve picked it off the shelf.

The only way uninstalling programs will speed a PC up is if the program you removed was loaded up at boot time. The PC will boot faster and you’ll have more memory available. Also, reducing the number of files on the hard drive will have a positive effect if you’ve got indexing on – less files means less to index.

But if the program isn’t loaded up at boot time, and indexing is off, I can’t see how uninstalling it will make the PC any faster at all.

Alf Said,

February 16th, 2009 @12:27 pm

Cleaning the prefetch folder doesn’t do anything to improve performance. In fact, it has the effect of REDUCING it. http://www.edbott.com/weblog/archives/000619.html

computeryah Said,

February 16th, 2009 @1:25 pm

Good !
Thanks …

Timothy Said,

February 16th, 2009 @2:24 pm

Wow, what a list! I didn’t realize you could even do some of these things. Very helpful. Thank you!

Aseem Said,

February 16th, 2009 @2:26 pm

@bob, @Mike – I should have named this 99 ways to make your Windows computer blazingly fast. Definitely Linux users would not have to worry about these issues.

@Dan – I would also say that having more programs means that your registry is more cluttered, which means Windows loads slower since it is always accessing the registry. And yes, taking a book off the shelf would take the same time for any book, but finding the book is what takes more time when you have more books.

@ Alf – Interesting point. I will read into that. I might add your point to my tip as a counter argument.

rae Said,

February 16th, 2009 @10:16 pm

1 ways to make your computer blazingly fast:
Using Linux.

Jason Bartholme Said,

February 16th, 2009 @10:28 pm

Great list of tips. There was about 15 different tips that I was able to apply to my XP and Vista machines immediately.

X Said,

February 17th, 2009 @1:14 am

#6 is misleading. Paging file size has nothing to do with actual file storage/allocation. I think you may be thinking of page file fragmentation(which is way different from file fragmentation). Also, if this was the case, I think it would cause ‘fragmentation’(defragmentation is usually a good thing).

Simple Said,

February 17th, 2009 @3:22 am

Hi, those were really nice and hidden tips. thanks for sharing with us. It did helped me indeed in making my computer a little faster.

gedanken451 Said,

February 17th, 2009 @11:28 am

Generally I’m good with keeping my computer speedy (anti-spyware, degrag etc) but there were some new things on this list that never occurred to me – nice one!

However I think clearing the prefetch (#20) is a myth:

http://lifehacker.com/5033518/debunking-common-windows-performance-tweaking-myths

Yair Tendler Said,

February 17th, 2009 @4:03 pm

Nice list, I would not dare waste my time on all the 99.
But setting up a page file on a different hard drive.
and boot startup programs can be delayed, because 99% when I boot I log in to my email.

ANYWAYS keep it up.

Nipurn Said,

February 18th, 2009 @1:17 am

You missed 100 to switch over to mac OS.

vaderbot Said,

February 18th, 2009 @6:31 pm

Wow, just wow, did any of the mac/linux junkies even read the article? He very clearly suggests that moving to a faster operating system would improve performance. Vista<slower than XP<slower than mac OS<slower than linux (maybe mac and linux switched, not sure).
And to all the people arguing about clearing the prefetch folder….. if errors in the prefetch folder are so rare (from on the the posted links de-bunking the prefetch speed up myth), why are there so many people who ONLY clean out their prefetch folder and their PC speeds up? I’m not saying it’s the prefetch, it probably is errors in the information in the prefetch folder just like many people have suggested, but it seems to me that the errors are pretty common. For people who don’t have the time or energy to tear their computer apart looking for the real problem, clearing the prefetch folder seems like a pretty good, once-a-week/once-a-month solution.

elitesense Said,

February 19th, 2009 @5:00 am

26. Move or change the location of your My Documents folder so that it is on a separate partition or hard drive.

The access time to a remote drive or even partition will be slower.
This is a good tip if it is needed, however it would not speed up the computer, it would slow it down.

Gagan Said,

February 19th, 2009 @5:22 am

huge list !! gr8 !!

Tech Said,

February 19th, 2009 @5:30 am

About Physical Address Extension (PAE)
If I remember correctly, it DOES allow use of over ~3.5GB of RAM in 32bit Windows XP and Vista Operating Systems in some circumstances, however, PAE works in the background, separate and somewhat unknown by the Windows OS, and has limitations. Since the methods that PAE uses are at least partially independent from the OS, Windows still only reports that it is using/able to use ~3.5GB. As I read (wish I could find the article with the explanation again to post it here) PAE doesn’t enable Windows itself to make use of the additional (>3.5GB) RAM directly by means of caching small files there, but, if the user attempts to open a large file, such as a image or video file, PAE will essentially intercept the memory request and remap it so that the file is able to continue on into the previously unusable memory space.

Vijay Said,

February 20th, 2009 @9:17 pm

Superb compilation.

