Is your computer slowing down? This guide should help you get that machine of yours back to running like it was when you first had it, and will give you that "just reinstalled" feeling all over again.
Steps
1. Convert your hard drive to NTFS. If your drive is using FAT16 or FAT32, you can gain performance by converting it to NTFS. NTFS has faster access times, and stores data more efficiently. Click on START > RUN > type "cmd" (without quotes) > type "CONVERT C: /FS:NTFS" (without quotes). Follow the instructions and your drive will be converted to NTFS. Bear in mind that NTFS drives can only be accessed by Windows 2000/NT/XP and Vista.
2. Delete Spyware. Spyware comes bundled with a lot of free software found on the Internet. It can slow your machine down to a crawl. Download and install "Spybot Search & Destroy", and give your machine a full scan for spyware.
3. Disable the Indexing Service. The indexing service scans your hard drive and indexes files to help speed up searching. It runs in the background using up memory and processor time, and is generally thought to be unnecessary by most geeks. It can also wake you up if your hard disk is noisy and you leave your machine on at night. To disable this service, click on START > RUN > type "services.msc" (without quotes) and look for the "Indexing Service". Double click on it. Now select "Manual" under Startup Type, and click Stop. Now click OK, then close the services menu.
4. Windows XP can look good ...but displaying all the visual items can waste system resources. To optimize>start>setting>control Panel>system>advanced tab>in the Performance tab click Settings>Leave only the following ticked or just uncheck them all!:>Show shadows under menus>Show shadows under mouse pointer>Show translucent selection rectangle>Use drop shadows for icons labels on the desktop>Use visual styles on windows and buttons.
5. To speed up folder browsing>Open My Computer>click on Tools menu>Folder Options>View tab>Uncheck the Automatically search for network folders and printers check box>click apply>click ok
6. To make menus load faster>go to start>run>type ‘Regedit’ (without quotes) then click ‘Ok’>find “HKEY_CURRENT_USER\control Panel\Desktop”>Select “MenuShowDelay”>right click and select “Modify’>reduce the number to around “100? or less but not too less.
7. How to disable unnecessary services because Windows XP has to be all things to all people it has many services running that take up system resources that you will never need.Below is a list of services that can be disabled on most machines>Alerter,Clipbook,Computer Browser,Distributed Link Tracking Client,Fast User Switching,Help and Support - (If you use Windows Help and Support leave this enabled),Indexing Service,IPSEC Services,Messenger,netmeeting Remote Desktop Sharing (disabled for extra security),Portable Media Serial Number,Remote Desktop Help Session Manager (disabled for extra security),Remote Procedure Call Locator,Remote Registry (disabled for extra security),Remote Registry Service,Secondary Logon,Routing & Remote Access (disabled for extra security),Server,SSDP Discovery Service - (Unplug n’ Pray will disable this),Telnet,TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper,Upload Manager,Universal Plug and Play Device Host,Windows Time wireless Zero Configuration (Do not disable if you use a wireless network).To disable these services go to Start>run and type “services.msc”>doubleclick on the service you want to change>change the startup type to ‘Disable”
8. How to Speedup Folder Access,disable Last Access Update>Go to Start and then Run and type “regedit”>Click through the file system until you get to “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem”>Right-click in a blank area of the window on the right and select ‘DWORD Value’>Create a new DWORD Value called ‘NtfsDisableLastAccessUpdate’> Then Right click on the new value and select ‘Modify’>Change the Value Data to ‘1′>Click ‘OK’.
9. How to improve boot times>Go to Start Menu and Click Run>Type in “Regedit” then click ok>Find “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Dfrg\BootOpt imizeFunction”>Select “Enable” from the list on the right>Right on it and select “Modify”>Change the value to “Y to enable”>close.
10. (Note: some people say that this only helps on Win9x and is useless for Windows NT based systems, including WinXP and Win2000). How to improve swapfile performance.It basically makes sure that your PC uses every last drop of memory (faster than swap file) before it starts using the swap file.>Go to Start>Run>>Type “msconfig.exe” then ok>Click on the System.ini tab>expand the 386enh tab by clicking on the plus sign>click on new then in the blank box type”ConservativeSwapfileUsage=1?>click OK>restart your pc.
11. How to improve your xp's shutdown speed.This tweak reduces the time XP waits before automatically closing any running programs when you give it the command to shutdown.>Go to Start>run> Type ‘Regedit’ and click ok>find ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop’Select ‘WaitToKillAppTimeout’>right click and select ‘Modify’>change the value to ‘1000′>click ‘ok’>now select ‘HungAppTimeout’>right click and select ‘Modify’>change the value to ‘1000′>click ‘ok’>now find HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desktop’>select ‘WaitToKillAppTimeout’>right click and select ‘Modify’>Change the value to "1000">click ‘ok’>Now find ‘HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control’>select ‘WaitToKillServiceTimeout’>right click and select ‘Modify’>change the value to ‘1000′>click ‘ok’
12. To remove the background image right click the desktop>properties>desktop tab>change it to "none".This will speed up windows xp a lot and while your at it go to the settings tab>colour setting change it to medium (16 bit).
13. To speed up your computer more go to my computer>right click the C: drive>properties>general tab>uncheck the "allow indexing services". Then go to tools>click "defragment now" and defragment your C: (and optionally other) drives.This will speed your computer even more.
14. Remove unwanted programs by going to start>settings>control panel>click "add or remove programs">remove unwanted programs.
15. Remove the confirm delete message because it saves time and if you accidentally delete something it will still be in the recycle bin.You can do this by right clicking the recycle bin>uncheck "Display Delete Confirmation Dialog">ok.
Tips
* You must make an back up copy of your disks before beginning this because if you mess up it can do a lot of damage to your computer's hard drive.
