Eliminating Freezes Can Speed Up Your Computer

Thawing Out A Frozen Computer

So how do you get a handle on OS freezes? Sometimes – though not often – a freeze-up can have a readily identifiable trigger. Each time you access a certain piece of hardware, or every time you run a particular application, your computer may freeze. When the trigger can be identified, the problem is usually somewhat evident. Application freezes can be caused by corruptions in the application files that make the computer hang when it tries to access the damaged files.

In most cases, however, a frozen OS isn’t attributable to any one thing. One minute, your computer is running fine, the next it’s been stopped dead in its tracks. Here, one of the “usual suspects” is leftover bits of programming code in the computer’s registry.

These orphans have been left behind by other applications that have long since been removed. The registry becomes loaded with old instructions for allocating and configuring resources. The computer still follows these instructions because it has no way of knowing that the instructions are no longer necessary, or that the application that uses them is no longer on the computer. Perhaps the application is still there, but it’s been upgraded and now needs different resources to operate.

After awhile, the computer is left with a confusing mish-mash of old and new code. Sometimes these instructions contradict each other. When that happens, the OS is forced into an unpredictable state, and the end result is often an operating system crash.

Unfortunately, the registry isn’t a straightforward place. It is a database that is located across multiple files, and has thousands upon thousands of lines of code that mean little to anyone except the computer itself. How do you find and eliminate these little “zombies”?

Many people choose to use a tried-and-true registry cleaner like RegCure. RegCure has been downloaded more times than any other registry cleaner on the market, and it works to eliminate the root causes of poor computer performance. Run regularly, RegCure will have your computer operating as designed in no time flat!

Photo Credit: Jasmic, via Flickr

Registry Cleaners: What Does RegCure Look For?

What’s In A Registry Scan?

Errors in the registry file can wreak all kinds of havoc, so finding and fixing these errors is a critical component of what RegCure does. Among the COM/ActiveX entries, for example, errors can cause application failures, freezes, crashes and other malfunctions, like problems when opening documents. RegCure locates errors in this section of the registry file and eliminates them and the problems they cause.

Lots of errors can be found in the Uninstall Entries section of the registry. As you know, uninstallers don’t always work correctly. This section of the registry can contain entries that point to missing files and folders, or other registry entries that have been removed. RegCure locates and removes these invalid entries that can otherwise slow the performance of your computer.

RegCure checks the Font Entries section of the registry, looking for pointers to missing files. These pointers can cause problems with font-dependent applications like word processors. Removing them will improve the performance of your computer and of your font-dependent applications.

If you’ve worked with Windows for awhile, you know that DLLs can cause a lot of problems. To confuse things, some applications share DLLs, and other DLLs compete with each other for system resources. DLL conflicts can cause system performance problems, application crashes and other similar problem. RegCure hunts these problems down and removes them to improve the performance of a slow computer and prevent application and system crashes.

Help files aren’t very helpful when they don’t work properly. The Help Files Information section of the registry can contain invalid entries that will cause help files to open incorrectly or not at all. RegCure locates and corrects these invalid entries to help you take advantage of the help files on your computer.

The Windows Startup Items section of the registry can be filled with invalid entries that can cause applications not to start up properly when the computer boots. In addition, the registry can contain bad path or file name information that will slow the performance of the computer. Broken program shortcuts and invalid registry keys can also slow the performance of your computer and cause problems with your applications.

Next time, I’ll cover what you can expect from a scan and repair and removal options that RegCure provides.

Photo Credit: Athena Workman