Last point is good LOL

AussieRodney Said,

February 21st, 2009 @5:35 am

26 also has the effect of removing all of your precious data away from C drive, so that if (& when) you need to re-install Windows, you only need to have a few key items like your Firefox profile (& perhaps your outlook folder) backed up & you can then confidently wipe the C drive & go ahead.

I always install machines with 20 Gigs in C drive & the rest in D drive. One of my first activities after that is to MOVE the My Documents folder to the root of the D drive, where it will quite happily adopt whatever is there.

100-98 Said,

February 21st, 2009 @7:39 pm

Faster computer in 2 steps only:
1) Format disk
2) Install Ubuntu Linux

You are done…

Falcon Said,

February 22nd, 2009 @9:06 am

Revo Uninstaller also does a lot of things to speedup your computer! Check it out you!

Nath Said,

February 27th, 2009 @2:13 pm

Any tips to improve the speed with MAC OS???

Conga Keystone Said,

March 2nd, 2009 @3:12 am

Please help. Forget which tip I used, but it has disabled both Firefox 3 and IE7 Neither one will load a web page to tabs. Any ideas on how to fix? (In case you’re wondering, I’m using Google Chrome). Thanx

TweetyBlossom Said,

March 2nd, 2009 @5:06 am

WOW what a list thanks for taking the time to create it. Greatly appreciated!

SirPsycho Said,

March 2nd, 2009 @8:35 am

Typical “I think i’m better than you because I run Linux” users, Who sadly have no clue about computing. Everyone knows that Linux can be faster than windows, there is no need to point it out here on a blog with tips aimed at windows users!

1. Most Linux users use Windows aswell, primarily for playing games and other apps that Linux can’t run.

2. I work for a multinational company with offices all over the world. You can’t just switch them to linux. It don’t work like that i’m afraid.

3. Average Joe at home WILL find the transition to Linux a struggle, and at the end of the day not worth the hassle.

So think before your next “Just install ubuntu” comment, it doesn’t make you sound clever. In fact the opposite.

lefty.crupps Said,

March 2nd, 2009 @9:45 am

> 99 ways to make your computer blazingly fast
Ahh… I think you mean, 99 ways to make Windows a bit faster. Seriously these are all limited to the Windows OS.

Step 1 should have been “Install Debian Linux” and step 2 “learn some quick package management skills to ‘apt-get install kde xorg’ “. Rather than spending the time on the other 97 tips here, just get a fast secure system that doesn’t have these issues to begin with.

shoaib2k2 Said,

March 7th, 2009 @8:00 am

I Agree with the above comment by lefty these 99 ways are limited to Windows OS only

Tony Said,

March 7th, 2009 @1:13 pm

Lots of useful tips. Some things are more beneficial than others, depends on your hardware, computer type and OS version as well. Or just switch to Ubuntu…

thany Said,

March 10th, 2009 @7:51 am

Brian, #98 actually is correct. Enabling PAE will cause a 32-bit OS to reconize memory beyond ~3.2GB, but the motherboard needs to correctly support PAE to begin with. This is used in server that have way more than 4GB memory and still a 32-bit server OS

Walter Said,

March 11th, 2009 @3:43 pm

In the tip “22″ I copied the fonts back to the original font folder (I realized there were no changes), but still some fonts doesn’t appear anymore on Internet Explorer. Could you please tell me how can I fix it??

SweetheartAngel Said,

March 12th, 2009 @12:17 am

Great list. Thanks for all the info.

ryan Said,

March 14th, 2009 @2:54 pm

And by installing all those programs you slow down your computer even worse then it was before…tisk tisk

Bill Vincent Said,

March 15th, 2009 @6:20 pm

Great list. Most of these are quite useful.

To all the idiots saying “get linux”. Get over yourselves. We all know that *nix systems are NOT for everybody and will never be the mainstream home OS. My primary machine still runs a Windows OS, and probably always will. When you say things like that, all you do is make yourself sound like an elitist douchebag.

Kane Said,

March 23rd, 2009 @5:05 pm

Yeah, the linux thing is a little silly. I love it for myself but it will never be mainstream. Try troubleshooting linux problems with a non-power user over the phone. You’ll be saying ‘install windows’ after a couple weeks.

Khan Md Ashraf Said,

March 26th, 2009 @4:32 am

Imagine having to do these things to get your OS to perform satisfactorily. Lots of work I must say. Why do people have to put in so much effort maintaining their PC’s. When are we going to reach a stage where PC’s should only be used and the maintenance of it be almost unheard of like the many appliances we use. Where the failure rate is low. The point being that if a PC slows down as to be almost unusable is as good as having failed.
The closest to this low maintenance scenario are the open source OS’s. They need a much lower level of maintenance. The PC with an open source OS is close to the ideal of ‘It just works’.

