how to clean up slow PC?

suiko

My PC is about 5 years old and was given to me by a friend, and it's really slow, esp at startup. Does anyone know how I can improve this? Perhaps a good (free!) registry cleanup programme? Do any of them give you a limited-time full trial (with everything done rather than just a few things)?

Cheers

isofa

Try CCleaner to start with, excellent and free, gets rid of all manner of rubbish that accumulates.

The best solution is to backup everything, wipe the computer and reinstall from scratch, it'll run so much faster, you'll be amazed.

suiko

Thanks. I'm a bit scared of wiping the system, after a bad experience once before. Also I don't have rescue disks, I don't think.

OK_Sauce

How about adding more RAM? My son was given an old laptop which was so slow it was pretty much unusable. Adding a paultry 512 MB module made a massive difference and it was only about a tenner.

suiko

It's funny everyone thinks of this PC as old - for me it's super-new - my last one was a Windows 95 with a 3Gb hard drive, and it worked fine for my needs

Jesthar

Hi suiko,

Don't worry, there are a number of things you can try before resorting to a wipe! Be warned, 5 years isn't spring chicken for a PC, so don't expect miracles, but improvements should be possible. For starters, try the following:

1) Check how full the hard drive is. Computers start to slow down noticeably after the hard drive gets much more than 60% full, and the fuller it gets, the slower it goes. If it gets above 90% full, you're officially in snail-pace city, and you need to have a clearout! In fact, having a clearout is a good idea anyway - back up any documents/data files you defiitely want to keep (just in case!) and delete everything which isn't yours or you don't need, then empty the Recycle Bin.

2) Uninstall any progams you definitely don't need, including any games you're not intending to play for a while. If you want to save any savegames, you can usually find out how to do this with a quick Google query.

3) De-fragment your hard drive. If the PC is five years old and has not been defragmented, that's like living in a big house for five years and never clearing any up - it dosen't have much of an impact at the start, but eventually you're tripping over bits and pieces all the time! The defragment tool is under System Tools - don't forget to empty the Recycle Bin first!

4) Now you have a tidy hard drive, you need to clear out any pests - adware, spyware, virii etc. Not only do these eat resources, but they can cause damage and steal data too, so it's time to call in the exterminators. A good pair of programs for spyware and adware this is Spybot Search and Destroy (this is free) and AdAware (has a free edition) - I update and scan with both on a fairly regular basis, as one tends to catch what the other misses. Download and install them, make sure they are fully updated, and then run a full scan with each of them (in turn, not at the same time!) and follow the instructions to remove any problems found. Also, Spybot S&D has an 'Immunise' feature which protects you from getting some things in the first place - you should run this every time you update, it only takes a few seconds.

5) Next, download a good free AntiVirus package (don't bother with Norton or McAfee, there's no need to pay for a decent AV these days!) - I use AVG Free Edition. Make sure that is fully updated, then run a full scan with that too. PLEASE NOTE - these full scans will take a while to run, ofted half an hour or more, so do them when you aren't going to need the machine for a while! You can just use mainly quick scans afterwards (and sometimes these take a while too, especially on big drive with lots of programs), but a full scan is a must for starters.

6) Finally, you said it was slow at startup? It may be a lot of programs have been set to load into memory at startup, and if you tell them not to, your PC may boot a bit quicker. This web page: http://www.softwaretipsandtricks.com/startup_applications/howtoremove.php has a good set of instructions on how to do that. NOTE - do NOT disable your AntiVirus from running at startup, especially if you have automatically connecting broadband! Once you have finished all this, it may be a good idea to defragment again just to tidy up properly/

OK Sauce also has a good point about adding more RAM - if you go to http://www.crucial.com/uk/index.aspx (a very good RAM company, and pretty cheap too), they have a free, non-invasive scanner tool which will tell you what you would be able to upgrade to with your machine.

Hope that helps a bit - let us know how you get on or if you need more help. I'm off on holiday for a week, but others should be able to suggest things, or you can always drop me a PM and i'll get back to you when I return

~Jes

suiko

That's fantastic - I shall print it off and set to work!

norms_2

You cn also download advanced windows care2 this also a free programme that check a lot of things in your computers registry there isn't any trial period for it all yo do is download it for free and check for updates as well then run it.

Get AVG anti virus free edition as well this is also very good.

Keep runing the advanced windows care2 for a few days hopefully this will help you as well.

aliEnRIK

norms wrote: »

You cn also download advanced windows care2 this also a free programme that check a lot of things in your computers registry there isn't any trial period for it all yo do is download it for free and check for updates as well then run it.

Get AVG anti virus free edition as well this is also very good.

Keep runing the advanced windows care2 for a few days hopefully this will help you as well.

I would personally advise AGAINST the 'windows care' product

Anything that plays about with 'registrys' can create serious problems with 'some' computers for very little (if any) speed increases

isofa

Cheapest and best way by far is to wipe and start again - nothing will speed up your PC more, then add some RAM if it's a bit low and it'll fly.

But as the OP says they don't have the original discs, then I guess it's not possible...

nibs

If its any help, my pc was running as poorly as yours and i've just paid a guy to do exactly what jesthar has suggested. Its now running great. I just wish i'd posted on here first :mad: