If you’re looking for ways to speed up your computer, performing a little routine maintenance can go a long way. Routine maintenance includes trimming the list of programs that start or load automatically when you boot the computer, cleaning the registry with RegCure, and defragmenting the hard drive on a reasonably regular basis. You could also add scanning your computer for worms, viruses and other malware that can seriously impact the performance of your computer.

Defragmenting Can Speed Up Your Computer

Defragmenting your hard drive is probably the easiest thing to do, since the defragmenting tool comes as part of the operating system. Defragmenting the hard drive periodically – at least twice a year if you don’t use your computer a lot, once per quarter if you use it frequently and about once per month if you’re a “power user” – can really cut down on the work your computer needs to do to write and retrieve files. The defragmenting tool is in the System Tools folder. If you’re not sure where you fall, the Defragmenter has an “analyze” function that will tell you how much your disk is fragmented. A good rule of thumb is 10%. If the analysis shows your disk is more than 10% fragmented, run the Defragmenter at your earliest convenience.

One word of warning about the Defragmenting tool: if you haven’t defragmented your computer lately, the defragmenting process could take hours. (Yes!) It’s one of those jobs that’s best saved for an overnight task or one that you start before you leave the house in the morning. It’s definitely not something to do when you’ll need the computer for something important.

Before you defragment your computer, you could also benefit by running Disk Cleanup and Disk Error checking (called Check Disk on older versions of the Operating System). These utilities, all found under System Tools, will check your disk for errors and clean up the little messes they find. Another tip: once you’re done with the Defragmenting, back up your hard disk using the Backup Tool, also found under the System Tools menu. Like disk defragmenting, the first backup can take a long time, but subsequent backups – especially if you schedule them – should go much more quickly.

You should be running an anti-virus program at all times on your computer. One big mistake people make is to assume that their anti-virus definitions are up-to-date. You need to download new definitions periodically to help keep your A/V protection current. If you haven’t downloaded your definitions in awhile, download the latest ones and scan your hard disk immediately!

Photo Credit: Soumit Nandi, via Flickr

Apple has put together one of its “Mac & PC” commercials that focuses on operating system freezes. While the commercial may be funny, a frozen operating system is not, especially when the sudden stop has no rhyme or reason to it. It almost always interrupts something important, and freezes (or crashes, if you prefer) can do additional damage to your operating system and applications that may not be readily apparent. These problems almost always defy your best attempts to 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

If you’re running an older version of the Windows operating system, you may be wondering if Windows 7 will speed up your computer a bit. For users like you, there’s good news and bad news.

Windows 7 Migration May Provide Cleanup Opportunity

Actually, the good news is kind of thin. If you’re already running Windows Vista, you’re probably in good shape for Windows 7. You’re likely to have all of the hardware support you’ll need, but you could still run into a few pitfalls, not the shallowest of which is Vista Home Basic. If you’re running Vista Home Basic, there’s no easy road from Vista to Windows 7 for you.

You’ll either need to reinstall the operating system or upgrade to Windows Vista Home Premium first, as opposed to just upgrading what you’ve got to Windows 7. Sorry! That means you’ll need to take special care with your files and applications. On the other hand, if you’re transferring files from your old system to a new one that runs Windows 7, Migration Day would be a great time to rid yourself of old applications, taskbar widgets and the virtual tons of stuff that takes up space on your hard drive but doesn’t perform even one useful function.

Cleaning out your old applications and re-installing the ones you still use on your new OS is the opportunity to regain some speed from your old hardware. When you re-install your applications, however, take a good look at the “standard installation” before you choose that route. Often, the standard installation will pull the old “start on bootup” trick, meaning that the application will start up every time you boot your computer. This takes up a lot of memory and will degrade the performance of your computer if you let that one slip by often enough, especially for little applications and widgets that you don’t really need.

Cleaning out your old hard drive will also give you the opportunity to leave old files behind. In many cases, these things just take up space, hastening the inevitable disk fragmentation that will occur. If you think you may need old files at some point, burn them off to a CD or store them on a USB drive. My bet is that you’ll never need these items. If you do, they can be kept handy without bogging down your computer.

If you’re running Windows XP or an even older version of the OS, Microsoft recommends that your “upgrade” to Windows 7 consist of buying a new computer with the OS pre-loaded. (Seriously!) That’s fine if you’re in a position to do that. It’s Microsoft’s way of saying that you’d need to do some serious hardware upgrades to your old computer if you really want to run the latest software.

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Everyone feels the need for speed. Especially computer users. No matter how fast your processor is, you’ll eventually outrun it, and when you do, you’ll wonder what happened to the good old days, when your computer seemed a lot … well… perkier than it does today.

Computer slowdowns can be perceptual or actual. You can’t fix your perception of speed (except maybe by buying a new computer) but you can cure actual problems that make your computer slow down. Today, I offer five habits that, if you’re willing to adopt them, will cure actual problems and speed up your computer.

1. Clear Out The Cobwebs Periodically, go through your computer and remove applications you’re not using. While you’re cleaning up, clean out the startup items your computer loads each time it starts. Manually start the programs you need and leave the rest closed.

2. Reboot Your Computer Once In Awhile Just like you, your computer needs a break. For the computer, that means a reboot. Rebooting will clear out any misallocated memory, zombie programs that didn’t shut down correctly and runaway processes that you’re not aware of. If you shut down your computer every time you finish using it, you’re ok. This tip mainly applies to the folks who leave their computers on all the time.

3. Defragment Your Hard Drive Your hard drive space gets parceled out pretty quickly. In short order, files are broken into pieces and some parts are stored over here, while others are stored over there, or just wherever the computer can find space. Very disorganized! Like business cards for a business, your hard drive represents your computer, keep it simple, clean and organized. The computer has to jump around quite a bit just to read a single file. Defragmenting will reassemble your piecemeal files into contiguous spaces on the hard disk and eliminate the delays in reading (and writing) files. Defragging is a good overnight task, especially the first time you do it.

4. Upgrade Your RAM The more RAM your computer has installed, the faster your computer will run. There is an upper limit to how much memory your computer can take. That will depend on your BIOS and your OS. Consult the owners manual for your computer to determine its maximum addressable memory. If your installed memory is nowhere near the limit, consider installing more RAM.

5. Use A Registry Cleaner After you’ve removed your unused programs, cleared out your startup items, and defragged your hard drive, your registry may be pretty well hashed. Using a registry cleaner like RegCure can tidy up those hard-to-reach spots in the registry that frankly won’t make much sense to most users, but can make all the difference in the world when it comes to performance.

Photo Credit: Esther Dyson, via Flickr

If you downloaded an early copy of the Windows 7 Beta, you should notice that the OS-wannabe has started acting strangely. The beta version (not the Release Candidate) has started the process of expiring, which means that the system will shut down every two hours. Not exactly a great way to speed up your computer!

Move To Windows 7 Release Candidate

If you haven’t already migrated to the Windows 7 Release Candidate, now would be a good time to do that. The shutdown behavior will continue, and eventually the beta will stop working altogether on August 1. The Release Candidate will start exhibiting the same behavior next spring. June 1, 2010 is the Release Candidate’s “sunset date.” By that time, Windows 7 will have been on the market for about seven and a half months, long enough to get over any cold feet that may seize hold of you.

Windows 7 is faster in most respects than either Windows Vista or Windows XP. It installs faster, loads faster, responds faster and shuts down faster, all common complaints that Microsoft heard from users regarding Vista. Microsoft has gone out of its way to make sure that the move to Windows 7 is trouble-free… inasmuch as that’s possible.

You’ll need to verify that your hardware is up to the task of running Windows 7, especially if you skipped the Vista upgrade. The Windows 7 Advisor can help you determine whether your computer has the right stuff. If you’re already running Windows Vista, there’s a good chance that you’ll be able to run Windows 7 out of the box. Windows 7 is built on Windows Vista, so if you’re already running Vista, the move to Windows 7 shouldn’t be too difficult.

If you’ve been working with the Windows 7 beta, you’ll find that the Release Candidate operates more smoothly and fixes a number of problems found in the beta and is generally more stable. Microsoft’s “carrot-and-stick” approach to migrating users may produce some added benefits for early adopters.

Until July 11, Microsoft is offering the Windows 7 operating system at a steep discount for those who are willing to pony up for the new OS right now. If you already have Windows Vista or Windows XP installed, you can get the Windows 7 Home Premium edition for $50.00. If you prefer the Windows 7 Professional Edition, that’s also on sale for $100, providing that you’re upgrading from a similar version of XP or Vista. Windows Ultimate is not part of the pre-sale. It will retail for $319 for the full product and $219 for an upgrade version. After the presale concludes, you’ll pay the rack rate for Windows 7.

Photo Credit: F687/s, via Flickr

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