D. W. Whitlock Said,

March 26th, 2009 @4:00 pm

Good list. Helpful. However……prefetch should be left alone. Windows clears and reloads the prefetch every 60 days or so (I forgot the exact interval) automatically based on user activity. Manually clearing the prefetch actually slows down browsing and app launching. You mentioned Smart Defrag. IOBIT has a nifty app containing it’s Smart Defrag and other cool tools plus a bunch of very useful utilities…its called Advanced System Care…and its free. The Foxit PDF reader is smaller and faster than Adobe and is free. Also, Malwarebytes Anti Malware will snag nasties other virus scanners miss. Its free too. Everyone should try Open DNS. If you don’t like it, its easy to reverse, but, you probably won’t want to go back to your ISP’s DNS. Always back up your registry before mucking about in there. One wrong keystroke or click could cripple your PC. Vista is indeed the Edsel of OS’s. Lets hope for our sake that Microsoft can redeem itself with Windows 7 the way Ford did with the Mustang.

Eli the Computer Guy Said,

March 28th, 2009 @12:24 pm

This is great! This is the most comphensive listing of Windows speed enhancements that I have run across.

Vijay Said,

March 31st, 2009 @8:38 am

Very useful tips. You could even publish everything together as a e-book.

Great effort!

George Serradinho Said,

April 5th, 2009 @9:53 pm

Thanks for the list, I will have to try a few and see what the results are.

Farfetchedchild Said,

April 11th, 2009 @10:59 am

Thanks for all the advice! It has worked wonders. This may be off subject, but I’ve noticed another thing that has helped my speed a lot as far as internet browsing. For one, the type of browser you use effects a lot. I use firefox. If you edit userChrome.css and the like (there are a couple more in there) you can improve performance amazingly well. User.js is the other main one. http://webdesigns.ms11.net/chromeditp.html makes things a lot easier than going the ‘about:config’ route. You can google through lists of good tweaks. If anyone is interested in any just email me at monopoles@hotmail.com

MJ Said,

April 20th, 2009 @6:13 pm

This is a very comprehensive list you have here. I have tried a number of these myself and they can do wonders.

Thanks for the effort you put into coming up with this post.
I’m sure it will help a lot of people.

Good Job!

Wislu Plethora Said,

May 9th, 2009 @12:18 pm

If you think the number of installed programs affects system speed, and that registry cleaning is necessary or helpful, and defragging will make a significant difference in performance, it indicates that you have no idea what you’re talking about.

MAC Said,

May 15th, 2009 @10:30 am

#1 WAY TO MAKE YOUR COMPUTER BLAZING FAST…GET MAC OR LINUX SCREW WINDOWS

mambo Said,

May 17th, 2009 @6:32 am

Turning off the boot logo? O.o That thing’s 500kb big at max, how is this shortening the boot process? 46 is downright dangerous and could lead to data loss.
In general most of those tips wont make your computer noticeably faster, diabling ports may work on a 486 but won’t make much difference on the average pc at all.

Steven P Said,

May 17th, 2009 @11:30 am

GET A MAC!

Red M@ Said,

May 22nd, 2009 @8:35 pm

My own strategy to diagnosing a slow/unresponsive computer:

1. Check signs of malware and use something like MBAM (www.malwarebytes.org/mbam.php) to clean it up

2. Use tip #5 to oust legit programs from startup (Quicktime (qttask.exe), Adobe Reader, DVD/CD burner software, printer/scanner utils, sound control panels, keyboard/mouse utils, etc.) Evaluate whether useful functionality is lost (react to scanner buttons, keyboard media keys, etc.) and re-enable if necessary. For more extreme measures, disable programs such as IM clients or switch to leaner alternative programs (Foxit, Pidgin, VLC, etc.)

3. Spend the cash on tip

#4. – 5. DDR and DDR2 esp. are dirt cheap.

All of this is really designed to prevent memory usage from hitting close to 100% with normal usage and causing large amounts of paging, which is what typically causes computers to become “slow”.

Red M@ Said,

May 22nd, 2009 @8:57 pm

#40 is a great way to get a higher quality/cheaper machine if you research parts/shop for deals. Plus you start with a clean Windows install and don’t need #13!

#7 may not be “faster” if you do a lot of searching, esp. in Vista with start menu search.

#16 I wouldn’t recommend. Instead if you get excessive UAC prompts, give yourself higher permissions in folders that make sense, such as the Start Menu. UAC is needed to use IE or Chrome sandbox mode.

#67 May actually slow desktop response if you have a fast video card. Windows 7 also stores the image of each window solely in VRAM, which means turning off Aero would use MORE main memory.

#81 seems contrary to this article. For the computer savvy, not running antivirus helps a lot, especially on older machines.

#86 may make a machine run faster, and be better in the long run, but the learning curve will definately make the user less efficent in the short term. Learning curve length would vary quite a bit, depending on what kinds of software someone uses and would have to learn replacements for. If Computer = web browser = Firefox, then the switch could be pretty quick/painless. In my personal experience, Linux (Gnome) seems less responsive than Windows, but of course that’s just one measure of speed.

Grizzlyironbear Said,

May 23rd, 2009 @9:18 am

OK…i have been in the computer repair/installation world since about 99. i have watched the evolution of the OS’s…*nix open source OS, The Microsoft OS, and the Apple OS. So….that being said, YES there has been issues with Windows…and the other companies have practically shouted about it since the creation of Windows.

What better way to hide one’s own flaws than go NUTS about someone elses? The thing they all have seemed to overlook…is that even with all the flaws Windows has….it is still the “easiest, most User friendly OS” out there. Look me in the eye and tell me that the average joe will be able to sit down at a *nix computer and get it to do what he wants. And don’t get me started on the Macintosh/Apple OS.

SO…in argument, YES windows has issues…but rather than just saying “go with *nix” because it happened to work for you…why not use your obvious knowledge of computing skills….and HELP someone!

Anonymous Said,

June 3rd, 2009 @2:21 pm

All but maybe 10 of these aren’t even a problem in Linux because Linux, unlike Windows, isn’t broken in its design.

Blade Said,

June 8th, 2009 @9:36 am

What an awesome post!
Loved it!Really helping!You rock computer geek!
Keep sharing these kinda stuff!

GDI Said,

June 14th, 2009 @11:46 am

Switching to Ubuntu Linux definitely resolves the issues. It is much faster and infinitely more stable than any Windows OS. I mention Ubuntu simply because it is the most popular and easy to use for the vast majority of users out there. I meant no disrespect to the other Linux distributions out there as there are many good Linux distros.

meisert Said,

June 14th, 2009 @4:50 pm

I’ve gone through a defrag after making an image backup of my system and my Windows XP system is running much quicker. Thanks for the tips. So far this seems to be the best laid out list of Windows performance tips I’ve found on the web. Just read one comment regarding Windows being the easiest to use and strongly disagree. I’ve been using the FREE Ubuntu OS for some time and find it easier to use and much faster then Windows. The only hangup is when you come accross a program that’s not ported to a Linux distro. But that the fault of the app Vendor not the OS.

Deepak2455 Said,

June 29th, 2009 @7:28 am

Thanks….. These are very useful tips

AJ Said,

July 12th, 2009 @4:35 am

Thank you for this helpful post. I appreciate your willingness to share knowledge instead of keeping it to yourself.

Now I’m enjoying the benefits of your article.

filetonic Said,

July 12th, 2009 @8:23 pm

Wow 99 ways, now if only we can find a software that will automate at least half of these important but admittedly mundane tasks. This is some really great research, and how to speed up ones pc is about one of the most asked computer tech questions – Well done!

Prasanth Chandra Said,

July 13th, 2009 @5:38 am

useful list. If you follow 5 important maintenance tasks, you can always increase the performance of your computer.

Check out..

pcsplace.com/tips-n-tricks/5-maintenance-tasks-that-improve-performance-of-computer/

Alastair Said,

July 15th, 2009 @4:42 pm

Thanks a lot for this!
I really was getting tired of my pc being slow.
And for all saying this doesn’t work, I am witnessing my PC get faster with every point.

Thanks!

SharonB Said,

August 1st, 2009 @11:22 am

Great Tips – I will be trying these out tonight, thanks

Shame about the negative comments above…

Sharon

alan Said,

August 2nd, 2009 @8:45 am

I use Linux.

Fast. Reliable.

Almost impossible to break, in fact I have never broken it with all the fiddling I do – installing/uninstalling all the FREE software to try out new things.

And over a year down the line, it is still as fast as ever and never once had a system freeze etc.

As a windows user all my life prior to this, the last straw was buying a new laptop with Vista on it and realising how slow and inefficient it was out of the box and just didn’t do what I wanted it to do (watch and recode video etc. etc.).

Dual booting with Linux and I can’t remember the last time I booted into Vista… don’t need to as the software (which is OpenSource and free) on Linux is generally (99% of the time) MUCH better than the windows equivalents and just works without tweaking, fiddling around etc.

Best of all… it is FREE.

Microsoft has had it’s day.

If I owned MS shares, I would definately have sold or be looking for other places to invest my money.

Google is bringing out it’s own OS soon as well.

Microsoft’s answer? Windows 7 and another large bill for PC users to carry on using a second rate OS.

Rant over!

Bilbo Said,

August 16th, 2009 @12:03 am

I love how the Mac cultists suggest that OSX is actually faster without actually using a well-optimized XP on the same PC to compare. I have OSX and XP (with Litestep) on this Macbook. XP simply runs rings around OSX. And everything takes less clicks. Mac people make me laugh.

Deadly Furby Said,

August 26th, 2009 @3:09 pm

Comment by: Prasanth Chandra, July 13th, 2009 @5:38 am
“Check out.. pcsplace.com/tips-n-tricks/5-maintenance-tasks-that-improve-performance-of-computer/”

Site is listed as potentially Deadangerous by WOT.

geeknik Said,

August 26th, 2009 @11:34 pm

#9 is wrong. Even Microsoft has debunked this.

#10 is unnecessary and can even make your PC unbootable.

#20 will actually slow down your PC and cause your PC to boot slower. Leave the prefetch files alone.

#21 is pointless. What is it gonna do, shave 1/10th of a second off your boot time? Give me a break.

