If you have a day or 2, I highly recommend you to apply these strategies. Unlike other techniques, it might take 1 or 2 days to improve speed of computer. However, these strategies work better than shortcuts that work temporarily.
Step 1: Remove unused programs and files
A computer is like a library. The more books you have in a library, the harder it is to find the book that you want. When you have lots of files and programs installed in your PC, it will take time to find and load as well. By removing programs and files that you don’t use, your computer will run much faster.
To remove programs, you can use the following steps:
Click on “Start” menu
Choose “Settings”
Choose “Control Panel”
Choose “Add or Remove Programs”
Select Programs that you are not using anymore and uninstall or remove it.
To remove the files, just right click the file and delete. After deleting those files, make sure you empty your recycle bin by right clicking on “Recycle Bin” and choose “Empty Recycle Bin”.
Step 2: Move files to external drives
Move seldom or common used files to External Hard Disk or USB Flash Drives. This is also another step to reduce the “books” in your “library”. These tools are getting cheaper nowadays and very affordable. I highly recommend external hard disk because it has more space and not easy to lose it (people around the world are losing more than 1 million of USB flash drives almost every year).
Moving them is quite simple. Just select, cut and paste it on your external hard disk.
Step 3: Cleaning up your desktop
If you are just like me, you probably have tons of files, program shortcuts and folders on your desktop. It is very convenient and I totally understand it. But having lots of stuffs on your desktop will slow down your computer’s performance.
Cleaning up your desktop make require some planning. Create a folder on your desktop and name it as “Work” or “Studies”. You can create 2 or 3 more folders. Next, create more folders in those folders to organize all your files and programs. Keep a habit to organize your files into these folders.
Step 4: Detect errors and repair
If you have been using your computer for months, your hard drive might start to develop errors and bad sectors. These errors will slow down your computer. Fix this errors once a week by following these steps:
Click on “My Computer”
Right click the drive you use (normally Drive C)
Click on “Properties”
Click on the “Tools” tab
Click “Check Now” button
Check the box that says “Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors”
Fix if bad sectors are discovered.
Step 5: Defragment
This is a popular way to improve speed of computer. The steps to defragment are quite simple. Start with clicking on the “Start” menu, choose “All programs”, “Accessories”, “System Tools” and “Disk Defragment”. Click on “Analyze”. Once your computer finish analyzing, click on “Defragment”.
Step 6: Clear hidden Windows errors
About 90% of SLOW computers are cause by hidden Windows error. Cleaning these errors would be hard if done manually. Fortunately, There’re programs such as PC Speed Doctor to do it for you automatically.
Step 7: Overclocking
Overclocking is a way to hack your own hardware and increase their speed. Overclocking is quite technical too. If you are interested in this step, I highly recommend you to learn from Overclock Your CPU. The author teaches how you can increase processors from 1.9GHz to 3.5Ghz.
Other websites:
- Computer Fundamentals
- web design toronto
- Motorola Surfboard
- nikon digital cameras
