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(slightly skeptical)
Open Source Software Educational Society
May the source be with you, but remember the KISS principle ;-)
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May the source be with you, but remember the KISS principle ;-)
Softpanorama Search
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(Fighting configuration bloat and bloatware)
According to Microsoft, Windows XP was designed to boot up within about 30 seconds. Add several additional services and that can become a minute. You can probably slush it but not much. It depends on how much additional functionally you want to be included. If you need multiple services enabled (for example Services for Unix) you might need probably up to two minutes. time also depends of speed of your CPU and speed of hard drive. From 2GHz dual core CPU with 2G of RAM and 7200 RPM harddrive you can expect 30 sec boot in most cases.
Slow start and shutdown can be a symptom of Spyware infection or bloated configuration or both. In rare cases it also can be connected with device sharing problems (for example network drive not available).
Amount of RAM also is important. Generally Windows XP is not running that good on 256M PC and Windows 2000 here has an edge. Windows XP is definitely more resource hungry and on 256K PC it feels slower then Windows 2000. 512K are usually OK and if you have 2G only small amount of this memory is used unless you run some very memory hungry applications. Probably 1G is a good compromise between cost and speed for modern desktops and laptops with XP. You generally do not need 2G for XP and can save money.
As for Spyware problems, they are addressed on the other set of pages. I will only restate that in no way you can rely on disinfection. You need something like Ghost and clean image from which to restore Windows to feel yourself safe (Linux based analogs of Norton Ghost are free). Also browsing of grey sites should be done in VM environment as VM image can easily be disposable. Microsoft virtual machine is free. VMware player is also free if you want to use Linux images.
Here we will concentrate on the problem of bloat, not on the problem of spyware. Bloat is probably the second major cause of slowness of XP after spyware infections. To access the level of bloat on a particular PC you need to create the list of services running after booting (before you open any other program) as well as list of start-up programs. This list should be both printed and saved into a file (see for suitable command line tools to do this) and carefully analyzed. It constitutes the important baseline that can tell you what went wrong.
Analysis of you startup configuration is a very important step. Even if you do not find some rogue services installed, the results of analysis usually get you better understanding of what is used by the computer and several services Microsoft and third party services can usually be disabled. Actually many third party services are just a nuisance and should be disabled. Symantec, Adobe, Apple, and ATI are especially bad in this area. They also put unnecessary program into system tray (can be called recidivist system tray abusers ;-)
If you have such a blueprint and understands that meaning of entries, then you can trim unnecessary start-up programs using msconfig from the Run menu and unnecessary services from Control Panel/Administrative Tools/Services. Still if you install new programs on a regular basis Windows can became "dirty" and startup slow pretty quickly so periodic reinstallation from clean Ghost image is a must
If you have just 256M of RAM and run Windows XP large add-ons like Windows Defender are overkill: they slow down the system considerably. It might be beneficial to eliminated them. You also need more lightweight browser then IE.
Generally with 256K you need cut your services and resident programs to bones in order to cut swapping of pages from disk. Watch the activity of your swap file.
The list of running processes after boot-up are visible in any process viewer. Built-in Windows viewer is actually very primitive and you need to use a better substitute, for example, Process Explorer. But just viewing processes it is not enough. You need to write this snapshot into file and analyze and annotate it line by line (most non-standard free Windows Process Viewers has this capability). Many antispyware programs like Windows Defender also have such tools.
Turn off automatic updates. You can do them manually once a week (you
really need to be diligent with this as current generally or worms and
spyware is not
a joke). Even notifications are pretty taxing and involve scanning for automatic
updates on startup with 3-5 minutes of almost 100% CPU usage when you PC or
laptop became sluggish and almost impossible to work with. If you do not
mind drinking a cup of coffee before starting work it might be a perfect opportunity.
Windows Protector is a resource hog and is slows down 256K PCs. Here you
need to wait you need to spyware protection and you need for quick and responsive
PC. Windows Protector is a good security tool from the point of view of
catching spyware, the problem is that it is designed for PCs with at least 512M
of RAM and CPUs faster then 1.2GHz.
Periodically, once a week or once a month defragment your C drive and
other drives that you are using frequently. See
Maintaining Windows 2000 Through Defragmentation for details.
The best strategy that I have found is to start defragmentor each day when you
are going for lunch.
Sometimes very slow startup means that you have remote drives for
which server is currently unavailable mapped permanently for your desktop. The
simplest solution is to delete all such mappings.
