Speed up your computer

SPEED UP YOUR COMPUTER WITHOUT SPENDING A DIME!

I have performed this procedure on several of my friends and relatives' computers. I have finally decided to put it in writing so you can do it yourself. By following these simple steps using free
shareware software. You can make your computer run as fast or faster than new. Try this before you buy overpriced software advertised on TV that may or may not work.

OVERVIEW

Over time we tend to collect our share of Malware, Adware and viruses.Our computers come from the vendor packed with unwanted software. Our start up menus often get loaded up with unnecessary applications that automatically load at startup. Windows and application programs leave temporary files on your hard drive, taking up space needlessly. A hard drive that is close to being full can cause Windows to act weird, and will slow down disk access and virtual memory operations. When you surf the web you pick up hundreds of Temp files. your temporary internet files folder can become huge, causing Internet Explorer to slow down or malfunction. This procedure will help you deal with all of these problems using free software.

STEP ONE. BACK UP YOUR IMPORTANT DATA.

There is a remote chance that you may hose up your computer during this process. You don't want to lose these files.
I am a firm believer in attaching an exterior hard drive and backing up my hard to replace photos of the children, Mp3's etc. I purchased a Hard drive case on eBay and used an old hard drive an old computer for an external drive. My cost; about fifteen bucks not counting the hard drive. If you don't want to go that route use CD's, DVD's or flash drives to back up your hard to replace files.
In my opinion all hard drives will fail sooner or later. Data backed up on your primary hard drive is not really backed up!

STEP TWO. Set a restore point.

Go to START\ ALL PROGRAMS\ACCESSORIES\SYSTEM TOOLS\ SYSTEM RESTORE\CREATE RESTORE POINT.
Now if something doesn't work out the way we want we can start over.

STEP THREE. GET THE LATEST WINDOWS UPDATES.

To get the latest updates & configure your system for automatic updates, open Internet Explorer,
click on Tools, then Windows Update.

STEP FOUR. REMOVE VIRUSES AND MALWARE

Viruses and Malware can slow down your system , they consume resources to generate popup ads, send spam, and slow useful programs.
Download,install,update and run AVG Free
Do a full system scan. This will take several hours. I typically start the scan at the end of the
day and let it run after I'm through with the computer for the day. I let the program remove all
cookies etc. in addition to malware and viruses.
HINT: Do this every week or so.

Download, install, update and run Ad-Aware If AVG missed anything Ad-aware will probably catch it.

STEP FIVE. REMOVE UNNEEDED SOFTWARE USING WINDOWS TOOLS

You probably have several software packages on your hard drive that are no longer needed. Chances are your computer came with a ton of free trial software etc that you don't want or need. As we surf the internet we also tend to pick up a number of software packages that we don't use. The majority of the time these automatically load and run in the background for our "convenience".
Go to Control Panel, then Add/Remove Software to see what packages are installed. Remove the ones you know you don't need, and do a web search to learn about the ones you're not sure about.

STEP SIX. TAKE CONTROL OF WHAT PROGRAMS ARE RUNNING.

You may be surprised at how many programs automatically run at start up. This is one reason it takes so long for your computer to boot up.
NOTE, I RECOMMEND THAT YOU SET A RESET POINT BEFORE YOU PROCEED TO THE NEXT STEP!
We are going to work with your registry. You can screw up your computer if you remove the wrong program from startup.
Download & update CCCleaner. Click Startup You will see a list of programs that automatically load and run at startup. Right click any program that you don't want to run at startup. You can manually start them anytime you want. Choose disable to keep that program from starting and running automatically. If anything says Microsoft I typically leave it alone. If in doubt let it run for now.
Click UNINSTALL, you will see a long list of programs. Chances are you have never used some of them.
You may find some here that didn't show up in step Five Right click and choose Uninstall to remove the unwanted programs. If in doubt leave them alone. I typically leave anything that says Microsoft.
Click CLEANER, Choose which folders you want to clean. I typically leave all of the advanced
features unclicked. Under Internet Explorer I just choose temporary internet files and cookies. I
find that some of the other files are useful to me. Click ANALYZE, then RUN CLEANER.
STEP SEVEN. CLEAN UP AND DEFRAG YOUR HARD DRIVE.

At this point you have backed up your data, removed malware and viruses, stream lined your start up and removed unneeded software. You may consider taking a look at some of the photos, video clips, mp_3s etc that you have collected. The search function is handy for this. I recommend that you do a little house cleaning and delete duplicate files and ones you will never use. If in doubt, move them to an external source, CD, Floppy etc. Then delete them from your computer.
Whatever unnecessary files that the previous steps have missed may be deleted using the good old Windows Utilities.
CLOSE ALL PROGRAMS, ESPECIALLY YOUR SCREEN SAVER! Open My Computer, right_click on the C: Drive icon, select Properties, then click on Disk Cleanup.
To DEFRAG, open My Computer, right_click on the C: Drive icon, select Properties, then Tools. Click the Check Now button to scan your disk for errors. When the scan is complete, click the Defragment Now button to run the defrag, this reorganizes your hard drive so Windows can locate and access files faster.
Once again, this takes several hours so I start the defrag process running when I close up shop for the night.
At this point your computer will start up much faster and run like a new one when you restart it in the morning!

GENERAL INFORMATION
.
AD_AWARE
Another must_have piece of free software. Use it to remove spyware and Trojans get it at: http://www.lavasoft.com/products/ad_aware_free.php
To quote Lava_soft:
We keep you safe from password stealers, keyloggers, spyware, trojans, and other potential identity thieves. Control your privacy; Erase tracks left behind while surfing the Web, on browsers such as Internet Explorer, Opera, and Firefox, in one easy click.

Adobe Acrobat
The standard for PDF files. Big, slow, insists on updating every time you attempt to open a file.
Guaranteed to slow down your computer. Consider removing it from your startup list. Some people recommend Foxit instead.
Try a few adjustments in the Edit\preferences area. Set the correct internet speed, consider
choosing "Do not automatically check for critical updates" do it manually instead.
Automatic updates.
Many of your programs automatically search for updates. This can really slow your computer down. It is worth adjusting when your programs search for updates. Many have a default to search every time your computer boots up. Consider updating them manually.

AVG ANTIVIRUS
A great free antivirus protection software. Get it at: http://free.avg.com/ww.homepage
Protection against viruses and spyware (antivirus and antispyware)
Fast, effective security that is kind on resources
Compatible with Windows XP and Windows Vista

CC CLEANER
In my opinion it is a must_have piece of software. You can use it to clean up unneeded files, your registry and control which programs run at startup. It's free and there is an updated version that works with Vista.
Publisher's Description:
CCleaner is a freeware system optimization, privacy and cleaning tool. It removes unused files from your system _ allowing Windows to run faster and freeing up valuable hard disk space. It also cleans traces of your online activities such as your Internet history. Additionally it contains a fully featured registry cleaner and contains NO Spyware or Adware get it at: http://www.ccleaner.com/

INSTANT MESSENGER
I never use it so I disabled it at startup.

LIMEWIRE
Having a P2P app running in the background slows your internet access. Limewire is a little sneaky, when you click to close Limewire the window closes but the app keeps running. You have to click and close the little icon on the task bar also. Be really careful about this and other P2P programs. Make sure that you know which files you are sharing. People have been known to accidently share income tax returns, illegal mp3s etc by not paying attention to what files are being shared.

PICASA and other photo processing software.
If you do not use your photo editing software constantly make sure they do not start on boot up.
Picasa and other software scans various folders on your hardrive for new and modified photos. As a default hundreds of folders are scanned when you boot up and when you open a photo file. This slows your computer to a crawl while the process is underway.
You can speed up Picasa by setting which drives and folders Picasa scans. DO YOURSELF A FAVOR! LIMIT THIS TO ONLY SCAN FILES AND FOLDERS WHERE YOU WILL BE STORING PHOTOS THAT YOU WILL USE IN PICASA.
I like this free software however the default settings really slow your computer down.
You can determine which locations on your computer Picasa scans for photo files by using the Picasa Folder Manager.
(Click on TOOLS / FOLDER MANAGER.) You can change the status of folders being accessed by Picasa.
There are three states you can set for folder locations:
1. "Scan Always": Picasa will access all compatible image types and will access all newly added
photos. Picasa actively scans this folder for changes.
2. "Scan Once": Picasa will access all compatible image types once. It
will not detect new photos added to this folder.
3. "Remove from Picasa": Picasa will not look in locations set to
"Remove from Picasa" for photos. CHECK THE LOCATIONS ON THIS LIST REMOVE ANY LOCATIONS WHERE YOU DON'T STORE PICASA PHOTOS.

RAM and Virtual Memory NOT FREE BUT WORTH CONSIDERING
When you run of (RAM) memory, Windows will use part of your hard disk to create virtual memory. The virtual memory is a lot slower than real RAM. Find out how much your
system will hold (and you can afford) install the maximum amount.

AFTER YOU HAVE TAKEN THESE STEPS YOUR COMPUTER WILL RUN SIGNIFICANTLY FASTER. MINE ACTUALLY RAN FASTER THAN WHEN I BOUGHT IT!

TO SHOW YOUR UNDYING GRATITUDE TO ME FOR SHARING THIS INFO GO TO ONE OF MY ON-LINE STORES AND BUY SOMETHING:

Looking for a good deal on motorcycle gear?

YAHOO STORE: http://www.donscycleware.com
eBAY STORE: HTTP://BARGAINMOTORCYCLEGEAR.COM