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If your computer seems slower than it used to be, it probably is.
Over time, computers get slower for a variety of reasons: files
become disorganized, unnecessary software consumes resources, unused
network drives slow startup, or too many programs automatically run
at startup. Larger, serious issues can dramatically slow your
computer's performance too. You may have a virus or need to
troubleshoot problems by clean booting.
Fortunately, Windows XP includes tools to clean your computer and
restore its performance. As I write this column, I'll be cleaning up
my own computer and explaining how its performance improves. I'll
cover Backup, Disk Cleanup, Disk Defragmenter, Add or Remove
Programs, and the System Configuration tool.
Back Up First
Back up your computer before you run any system tools or do any
troubleshooting. This is not just an over-cautious warning. Some of
the steps I recommend in this column can cause pre-existing but
hidden problems to surface, which may keep your computer from
starting. Windows XP includes Backup, a tool that helps you
protect your data.
To open the Backup or Restore Wizard
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Click Start, point to All Programs, point to
Accessories, point to System Tools, and then click
Backup.
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Before I make any changes, I'm going to time my computer to see
how long it takes to restart. That way I know which of the
changes helps the most. My computer took about three minutes to
shut down, restart, and then open my e-mail client and browser.
Of course, I hope to improve the computer's overall performance,
but the time it takes to restart is easiest to measure.
Clear Out Forgotten Programs
The first step in tuning up your computer's performance is to
remove any unnecessary programs. I install new programs all the
time. Sometimes I'm thrilled with the new program and I continue
to use it. Other times, it doesn't do what I hoped, and the
program sits on my computer consuming resources and hurting
performance.
Follow these steps to remove unneeded programs |
1 |
Click Start, and then click Control Panel. |
2 |
Click Add or Remove Programs. |
3 |
Scroll through the list and examine each program. Windows XP
lists how often you use a program and what day you last started
it. As shown in Figure 1, the Age of Mythology Trial is a good
candidate for removal from my computer. Though I liked the game,
I haven't used it recently and it's consuming a lot of disk
space. You shouldn't remove anything labeled as an Update or
Hotfix, however, because they improve the security of your
computer.
Figure 1: The Add or Remove Programs window.
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4 |
Click each program you no longer need, click the Remove
button, and then follow the prompts to uninstall it.
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You may have to restart
your computer after removing a program. After your computer
restarts, repeat the steps above to remove more programs.
Free Up Wasted Space
Removing unused programs is a great way to free up disk
space, which will speed up your computer. Another way to find
wasted disk space is to use the Disk Cleanup tool by
following these steps: |
1 |
Open My Computer, right-click Local Disk, and then
click Properties. |
2 |
On the General tab, click the Disk Cleanup button.
Disk Cleanup will spend a few minutes examining your disk. |
3 |
The Disk Cleanup dialog box opens. As you can see in
Figure 2, it found almost three gigs of space on my computer
that it could free up!
Figure 2: The Disk Cleanup tool.
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4 |
Select the desired check boxes in the Files to Delete
list, and then click OK. Disk Cleanup will spend several
minutes clearing space. |
5 |
If you have more than one hard disk, repeat this process for
each hard disk listed in My Computer.
You can save yourself some time by automating the disk
cleanup process. For more information, read the Microsoft
Knowledge Basic article,
How to
Automate the Disk Cleanup Tool in Windows XP. |
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Defragment Your
Computer I hate newspaper articles that start on the front
page but continue somewhere in the middle of the newspaper. I
could get through the article much faster if it was printed on
consecutive pages like a magazine article. Files on your
computer can either be fragmented like a newspaper, or
unfragmented like a magazine. Over time, more and more files
become fragmented. When a file is fragmented, it takes longer
for the computer to read it because it has to skip to different
sections of the hard disk—just like it takes me a few seconds to
find a page in the middle of a newspaper. Figure 3 compares how
a computer reads unfragmented and fragmented files.
Figure 3: Fragmented and unfragmented files compared.
You need administrator privileges to defragment a drive or
volume. Although fragmentation is complicated, it's easy to
defragment your computer by following these steps: |
1 |
Open My Computer, right-click Local Disk, and then
click Properties. |
2 |
On the Tools tab, click Defragment Now. The
Disk Defragmenter opens. |
3 |
Click your first hard disk, and then click Defragment. As
shown in Figure 4, Disk Defragmenter will work for at least
several minutes, though it may take several hours.
Figure 4: The Disk Defragmenter tool.