Opera is not
a bad browser that might fit your needs (Firebox and Netscape both are resource
pigs too: not a big improvement over IE). It has the initial memory footprint
of approximately 16M. But you might suffer from using non-mainstream browser.
- The quickest way to speed up boot times is to use the free Microsoft utility BootVis.exe. Although it's intended primarily for developers, anyone can use it to analyze their boot times and see where there are slowdowns. More important, the tool will also automatically make system changes to speed up your boot time, so you don't need to go into a lengthy analysis of where your slowdowns are and how to solve them
- Depending on your system and how it's set up, you may see only a moderately faster startup time, or you may speed up boot time dramatically. I've seen reports of improvements ranging from a little over 3 seconds to more than 35 seconds. The improvements I found on my systems were moderate-7 seconds faster on one, and 10 seconds faster on another. Think of all the things you could accomplish with another 10 seconds in the day!
- The BootVis utility traces boot time metrics and then displays the results in a variety of graphs showing total boot time, CPU usage, disk I/O, driver delays, and disk utilization.
- Download it from www.microsoft.com/whdc/hwdev/platform/performance/fastboot/default.mspx and extract it into its own folder.
- Go to the folder and double-click on BootVis.exe.
- To analyze how your system boots, choose Trace → Next Boot. (Choose Trace → Next Boot + Driver Delays if you want to trace delays caused by drivers as well as your normal boot sequences.)
- Tell the program how many times to reboot and run the test (the more times it runs, the more accurate the results, although the longer the test takes to run). Click OK, and your system will reboot.
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09/22/2008
Is your PC tired and sluggish? Has its get up and go got up and went? If you want a faster system, you could certainly break the bank and buy a new machine. Or you could read this article instead.
We've found 50 downloads that will make your PC run more quickly and smoothly, help you use the Internet more effectively, and push Windows to work at optimum speed with the interface you want, not what Microsoft gave you.
[an error occurred while processing this directive]Most of these downloads are free to use forever; some are free to try, but require that you pay for them after a trial period (we've labeled each download accordingly). You won't have to search high and low on the Internet to find them; they're all available from the PC World Downloads library.
What are you waiting for? Get downloading; you're minutes away from a spiffier, faster system.
General Tune-Up Tools
Sometimes the best way to optimize your PC is to use all-in-one tune-up tools that offer a slew of utilities, ranging from file cleanup to Registry cleaners and beyond. Here are some of our favorites.
Advanced WindowsCare V2 Personal
This great free all-in one tool straightens out your Registry, handles Windows startup programs, erases your surfing history, removes spyware and protects you from future infections, and gives your system an all-around optimization.
Be sure to tell the program to create a restore point before it goes to work. And examine, closely, what it will do in its overall system optimization. Apart from that, just direct the program to scan your system, see what it wants to do, and let it do its business.
Download Advanced WindowsCare V2 Personal | Price: Free
TuneUp Utilities
This all-around degunker and system cleaner will sweep away unneeded files, control which programs run on startup, undelete, and even completely destroy unwanted files to protect your privacy.
Download TuneUp Utilities | Price: US$50 (Trial)
WinSettings Pro
With this tool you can kill junk files, duplicate files, and Internet tracks. It also includes a good cookie cleaner that displays all your cookies, lists their contents, and then lets you eliminate ones you don't want. Features beyond system cleaning include Registry tools that claim to speed up Internet access. And how about a screen-capture program and wallpaper randomizer on top of that?
Download WinSettings Pro | Price: $50 (Shareware)
Super Utilities
Given that Super Utilities has 27 tools for cleaning and optimizing your PC, you're sure to find a module that you want. Included are a startup organizer, a Registry cleaner, defragmentation tools, antispyware features, and much more.
Download Super Utilities | Price: $60 (Trial)
Glary Utilities
This excellent no-cost tool promises one-click cleanup and optimization, and it delivers. It scans your system for problems with the Registry, shortcuts, startup programs, and spyware, and then gives you the option of which to clean up. It also deletes traces of your Internet surfing and erases temporary files. Optimization doesn't get simpler than this.
Download Glary Utilities | Price: Free
Application and Startup Optimization
System sluggishness is often the result of problems with the applications you run. Are they outdated and in need of patching? Do too many run in the background? Use the following utilities to solve those problems and others.
Secunia PSI
If you make sure that all of your applications are patched and up-to-date, they'll run faster and be more secure--and so will your PC on the whole. Unfortunately, visiting the Web site for each of your applications can be so time-consuming that you'll never get around to doing it. Grab this freebie instead. It scans your system, lists all of your applications, and then regularly checks for security patches. When it finds a new patch, it applies the fix.
