One of life's biggest annoyances is to wait for a slow, creaking, computer to churn through a simple task. But we have come with answers.
So if your computer fails a swift boot, just follow these top 10 tips to fixing a slow PC.
1. Uninstall unused programs
There are chances that your new PC has come with a load of programs pre-installed onto it. These can simply be accumulated over time on the Old PCs. You will never use most of these and sometimes you might find them running in the background and slowing your computer down.
You can remove these just by clicking on Start and going to Control Panel and then clicking Programs and features. Then just scroll through the list and uninstall the ones that you never use.
There is a free software called PC Decraprifier, you can use it if you are unsure of what should stay or go.
2. Delete temporary files
All your browsing history remains in the depths of your PC whenever you use Internet Explorer. Also, when you install something, the same thing happens. You can just get rid of some of this clutter to free up your system. You can just open My Computer, then select your main drive, click on the Windows folder and then open the folder inside that is called Temp.
Right-click on the folder, and choose Details in the View options. After doing this, just select all the files that are older than the current date and press the delete key. Then move to the Recycle bin and empty it.
3. Install a solid-state drive
Your hard drive could be the reason behind the slowness of your Computer. On most occasions, they have loads of moving components thus taking a long time to fire up.
You can use a solid-state drive instead, as it uses flash memory just like a USB drive and can read data a lot faster hence speeding up your start-up.
4. Get more hard drive storage
If your hard drive becomes too full, it doesn't matter how tidy you keep your computer, it will still affect the speed of your PC. Your drive might get choked before you know it if you use your PC for processing-heavy tasks like recording videos and media.
So it will be a smart option to get an external hard drive. You might get a mega storage drive with over 1TB memory, which will be good for 1000s or more HD movies.
5. Stop unnecessary start-ups
Some programs automatically start running in the background as soon as your fire up your PC. Some applications like Skype, Spotify do this every time. These apps will use your computer's memory unnecessarily and you can ditch the ones that you do not need.
For this just click on Start and type "Run". Type "msconfig" in the box that appears and another box will appear. Click on the Startup tab on the top listing all the applications that run when your computer starts up. Then, you can either manually untick the ones that are not required or click on disable all. You just need to make sure that vital things like antivirus are not disabled.
6. Get more RAM
You must have noticed how your PC flickers for life when you have many different applications running at the same time and you try to move in between them. The reason for this minor stroke that your computer has is that it doesn't have enough RAM. RAM is the memory that your PC uses to run the programs and this memory can be upgraded very easily and quite cheaply if you get it from the right place.
7. Run a disk defragment
Disk fragmentation is basically a way to optimize your hard drive's efficiency.
You can run this by going to My Computer, then right-click on the hard drive and click Properties. There should be an option to Defragment Now under the Tools tab.
8. Run a disk clean-up
You can use this built-in tool that looks for unnecessary large files to spring clean your whole system.
To do this you can just click on Start, then move to All Programs, then Accessories, then System Tools, and finally Disk Cleanup.
9. Vacuum out the dust
If you open your computer someday, you will be surprised by how much dust gets sucked into it through the cooling fan. This dust can prove to be fatal for the health of your computer as it clogs the airflow that keeps your system temperature down when it overheats.
Thus it will slow down the process.
You can clean out the insides by using the vacuum on a low setting, but make sure that the PC has been off for at least 30-minutes and that it is disconnected from the mains. Also, be very careful as you are poking around.
10. Buy a new PC
This is the simplest of advice, but it's most effective only if you have got a PC that should be cashing in its pension.
