Okay, you have a Quadore PC with 4GB of RAM. It’s a speed demon.. well, it used to be. Now, it’s barely a month old and already it takes twice as long to start up. You begin to wonder if the processor had gone schizo and started behaving like a 386DX-33. Do you buy a new system?
Of course not. You simply have to weed some autostarters that gunked up your system and massage a few system settings.
Here’s how to get back to speed:
Get Rid of Autostartup Programs
The key is to eradicate non essentials. The first step entails identiying autoloading programs. To view all of your autoloaders, select Start, then Run, type msconfig, and press ENTER . Click the Startup tab. This screen then lets uncheck any of the listed programs to keep them from autoloading.
Which ones should you eradicate? Definitely not your firewall, or security suite; maximum protection takes precedence over speed. Beyond this, you have discretion. Do you realy need Quicktime? Or adobe reader? Or that world clock? Unless you need them, remove them. You can shave off at least 10 seconds from bootup.
Eliminate Splash Screens and Sounds
Some essential software start up with splash screens and sounds. Remove these and you also speed up start up time. On my system, I have Eset SmartSecurity running. This great antivirus system loads with a splash screen that delays my access to a usable desktop. When I eliminated it (via Preferences) as well as all other miscellaneous windows start up sounds, I reached the desktop faster.
Buy 3GB of RAM and Kill the Swap File
Virtual memory is window’s answer to low memory situations. The problem is, it creates this phoney memory on a slow hard disc. Eliminate this bottleneck by adding extra memory (which is very cheap) and trash the swap file for good. Also, in the Advanced settings of the control panel, (System- Advanced- Performance), find the Memory Usage radio button. Tick the “Adjust or Best Performance of System Cache”. This allots more memory to accessing data files, which can speed up bootup and application access.
You might be wondering why 3GB. 3GB is the maximum usable by 32 bit systems. Beyond that, the memory can’t be manipulated by Windows. However, if you have a 64 bit system, go for the most memory you can get. Sky’s the limit!
Use Just One Security System
Many people run multiple antimalware software. I for instance, used to run Spybot, Eset and Threatfire all at once. I thought having multicore processors would make the speed drop negligible. I was wrong. When I eliminated Threatire and Spybot, my system yielded a usable desktop much faster and accelerated all processes across the board. System protection remained high with zero infections. Hence, I recommend just buying a single good security suite like Eset or Norton Security 2009 and leaving it at that. You’ll enjoy a leaner machine!