#23 can cause programs to hang, crash, etc. Don’t do this.

#25 System Restore is priceless. Don’t disable this. You might regret it one day no matter how many backups you have.

Show me proof that #27 and #28 do anything.

#39 is smoke and mirrors and can actually cause your browsing to slow down and/or not work at all.

I’m not even going to continue through this list. Thumbs down from me.

If you want to speed up your computer, buy more RAM. It’s cheap.

Anonymous Said,

August 27th, 2009 @1:45 am

It actually amazes me how I could reduce a list of 99 fixes to maybe 10 or 15 when I just use something other than Windows.

Anonymous Said,

August 27th, 2009 @2:05 am

Oh, and to all the anti-Linux naysayers in the comments saying its too hard: I’ve successfully converted several people who are far from tech savvy. When they have problems (Only happened a few times.) I have no issues helping them fix it.

And the ONLY reason Windows is “user friendly,” so-called, is because you’ve USED it extensively. Many a /. poster has pointed out that if the situation were reversed and we all grew up on Linux we’d be bashing Windows as the steep learning curve and praising Linux as the “user friendly,” so-called, operating system.

“User friendly” is a myth.

stonetree Said,

August 28th, 2009 @10:47 pm

Great tips…. definitely noticed less sluggishness with my system.. thanks…

dudebro Said,

August 29th, 2009 @6:57 pm

this really helped my computer….my virus scan detected a trojan horse virus from one of your error fixing links…

Peter Said,

August 31st, 2009 @8:03 pm

Linux.
Skinny Puppy, Browser Puppy,
Freakishly fast on my 700 Mhz dumpster Pc.

UBUNTU is idiot proof and user friendly…a little bloated but you can
whittle it down and the new one (Fawn or Jackalope) loves faster new PCs. Even found my wireless with no problem.

Great list, I still have windows cowering in the dark on a dual boot, I may let it out to see the light of day.

Mac Truck Said,

September 11th, 2009 @10:15 am

The only real way to make a PC go faster is to make sure you are on a higher floor when you drop it out the window!!

Dude, get a Mac.

dotndot Said,

September 19th, 2009 @2:03 pm

Good post…I will bookmark this post.Thank you.

Joshua Said,

September 30th, 2009 @2:29 pm

Some mediocre to flat out bad advice in this article. I’d say 1/5th or so of these methods are actually valid enough to work and not break a computer if a novice is performing these steps.

I’m with the guy that says to take a few computer classes, and never post something like this unless you are an IT professional.

Which yes, I am.

macssuck Said,

October 4th, 2009 @8:12 pm

give me a good reason why macs are soo good? just because everyone says so? Watch pirates of the valley, Steve Jobs is worse than Gates! face the truth!

Jim Said,

October 24th, 2009 @7:02 pm

This is excellent. Finally all the ways to speed up Windows in one place.

theska Said,

October 29th, 2009 @3:55 am

Great Post. I’m going to subscribe on your feeds.

Caitlin8765 Said,

October 31st, 2009 @9:24 pm

Thank you very much – 99 ways i was looking for maybe a few ways to sort out my vista – taking ages to load up……i have bookmarked this for future ref.

Oto24 Said,

November 12th, 2009 @7:53 am

That’s a great list of performance tips! I’ll come again and again

mouratios Said,

November 19th, 2009 @1:52 am

Thnx for the tips! really helpful optimizing my xp:)

theboss Said,

December 3rd, 2009 @2:45 pm

hmm, its funny how to make a pc run faster you need to install 99 programs which will make the pc run slower than before!

hakim Said,

December 6th, 2009 @7:11 pm

A complete list of Windows tweaks. What I do to my PC is defrag regularly, use ccleaner, and never use windows Aero

mwild Said,

December 12th, 2009 @12:57 pm

Since reading all the above comments could someone pick out the (lets say ) the best five optimization tips to use…

Codename Said,

December 15th, 2009 @6:57 pm

Thanks for compiling this list. It depends on us whether to use it or not. As for ID “geeknik”, perhaps u should try the modification before u disagree with it! I’ve done SOME of the ways above even before I read this list and they work fine!

stevae Said,

December 17th, 2009 @10:43 pm

To all of the linux and mac users, you are sooooo full of crap!!!!! I have several friends who use both mac’s osx and linux ubuntu (or however it’s spelled), and we frequently get together to test our computers against each other. I am running win 7 ultimate, and i kick their butt’s every single time.

No matter what they come up with, i always beat them. Ubuntu may be a faster os, but it can’t do squat! It is boring, and doesn’t have half of the abilities or programs to do the things i want to do. The mac’s take several more click’s, and are consistently slower at everything we try. The only thing i give mac’s credit for, is the multi-finger mouse funcx’s. Those are cool. But the linux is so limited in what you can do with it, i wouldn’t even load it as a dual boot os.