Download Secunia PSI | Price: Free
PC Decrapifier
One likely reason your system is sluggish is that it's bedeviled by "craplets"--software that your PC maker installed because it was paid to. Craplets slow down startup and general operation.
This free software removes dozens of unwanted items automatically. It zaps only a specific set of craplets and trialware programs: Those that are specifically put on new PCs, such as QuickBooks Trial, Wild Tangent Games, Dell URL Assistant, and others. (For a full list, go to the PC Decrapifier site.) Before you use this utility, create a restore point in case it kills something you wanted to keep.
Download PC Decrapifier | Price: Free
Autoruns
Unnecessary services and applications that run whenever you start your PC or log in to it are a big cause of system slowdowns. Unfortunately, it's tough to identify every item that starts up, because nothing in Windows gives you such information. That's why you need this free tool. It displays every program and service running and offers a great deal of detail about each, such as associated .dll files, the program or service name, and its location on your PC. With that knowledge, you can decide what you don't want to run on startup.
Download Autoruns | Price: Free
Security Task Manager
Similar to Autoruns, this excellent tool shows you every running program and process. The utility also indicates whether the program is likely malicious, its type, how it launched (for example, upon startup or from within Windows Explorer), and the file name. It lets you delete any program and process with a single click. It also rates files according to how harmless or dangerous they may be. To stop a program, highlight it, click Remove, and you're done.
Download Security Task Manager | Price: $29 (Trial)
WinPatrol
This very good all-around system optimizer frees your PC of unnecessary programs that run on startup and keeps it clean of spyware and other malware. Whenever a program tries to start automatically, WinPatrol sends you an alert so you can block it. In addition, it shows details about the program, including the creator, when the program was added, the file name, and so on. The Delayed Start feature allows you to put off the launch of certain programs for up to an hour. That way, you'll still have access to the program when you need it.
Download WinPatrol | Price: Free
Foxit Reader
Strictly speaking, this isn't an optimization tool because it doesn't clean your system or tune it up. But it does eliminate a cause of system slowdowns and instability for many people: buggy, bloated Adobe Reader software for reading PDF files.
The free Foxit Reader is smaller, loads quickly, doesn't take up unnecessary memory, and has no instability issues. So if Adobe Reader slows your system down, this is a great alternative.
Download Foxit Reader | Price: Free
Norton Removal Tool
Some Norton products, especially the security suites, are notorious for taking up far too many system resources and too much RAM. Removing them completely can be tough, but this free tool from Norton does the trick. Copy down your product key before removing them in case you want to reinstall.
Download Norton Removal Tool | Price: Free
McAfee Consumer Products Removal Tool
Like Norton products, some McAfee utilities can consume serious amounts of system resources. To remove them from your system, use this free tool.
Download McAfee Consumer Products Removal Tool | Price: Free
Hard-Disk Cleaning and Backup
Your hard disk is clogged with files you no longer need. They occupy precious space and could possibly slow your system. Get rid of them with these optimization tools, which include a very good backup program.
CCleaner
This is probably the best tool you can find for cleaning your system and thereby optimizing your PC. It scrubs temporary Internet files, the history list, cookies, autocomplete entries, the thumbnail cache, unneeded file fragments, temporary files--the list goes on. It also includes a Registry optimizer and uninstall tools, and eliminates traces that applications leave behind
Download CCleaner | Price: Free
Duplicate Music Files
If you have a big MP3 or media files collection, you likely have many duplicates and don't realize it. The excess files hog hard-disk space and junk up your media library. Finding duplicates can be difficult, though, because the same piece of music or media may have different file names. This freebie searches for more than file names, as it compares file sizes, does error checks, and even examines ID3 tags to track down duplicates and delete them.
Download Duplicate Music Files | Price: Free
Easy Duplicate File Finder
Looking to clean all sorts of duplicate files? This tool does the job for you. It scans your system, gives you a full report, and lets you clean either in bulk or just selected files. It also allows you to protect system files so that you don't accidentally delete any important ones that your PC needs to run.
Download Easy Duplicate File Finder | Price: Free
NovaBackup Professional
Backup software may be the most overlooked optimization tool of all. When something goes wrong with your system, you'll want a way to recover files and restore your machine to a working state. This software does a great job, and can restore individual files, folders, or a whole disk.
Download NovaBackup Professional | Price: $50 (Trial) [an error occurred while processing this directive]