Simple Computer Tune-Ups

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

by Rob Zwemmer

Simple Computer Tune-ups

Ever had that experience when you needed to download something fast, or wanted to find that webpage in a hurry, and your computer had other ideas? If your computer has started running slowly, is crashing frequently, or taking more than 90 seconds to start-up or open a software application, you are in need of a tune-up. Often times you can perform a few simple scans and file deletions yourself to optimize the computer and restore it to its level best.

Take a look at your list of programs, including the start-up items, and see how many are being used. Seek and find unwanted files and folders that act as memory zappers on your hard drive and immediately delete them. Through your Control Panel, uninstall all the programs you rarely or never use

As you surf the web day after day, a large amount of files, tracking cookies, etc., build up and get stored on your computer, further undermining its performance and reducing productivity. After you have deleted all of this excess clutter and created more space on your hard drive, you will want to defragment the hard disk. Files tend to get fragmented over time and scattered to different points of the hard disk, leading to diminished performance as well. Run the utility, Disk Defragmenter, an integrated feature of Windows OS that will rearrange the data and place it in correct order to restore seamless software operation.

A “corrupt registry” is another reason your computer may be running slow. When you download files and install various programs on your computer, it also allows useless registry entries to deposit on the hard drive. These entries increase over time, also attributing to the slow and inefficient computer performance you have been experiencing. To fix these registry errors you will need to scan and repair, utilizing
a trusted software program. Many tune-up software solutions are available as free downloads, so check out Microsoft.com or CNET.com for more information.