Make Your Pc Faster, Guaranteed

1. First, run a scandisk or checkdisk. Let Windows fix any errors. 2. Run a disk cleanup utility...this
will flush your temporary internet folder, trash can, temp system files, etc.
3. Delete any garbage files or data...if possible, run a Duplicate File Finder program.
4. Run Defrag on all partitions (NOTE: run this after you have deleted all trash and excess files!)
5. Run a registry cleaner utility and delete or get rid of any orphaned entries in that registry.
6. Check your exisiting swap file for it's size and location (*will explain location later in the post). If
you have alot of ram (i.e. 1 gig and over) set this swap file to something small, like 250 mb. The
reason is that this will force Windows to load more into memory, resulting in faster performance
(note: some games and applications actually require a certain sized swap file so check your
applications performance after making a size adjustment for any error messages.)
7. Under XP, you can tell Windows to use Classic Style on your desktop, - this will remove the neat
single click and internet-style desktop but for lower end systems this will improve performance in
other areas, such as gaming and multi-tasking.
8. Run msconfig and under startup and only keep the programs that are essential to load in the tray
icon (and hence stay resident in memory). Uncheck anything else non-essential, like an ATI or Nvidia
control panel, Quicktime utility, Real Audio, etc.
9. Upgrade drivers! Check for the latest BIOS, video, motherboard, sound, etc drivers from the
manufacturers. Alot of my friends had chipsets on their motherboard that had advanced disk
management capabilities or AGP port settings but the drivers weren't loaded for them so they were
never being used. A simple upgrade realized a noticeable difference. For instance, they didn't have
the latest driver for their AGP port so it was set to 1x, instead of being used at 4x!
10. (OK, so this won't speed up your PC but it could save you alot of time and trouble later on!) After
making all these improvements, make a working backup! I use Ghost, but for XP users you can also
use System Restore...
Open Registry Editor (regedit.exe) Click Start Run and then type 'regedit' press enter.