* Most changes take place after you reboot.
* You can easily make a restore point in start/Accessories/system tools/system restore it will then give u the option to create a restore point or go back to one u created earlier, This will be good if somthing happens to your computer while you are trying to speed it up and you have to go back to when u made the point. May be different in vista but if u put system restore in the search box you should be able to still get there
Warnings
* Please be very careful! If you don't know what you're actually doing, don't do it, you may actually slow down your computer, change something you cannot simply change back, or even destroy your system.
* There may be steps on this page that don't work for, or even break your operating system.
* Make a back up copy of your disks.
* Follow every instruction very carefully.
SPEED UP MOZILLA FIREFOX BY RUNNING IT IN RAM
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You can run Mozilla Firefox completely in your systems memory (RAM). It works because computers can read and write from RAM much faster than it can read from the hard drive.
Steps
1. Download and save Portable Firefox onto your Desktop. Double-click on the ZIP file and extract the contents of the archive to the folder "C:\PortableFirefox". You use a different directory, but you will have to adapt the rest of this article to that directory.
2. Download RAMDisk and save it to the same location as the ZIP file. Double-click RAMDisk.exe. This is a self-extracting archive. When asked where to save the extracted files, save them on your Desktop.
3. This creates a directory called __RAMDisk. Open this folder. Inside you will find a ZIP file named Installfiles.zip. Double click this file. Extract the contents of the archive to your Desktop. You should now have a folder on your desktop named INSTALL.
4. To install the RAMDisk software, open Windows Control Panel (found by clicking Start > Control Panel). Switch the Control Panel to Classic View if its not already. Now click the icon labeled Add New Hardware'. When the window opens, click Next.
5. Windows will search for new hardware added to your computer. When it's finished, click Yes, I have already connected the hardware, and then click Next.
6. You should now be looking at a long list of hardware available on your computer. Scroll to the very bottom of the list and select Add a new hardware device and then click Next.
7. When the next window comes up, pick the second option, Install the hardware that I manually select from a list (Advanced). Then click Next.
8. On the next window, leave the selection "Show All Devices" and click Next.
9. On the next window, click the button Have Disk. A small window will pop up asking you to insert the manufacturer's installation disk. Click the Browse button and browse your way to the INSTALL folder that was created on your Desktop.
10. Once in that directory, select the RAMDisk.inf file. Click Open. Now that you're back at the pop up window, click OK.
11. Back to the main window, click Next. On the Ready to install window, click Next.
12. Windows will throw up a window complaining that the hardware has not passed WHQL testing. Just click Continue Anyway.
13. Now click Finish. If Windows says anything about restarting your computer, just say No. It's not necessary.
14. We need to configure RAMDisk now. Back at the Control Panel, click the icon for System. When the window pops up, click the Hardware tab. Then click the Device Manager button.
15. You're now looking at all the devices installed on your computer. Scroll down the list down until you see RAM Disk. Click the + sign to open this tab. Now right click Ramdisk [ QSoft ], and select Properties.
16. A new window will open. Click the tab Ram Disk Properties. The options on this page are pretty self explanatory. You can set the drive letter that you want RAMDisk to emulate. In this case, pick B:. You can also set the size of the drive. 32 MB is plenty for Portable Firefox. You can also set the File system. Either file system will work fine.
17. Once you have set everything, click OK. Close all windows and the Control Panel. If you open My Computer, you will see you new ram disk as whatever drive letter you chose. If you double click the drive, you will see that its empty. If there are any files in there, just delete them.
18. Open Notepad (usually found at Start > All Programs > Accessories), and type in this line:
19. XCOPY C:\portablefirefox\*.* B:\firefox\ /E /Y /C
20. Now save the file as C:\portablefirefox\load_firefox.bat. Under Save as type, select All Files.
21. Click New in Notepad. Create a new file and add this line:
22. XCOPY B:\firefox\*.* C:\portablefirefox\ /E /Y
23. Now save this file as C:\portablefirefox\save_firefox.bat. Again, uUnder Save as type, select All Files.
24. These two batch files are important. Your RAM disk are completely erased when you shut down Windows. So you need this files to copy firefox back into the RAM disk when Windows starts, and then to save settings, to copy everything from the RAM disk back onto the C drive. The first one copies everything from C:\portablefirefox to B:\firefox. The second one copies everything back from the B drive to the C drive. You need to run the first batch file before running Firefox, so put a link to this file in your Start Menu's Startup folder. This way the file is run every time Windows starts. You can also create a folder on the Start Menu called Shutdown, and place a link to the second batch file in that folder. That way everything is copied back to the C drive when Windows shuts down.
25. Almost done. Browse to C:\portablefirefox and double click the file load_firefox.bat. A command window opens showing you that Windows is coping all the files from C:\portablefirefox to B:\firefox.
26. Now open My Computer and open up the folder B:\firefox. Right click the file PortableFirefox.exe, and pick Send To > Desktop (Create shortcut). This will place a shortcut to Portable Firefox that you can click to run Firefox.
Tips
* Once Firefox is running, you can follow the tips in the article How to Make Firefox Load Pages Faster to get even more speed from Firefox.
Warnings
* Remember, everything on the RAM disk is emptied when Windows shuts down. That means if the batch file save_firefox.bat isn't run before that, you will lose any saved passwords or extensions you've installed with PortableFirefox.
Things You'll Need
* Portable Firefox - Portable Firefox is a stripped down and reconfigured version of Firefox designed to run off of a USB thumb drive. You can download the files from the Portable Firefox website.
* RAMDisk for Windows - RAMDisk creates a fake disk on the Windows system that can be used just like any other hard drive, but its completely running in your systems memory. You can download the files from the RAMDisk website.
Hope it helps.Good Luck!!
):-)