Almost all of the problems people have with windows is operator error. For instance, so many people complaining before about the user account security notices in vista… turn them off! It took two clicks! Others saying they can’t find things in vista. Type anything into the search box on the start menu, and it appears as you type. Done! Maybe if half of those people had a brain, and some common sense they wouldn’t have so many problems.

I will put my win 7 ult os, up against anyone else os, any place, any time! All of you linux and mac users, can kiss my cache!!!!!!!!

Prashant Said,

December 25th, 2009 @12:10 am

It would be real nice if you could come up with a list like the above for MAC’s as well.

acilden Said,

December 28th, 2009 @3:31 pm

Thanks for all the performance tips! see you next time:):):):)

tonyh730 Said,

December 29th, 2009 @10:21 am

If I install Linux in my PC, will I still be able to reinstall my old programs or will I have to find the Linux versions? Because if thats the case, why would I want to bother with Linux just because its faster, but I wont be able to work my programs.

Adam Said,

January 1st, 2010 @4:45 pm

I can almost summarize all of these tips into one! Install windows 7

Malika Said,

January 8th, 2010 @11:38 pm

My computer was starting up very slow, but after disabling some built-in Windows services, the computer started up a lot faster. Of course, you have to make sure you disable only the appropriate services, but it’s definitely worth reading into and implementing!

Peg Salvage Said,

January 13th, 2010 @8:49 pm

Great list! I’d never heard of Teracopy before – I’ll have to check it out.

You can also check out our site to improve startupspeed.com.

_khAttAm_ Said,

January 22nd, 2010 @4:02 pm

Sorry, I did not bother to read the original post as it does not apply to me (I don’t use Windows)

@stevae
I’m sure you are smarter than your friends who use Linux and Mac. A smart person may be able to do a lot of work faster and better with DOS (with some utilities installed) than a person, with Windows 7, who has never used a computer. So does that mean DOS is the better OS?

I also have many friends who use Windows 7 and I have seen and used their PCs. Most of them re-install Windows on a regular basis. Almost all of them use Antivirus softwares and keep them updated. Some of the smart ones use various kinds of optimization tools and techniques to make it “run faster”. I have seen the speeds in their PCs.

I have also seen RAM and CPU utilization of Windows 7 and I know it is much worse than Mac OS X, Snow Leopard, leave alone Linux.
Unlike you, I can’t put myself against anyone Windows or OS X, coz many smart people are using those OS too. However, I would like to suggest those to try Linux and see how it works for them. Once they get a grip of it, any smart person will never look back, I’m sure.

I have used Windows all my life, before I moved on to Ubuntu and I find nothing difficult here. Since I don’t have much time for games and all, I don’t actually miss Windows (when I do have time for games, I play Assaultcube on Ubuntu). I am also not into any profession that requires applications that run on Windows. And I am really lucky.

I can’t force anyone to use Linux, if you’re not willing to, but if you are tired of Viruses/trojans/spywares/malwares and Antiviruses/Antispyware/AntiRootkits, reinstallations due to unsolvable(or very difficult to solve) errors or gradual slowing down of the OS, registry cleaners and system optimizers, then you should give Linux a try.

@tonyh730
Wait for Windows 8. You need to reinstall Windows at least then, so you will need newer versions of all those programs and maybe even a new PC (they won’t tell you you will need a new PC, but you will realize when you use Windows 8 for a week). Then you can safely migrate to Linux.

@those who think Linux is problematic
I love solving problems. I used Windows and I got problems of Viruses and Trojans frequently, not to mention many other problems that came along. I solved my problems and felt happy about it.

After getting bored with the same problems again and again, I moved on to Ubuntu Linux(as the only OS in my PC) and I got so few problems that I again got bored with it. I then starting using development versions of Ubuntu, as they are supposed to have problems. I’m currently running Ubuntu Lucid Lynx Alpha 2 and use development version of Firefox, Pidgin and many other packages, but I haven’t gotten to face much problems.

However, I have found a way around this. Now, I have started getting into problems that I can deal with at regular basis. I have started working (software development) on my PC to solve my client’s problems.

someone Said,

January 29th, 2010 @8:46 pm

defragmentation and registry cleaning: DEFINITELY NOT! It does more damage than it does good – also the time taken to run a defrag is much more then you will ever get from the speed boost. Cleaning the registry does actually nothing. There are millions of keys in there – deleting some 1000 wont even give you a boost of 1 ms!

Actually, dont use any “speeding up tools”! They wont bring any relevant benefits and will destroy your system in the means of long term usage. Giving you 1 sec fater loading times spanned over one hour is pretty much useless – dont you think?

Just tune the windows’s inbuilt settings – no more! There are pretty neat tricks, you can do with a regedit and actually most ppl (including “tune-up-tool-authors”) dont even know them. You will have to google, as these are hardware dependend!

@ the windows guy, competing against linux: You actually cannot beat linux with anything above win 2000. Not in security and not in performance. Believe me, I tried to beat some linux guys at university. It was no problem with win 2000, but i couldnt get win XP to perform as good as win 2000. Vista and win7 are total fail, when it comes to performance.

@_khAttAm_ : wise words!

Hulla Said,

February 3rd, 2010 @9:35 pm

Thanks for this article, now I can hopefully make my computer run faster! It’s definitely going to take some time to go through all these performance tips though!

John Citizen Said,

February 9th, 2010 @5:10 am

Try defragmenting your computer to make it gain a bit of speed. Free, no download requierd, it comes with all Windows computers (maybe with Mac, I’m not quite sure!)

sandeep Said,

February 21st, 2010 @9:06 pm

my pc is slow although i have “core 2 duo” processer.

bees Said,

February 24th, 2010 @2:48 pm

Wow. I didn’t realize there were SO MANY IT professionals out there. You have to wonder, if these guys know everything about computer performance, then why are they searching how to make their computers faster and ultimately wind up on THIS page?? People amaze me. You are either part of the problem, or part of the solution. Thanks for writing this blog. It helped alot.

Vsaket Said,

March 3rd, 2010 @1:54 am

Thanks for the post. I am not too much into tech but face the problem of a slow computer. This will be helpful.

Regards
Saket

stinky Said,

March 6th, 2010 @3:00 pm

lots of good tips lots of bad ones as well…
registry cleaners often do more harm than good. theyre just programs and dont have the human judgement as to whether to remove a key or not. they often use the date of last access as to decide whether to remove a key or not. if you know what you are doing its much better to do it by hand… though considering the number of entries in the registry… good luck fully cleaning it out lol. still a good thing to do though.

bootvis has had a lot more benefits attributed to it than it actually grants. it can optimize boot time quickly initially but doesnt help much after that.

prefetch… ill leave that alone everybody has complained about that tip enough

the max connections per server is a VERY VERY good tip. i have a netbook that used to have very slow internet and can now easily stream video with a low connection strength on wireless g.

working on services is hit and miss. most run in the background and dont use up much memory anyway and are more good than bad. but there are several memory hogs that arent really justified *coughindexingcough*

if you have enough ram using largesystemcache can be good. once again hit and miss, it can be WORSE for some programs.

for secondary ide channels in the device manager in the same menus where you enable dma, you have an option above about looking for ide devices. if you dont use ide devices a lot switch it to “none”. you will of course have to enable it if you DO want to run an ide device. this can speed boot time slightly.

in bios you can do 2 things even in a very basic bios like phoenix trustedcore… sigh… unfortunately i have that one… you can enable it to boot quickly and skip some basic tests. and you can also change the order of devices to boot from. normally it searches for external drives to boot from first. unless youre upgrading your bios from said external drives during this boot youre wasting time checking. speed up the boot by booting from your hard drive first.

also for the virtual memory… well its not really virtual memory to be splitting hairs here. virtual memory is the memory that is made up of your physical memory AND your paging memory. what youre altering here is paging memory. yes good advice set it to the same size or windows will constantly resize it. adding to that its good to put your paging memory on a separate hard drive if youve got 2 or a separate partition.

Beth Said,

March 6th, 2010 @10:08 pm

Definitely the most comprehensive “Make Your Computer Faster” list I’ve seen so far. I bookmarked this.

drreamsburnred Said,

March 9th, 2010 @12:39 am

*100 format hard drive
*101 install ubuntu

kmdennis Said,

March 18th, 2010 @1:53 pm

I am sorry for commenting on this article so late but I just read it. If you go through the list, you will find that probably a half are just the same advice repeated with a slight variation. This is ridiculous and a waste of time. Take for example 18,3,19,54.

Scan your system using antivirus.
Scan your system using free antivirus.,
Scan your system using something like McAfee, Avast, Avira, etc.
Clean the system using a free antispyware.
Scan using a freeware suvch as Malwarebytes, Antispyware etc,

Shutdown unnecessary windows service,
Shut down indexing.
Shutdown some unneeded service.

I mean just go over this list and I am sure it can be reduced to less than 30 and you would still not have missed any.

For example, you have maybe 4 items referencing defrag. Defrag your your system. That would take care of 1: defrag prefetch, 2:defrag filesyste, 3:defrag registry, 4:defrag pagefile. I hope you see how frustrated this can get even when well intended.

maja Said,

April 14th, 2010 @7:09 pm

ok all of your work is blazingly helpful! thanks for the tips on speeding up my computer!

Asif Said,

April 15th, 2010 @6:04 pm

Amazing list, you covered everything. Surely need to give it a try. thanks.

Shora Said,

April 15th, 2010 @10:12 pm

thanks for sharing this article, it seems very interesting. Hopefully it speeds up my PC.

Tobias Said,

April 21st, 2010 @5:53 am

Wipe out Windows in favor of Ubuntu to get a faster computer? Certainly never worked for me on any computer. XP and 7 both fly like birds (the latter pretty low though), and Ubuntu keeps slugging like a snail. Xubuntu is marginally better.

