There are a number of ways to speed up a slow computer (other than installing RAM, a faster processor and defragging). It really just depends on how easy you want the job to be. In general you can do your own performance tuning or you can use a product like System Mechanic.
System Mechanic is a good tool for overall performance tuning, with an easy to use interface.
Here is a list of some of the things I would do to make my system faster (even if I was using System Mechanic):
- Uninstall any software that is not needed. If the system came preloaded with a bunch of junk it is a good idea to get rid of it.
- sullivanr6 recomended turning system restore off, this is a good idea
- When installing software make sure you do not install unneeded add on programs, like toolbars
- Speaking of toolbars, turn them off or uninstall them
- Turn off OS features like animation
- Disable services that are not nessisary (be very careful here)
- Pay close attention to what kinds of software you use for functions such as firewall and Anti-Virus. Some, like Norton, really affect system performance
- Also, make sure you do not have more than one anti-virus and one firewall running, if you do get rid of all but the one most reliable
There are a number of other things that affect the performance of your computer.
Regardless of what you do, it is imporntant to note that you can only get so much out of a computer. In other words, if you are running Windows XP with 256MB of RAM it is going to be pretty slow because there is LESS SPACE than windows needs to run, so it is forced to swap applications from memory to the swap drive. So if you want to avoid upgrading memory, the biggest thing to so will be to reduce what needs memory.
