1/17/14 How to Make Your Computer Run Faster: 21 Steps (with Pictures)

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How to Make Your Computer Run Faster
Windows Macintosh
Have you noticed that your computer runs slower than before? Or just slowly in
general? Try these strategies to make your Windows or Mac computer run
faster.
1
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Check your hard disk space. As a rule, you want to keep at least 15% of the hard
disk space free to keep the computer running smoothly. Simply go to My Computer,
right-click on Hard Drive, and go to Properties. There you'll see a pie chart of your free
versus used space. If its mostly full, you'll want to start by removing unnecessary programs
and files; if its not, you probably want to tackle the actual way your computer operates.
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Method 1 of 2: Windows
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2
Remove any programs you do not use. Go to Control Panel > Add or Remove
Programs (or Uninstall a Program, depending on your operating system) to find a
master list of programs installed on your computer. Some things will strike you as useless
immediately, in which case you can remove them right away. Others wont look familiar to
you and may require you some research.
It may help to see how often you use the program. If you right-click one of the
column titles above your program list (ex. Name, Publisher, Size, Installed On,
etc.), you should be able to add additional characteristics by which to judge your
programs. For example, find Last Used On on the list of options and check it; a
column displaying the last time you used each program will now appear and can
also be used to sort your programs. Some programs will not have been used in
years and may be candidates for deletion.
When in doubt, don't remove anything you dont recognize; it may be critical to the
function of your computer and if you delete twelve different things only to discover
that your computer no longer works properly, it will be very difficult to determine
where exactly you went wrong.
Don't forget to empty your recycling bin.
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3
Prevent unnecessary programs from starting when the computer boots. The
more programs try to run while your computer initializes, the slower everything will be.
Revise your startup programs by altering your system configuration via MSConfig.
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4
5
Install an anti-virus program, spyware scanner, and an anti-malware also
Microsoft Security essentialls works very wll. The fewer bugs, viruses, and bits of
adware your computer has to manage, the more time it will have to devote to other
processes. While you're at it, make a point of keeping Windows up-to-date; not only will this
keep Windows itself in better shape, but some viruses ride in on Windows updates that are
downloaded way after the fact (and therefore not monitored as closely).
Run a Disk Cleanup. This can clean up hundreds of megabytes of temporary files
sometimes even gigabytes (if you have Windows XP, Vista, or 7). It will also open a
window in which you can chose what to delete. Go to My Computer, right-click the Hard
Drive and select Properties, and then click Disc Cleanup (within the General tab). Check
all the boxes except for the game files and setup files.
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6
7
Run a Disk Defragment. This will reconfigure the way the hard drive stores
information for maximum efficiency. Go to My Computer, right-click the Hard Drive
and select Properties, then go to the Tools tab and click Defragment Now.
Check for any disk errors. These will also slow your computer down. Go to My
Computer, right-click the Hard Drive and select Properties, then go to the Tools
tab and click Check Now under the Error-Checking area. When the dialogue box opens,
check both boxes.
If you get a window saying that Windows can't check the disk while it's in use, click
on Schedule Disk Check and then OK. It will run on your next reboot.
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8
9
Turn off indexing. Go to My Computer, right-click the Hard Drive and select
Properties, then unclick the box indicating that the drive should be indexed. Don't do
this if you actually use any of the Windows Search functionality. The background indexing is
what makes those searches fast and Windows is already very good about not getting in
your way to do indexing while you're trying to do something else.
Clear your Prefetch folder. Windows saves a file of the program you are using to
make it start up faster. After years of use, this folder gets stuffed with irrelevant
programs.
Open Notepad and type:
del C:\Windows\Prefetch\*.* /Q
Rundll32.exe advapi32.dll,ProcessIdleTasks (Copy and paste this text to
ensure you dont make any mistakes.)
Save as faster.bat (the .bat extension will run it as a batch file).
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10
Run it! Simply double-click the file to initialize. In a few moments, the command
prompt will disappear and your programs should run more smoothly.
Change Prefetch Parameters. This a dangerous task to complete unless you
follow these steps exactly. If you're not sure about anything, dont continue.
Go to Start > Run and type regedit to initialize the registry editor.
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Go to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE>SYSTEM>CurrentControlSet>Control>Session
Manager>Memory Management>Prefetch Parameters to access the
parameters.
Double-click EnablePrefetcher. Once the new window pops up, there should be a
small, editable text box with the number 3 in it. (Windows allows 4 options: 0, 1, 2
and 3.) 3, the default, fetches everything.
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Change this to 2. Your PC will boot a lot faster and your PC performance shouldn't
be affected.
Click OK and then close regedit.
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11
12
Add RAM to your computer. To see if you need more RAM, initialize the
Windows Task Manager by pressing CTRL+ALT+DELETE. Under the
Performance tab, find the area devoted to Physical Memory. If the Free amount hovers
around zero but the computer is still slow, you may need to take your computer in to add
RAM or even add more RAM yourself.
Restart your computer. The computer usually needs to reboot to implement
changes.
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13
14
Remove gadgets you don't use. All gadgets that are running slow down your
computer.
Log off the users who do not want the computer. Switch user your account
then if you see that many users are logged in, log them off.
Method 2 of 2: Macintosh
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1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Check your hard disk space. As a rule, you want to keep around 30% of the hard
disk space free to keep things running smoothly. Simply right-click the Hard Drive
icon on your desktop and go to Get Info.
Uninstall unnecessary programs. You can either uninstall them manually or
download a program to help you sort and delete them. Some things will strike you as
useless immediately, in which case you can remove them right away. Others wont look
familiar to you and may require you to do some research.
When in doubt, don't remove anything you dont recognize; it may be critical to the
function of your computer and if you delete twelve different things only to discover
that your computer no longer works properly, it will be very difficult to determine
where exactly you went wrong.
Delete files you don't need. Unless you have very little storage space on your
computer or simply have an abundance of unnecessary documents, deleting small
files won't make much of an impact on your computers overall function. However, any large
files like movies you never watch, photos you don't need, or songs you never listen to can
really gum up the works and should definitely be removed.
Don't forget to empty your trash bin.
Prevent unnecessary programs from starting when the Mac boots. The more
programs try to run while your computer initializes, the slower everything will be. Go to
System > Preferences > Accounts > Login Items. Select any items you dont need and
click the minus (-) sign to remove them.
Repair the disk. Go to Applications > Utilities > Run Disk Utility to repair both the
disk and the disk permissions. Its a good idea to run this once a month or at least
once every few months.
Remove unnecessary dashboard widgets. Even if you dont have the dashboard
activated, these widgets can eat up RAM by running background updates while you try to
do other things.
If you have OS X 10.4.2 or later, simply use the Widget Manager: go to the
Dashboard and open the Widget Bar by clicking the plus (+) sign; click Manage
Widgets and then either deselect widgets to disable them or, if theyre third-party
widgets, remove them completely by pressing the red delete button, which is a
circle with a line through it, and click OK to confirm.
If you use Mac OS X, download a free program called Monolingual. With OS X,
much of your computers hard disk is devoted to virtual memory and gets eaten up by
language-availability software. Monolingual will allow you to remove languages you dont
use on in order to free up space.
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Never delete system32 files on Windows! These are critical to
running the OS correctly and will break your computer.
Do not delete "shared" files! Sometimes, a program you dont want
shares files with programs you do want, making those files unsuitable for
deletion. Deleting the incorrect shared file can have wide-ranging
consequences.
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Categories: Featured Articles | System Maintenance and Repair
Recent edits by: Tonielgarcia2012, Anna, Chris
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