However, I have no argument against… that Linux and Mac’s might absolutely get an advantage over Windows a couple of months after install for the “average” non computer savvy user, who has generally little clue on how to avoid getting those five browser toolbars, two rootkits and ten trojans which all somehow managed to get by the resident antivirus in Windows.

n.zada Said,

April 22nd, 2010 @4:29 am

this is very useful for people who have slow PCs. Thanks a lot to whoever wrote this!

Pandr Said,

April 24th, 2010 @12:39 pm

Giving a non-IT professional simple tools like those above will teach them to keep their computer clean and give them some basic understanding of how adding garbage to thier machine affects system speed. I meet people everyday that are frustrated becuase they can literally take a shower while thier machine loads because they have never performed basic maintenance on machines they bought years ago. Teach a man to fish and he can feed his family for life, isn’t that in like 99 different religious texts?

pcExpert Said,

April 29th, 2010 @12:52 am

* Make sure you install and run only trusted 3d party software/application.
* DO NOT download then install software if 1 or 2 people say ‘it’s good’ etc. Compare the software with other software and read reviews/comment about the software you look at.
* The important thing is, make sure you add “Assistant” to your pc. The “Assistant” will help your 30% of your job to take care of the pc. You may choose “Assistant” like Tuneup Utilities or etc to help you. Other “Assistant” on your computer are Antivirus, Antispyware, Firewall.
* Do “spotcheck” to your pc once a week.

Zin Said,

May 3rd, 2010 @4:32 pm

thnkzz…..the tips were useful for my pc!!

Palla Said,

May 4th, 2010 @12:32 pm

Nice tips for increasing speed.

Chris Sanders Said,

May 10th, 2010 @12:16 pm

Ive tried to install linux but i couldnt get it to install right so if anyone has any tips or hell even a guide on doing it please email me at joexminion@yahoo.com I.E i was trying to install ubuntu linux kernel. Thanks!

ASHWIN Said,

May 10th, 2010 @2:38 pm

Thanks, nice set of tricks for speeding up a PC

Liam Said,

May 11th, 2010 @1:20 am

Thanks a lot for the great list of performance tips!

T1na Said,

May 11th, 2010 @4:44 am

Binny V A …. Thank you for your tip – it worked immediately!!!! Now, I still have to try the 99 tips that were graciously compiled… to make my computer go faster. Now, if only I could I could figure out a way to: 1) not get (Program not responding) often and 2) sometimes when internet is loading a webpage that takes too long to open, I try to press “Stop”, but it does not stop or let me go back or refresh or…

Liam Said,

May 11th, 2010 @4:32 pm

wow, yes, I applied just some of these methods and the difference is really big, even if I don’t like to turn it on and off very often, now it does it really really fast.

chefcolby Said,

May 12th, 2010 @5:22 pm

one of the easiest programs i use to speed up my computer is tune up utilities. it does half of these things maybe more all by its self just install the trial and go through it and do everything.

arturo74r Said,

May 20th, 2010 @3:21 pm

This list does a good job of outlining several tips to increase performance. However, I agree some of this tips are useless and could cause problems. For all you linux/mac lovers groupies I can say that they are faster OS but they are not as great as people portrait them.

The solution? there is not a clear one but I would advise updating to windows 7. Windows vista was a fail. However, the 64-bit version worked fine for me for a while but Windows 7 is an improved version of vista. Try to think of it like an improved XP with vista features and some more.

Linux is great. I have used it and I love it. It is really fast but the software available for it is limited. What I find funny is all the linux and mac users commenting in a “99 ways to make your computer blazingly fast” site. If your linux or mac computer is so blazingly fast like you say, what the hell are you doing here??

Mac is just plain nonsense. I mean the OS is nice and all but why would anybody spend twice as much in getting a underrated computer? And the software availabe for it is even more limited.

Bottom line: If your computer is slow and should not be the best thing you can do is back up your data, reformat your hard drive and do a fresh install whether it’s xp or win 7. I would recommend while you are at it make it a dual boot with ubuntu or gentoo linux and try it out. I’m sure you will love it, they are easy to use. You will find yourself using linux more often and using windows only when needed.

crazybishal1 Said,

May 26th, 2010 @10:11 am

Hey, these tricks made my pc blazingly fast!!!!!!

Mariana Said,

May 28th, 2010 @9:50 am

“If you don’t care about all the fancy visual effects in Windows, you can turn them off by going to Performance Options.”

I had a brand new Vista PC last year, and I think I did not spend a minute working on it without looking for the way to disable all those sweet graphics that were eating my resources!

I did a quick format and went back to XP SP2 after a couple of weeks.

PS:
I see you recommend the Windows Disk Cleanup utility. Does it work with Vista?
I’m pretty sure that it does not work with XP SP3, so I assumed I would not work with newer Windows versions.

Marin Said,

June 1st, 2010 @4:38 am

Get linux. I use the Ubuntu distro.. never had to do any of the things in this list. And, for those keeping windows because mico$hit says you can’t play games on linux, well.. i play all my games on linux + wine and is working better than windows.

pcExpert Said,

June 17th, 2010 @7:33 pm

why were my comment cutted? Is it too long?