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4 |
If you have more than one hard disk, repeat this process for
each hard disk listed starting at Step 3. |
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After defragmenting the hard drive on my desktop
computer, Windows and other programs started about 20% faster! |
Disconnect
Unused Network Connections
If you've ever had a network with more than one computer, you
probably found it useful to share files between the computers by
mapping a network drive. Network drives allow one computer to
read and write files to another computer's hard disk as if it
were directly connected. I use network drives all the time, and
for me, they were the most significant source of slowness.
The problem with network drives is that Windows XP will
attempt to connect to the network drives when Windows starts. If
the remote computers don't respond immediately, Windows will
wait patiently. Additionally, some programs will attempt to
connect to the network drives when you browse for files and
folders. If you've ever tried to open a file and had to wait
several seconds (or minutes!), it's probably because the program
was trying to establish a network connection—even if the file
you are opening is on your local computer.
am not as patient as Windows, and I'd rather not wait
for unused network connections to respond. To reduce this
problem, disconnect any unused drives by following these steps:
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1 |
Open My Computer. |
2 |
On the Tools menu, click Disconnect Network Drive. |
3 |
Select the network drives that you no longer need, and then
click OK. |
After I disconnected
the network drives on my computer, my computer was able to
restart in 1 minute, 45 seconds—about 40% faster! |
Remove Autostart
Programs
The next step in restoring your computer's
performance is to identify any unnecessary programs that start
automatically. Often, programs configure themselves to run in
the background so that they appear to start quickly when needed.
Some of these programs show an icon on your taskbar to let you
know that they're running, while others are completely hidden.
These autostart programs probably won't noticeably slow down
your computer as it starts up, but they will steal away trace
amounts of memory and processing time as your computer runs.
Windows XP comes with the System Configurationtool (Msconfig.exe),
an excellent way to manage the startup process. To start it:
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1 |
Click Start, click Run, type Msconfig, and
then press Enter. |
2 |
On the Startup tab, you'll see a list of all the programs
and processes that are set to run when Windows XP loads. |
3 |
Speed up your overall start time by clearing the check box next
to any item you think you don't need. |
4 |
Click Apply, and then restart your computer for the
changes to take effect. |
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My favorite way to
examine autostart programs is to use the
Autoruns freeware tool from
Sysinternals.
Autoruns lists every program that will automatically start and
allows you to quickly delete the link to the program. Many
autostart entries are important parts of Windows XP, including
Userinit.exe and Explorer.exe. So you should not simply
delete everything that you don't recognize. Instead, you should
look up each entry at
Paul Collins'
Startup Applications List to determine whether you want it
to start automatically.
For example, Figure 5 shows
Autoruns revealing a file called nwiz.exe that is set to
start automatically. I visited The Startup Applications List,
typed in nwiz and discovered that it's used to set my
desktop layout preferences. I'd like to keep this functionality,
so I won't delete it.
Figure 5: The Autoruns freeware tool.
I also found a file named Wzqkpick.exe. After
reading the description at The Startup Applications List, I
decided I don't need to load that file automatically. I deleted
the link using Autoruns by right-clicking it and then clicking
Delete. This procedure works best for advanced users of
Windows XP. If you aren't sure a program is unneeded—leave it!
The Startup Applications List may provide instructions for
removing the startup program. If available, you should follow
those instructions instead of deleting the link by using
Autoruns.
How to Fix Bigger Problems
Many of the
Windows XP Performance and Maintenance newsgroup users are
experiencing serious, sudden performance problems. One day,
their computer was fine and the next it was painfully slow. This
type of problem is often caused by a computer virus or failing
computer hardware. The suggestions in this article probably
won't fix those types of problems. Instead, perform a virus scan
on your computer. If that's not the issue, you should contact
your computer vendor's technical support team for additional
assistance. The troubleshooting process for this type of problem
requires the knowledge to examine the computer's performance on
a process-by-process basis, and usually includes a "process of
elimination" phase where drivers, services, and hardware are
removed/replaced one-by-one until the problem disappears.
There's a very good chance that the computer won't start at all
at some point in this process, so it's best to have support
during the process. Searching for "Windows XP Performance" on
the Internet turns up a large number of performance tweaks. Some
of these are useful, but most should not be attempted unless you
understand exactly what you are doing. In particular, many of
the tweaks that claim to improve your performance may only help
under very specific circumstances. For example, in our own
Windows XP Performance and Maintenance newsgroup, one user
recommended disabling Internet Connection Firewall to solve a
performance problem. Even if this did improve performance, it
would leave the computer vulnerable to attacks from the
Internet. I'd rather have a slightly slower computer than a
hacked computer! |
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