How to make my computer faster

[MGadAllah]

Take a look here , Here , Here

[coyotewrw]

Yeah, the index service isn't very useful to most.

The MSFN Customizing Windows and Tips & Tweaks forums are a good place to start. Also these sites are useful:

Neowin Customizing Windows forum. However, they have a higher level of rudeness compared to MSFN, imo.

Optimize Guides. He gets a lot of grief for not liking Firefox, but I've found most of his advice to be pretty solid.

Edited September 15, 2006 by coyotewrw

[Zxian]

Right, but from my experience any operating system MS issued can not stay more then a year, you will find yourself in a need for a new reinstall, so all tools from here and there just try to increase the time before the need time come, because system performance become so slow, but if any one know tricks, sure it will help alot.

I've been running my desktop on Server 2003 for a good 2 years now without any slowdowns. I also had XP installed on my old desktop without any slowdowns either. I went from XP Gold to SP1 as well without any performance hit. There isn't any proof that XP itself "just slows down"

The key thing to do - DEFRAG! It makes such a huge difference. coyoterw has the right idea with his post. Follow those instructions and you'll be in good shape.

nLiteing is only good if you want to spend the time finding the "perfect" setup for you. XPero, nuhi, Jeremy, and I all have different system requirements than you do, so our configurations will require different "nlitings" of XP. With a system like yours, you really shouldn't be complaining about system performance from XP.

Most regtweaks don't help that much, or are outdated from the Win9x days.

[Jeremy]

Windows XP does not eventually slow down. You have to maintain the performance of your PC. Your PC doesn't take care of itself. Clean out the junk/temp/cache, clean the registry (with a good regcleaner like JV16's), defrag. Also have at least 512MB of RAM and a decent CPU.

[coyotewrw]

I also can't stress enough the need to have some form of backup that allows fast incremental updates. With Acronis True Image, I can update my backup in about ten minutes before making a potentially harmful change to the system, like an unproven registry tweak or new software that I haven't used in the past.

I firmly agree that XP doesn't slow down by itself. It has always been caused by clutter that I didn't take the time to prevent.

[Jeremy]

Yeah, Acronis True Image really comes in handy. I haven't made a new image file in a long time. I'm waiting until the next nLite release comes out so I can reformat, install, configure and image at that time.

[CoffeeFiend]

Like some have said before, Windows doesn't just slow down for no reason.

If it's getting heavily fragmented, that you've installed countless junk shareware apps, that you have tons of spyware running and such, then yes it must definitely get slower over time.

I got some installs that have been running for quite a while too, and just as fast as day one. If it's not your case, then there's a problem somewhere.

[nitroshift]

Cool, any other tricks, that can boost my somputers speed?

First off and the most important: GET RID OF SYMANTEC!!! Ask Andromeda43 and he will explain in detail why you should do so...

[coyotewrw]

First off and the most important: GET RID OF SYMANTEC!!! Ask Andromeda43 and he will explain in detail why you should do so...

One of the worst disservices that beginner-oriented magazines like PC Magazine and PC World do to their readers is their constant recommendations to use suites like Norton and McAfee, who - gee, go figure - are major advertisers. I've never seen a "system suite" that wasn't bloatware. There are better, often free, alternatives.

Look at it this way: professional carpenters buy each tool on its individual merits, using multiple brands. All-in-one tool kits are never good enough for the pros. Same goes with system tools.

[sylvianorth]

My girlfriends pc used to freeze everyday, then I did her pc a massive favour and deleted Norton from it. Needless to say, no more freezing..... As mentioned above, delete Norton, Symantec and anything else that has taken over your PC.

[MGadAllah]

So, can I say that:

Symantec anti virus or Symantec client firewall are no longer good?

What anti virus I should use?

Does updated copy for NOD 32 is enough with windows firewall?

I really do not feel safe if I do not use a firewall application?

but I have to admit that outpost is good but let the machine dying:no:

so what do you think, let things run for better

[coyotewrw]

@mgadallah: My personal choice is F-Secure anti-virus/firewall. They have a very solid rep in the US and European business markets for providing security for large corporate networks, although they're still relatively unkown here in the US consumer market.

Not one single breach in the two+ years I've used it, so it's been well worth the money.

Edited September 16, 2006 by coyotewrw

[Fr33m4n]

I'm using Symantec AV and have had no major problems with it. Now the Norton line of products is a totally different matter. For FW I'm using Look'n'Stop which I switched to from ZA. This setup works for me though I still feel that the products are far from perfect so it would be interesting to hear what other people are using. I know my uncle uses the F-secure suit on his laptop and it is **** slow. I've tried both NOD 32 and kaspersky in the past and was less then impressed. Slowdowns and tons of false positives made norton seem like a good product.

[albator]

I use a pc with

no indexing service

no system restore ( i use acronis bootable cd instead)

no themes or visual candy options on

no unneeded services (9 service allowed including dhcp all other service are disabled)

no antivirus ( just use stict security on xp, firefox or opera 4 browser, and a rule based firewall)

no apps based firewall ( use a rule based firewall with policies on port, my choice is black ice defender

(rule based firewall use less system ressource )

And use nlite !

My system is very stable, what mgadallah said about instability if you turn indexing of is not true

My system is very fast my boot time from bios screen to windows is 8 sec.

My system is fully fonctionnal, except for printer, but I dont have one, so i print virtually to pdf.

If, like me you are a gamer, you should like this.

look a a screenshot for system ressource:

Edited September 17, 2006 by albator

[cyberloner]

more ram... raid harddisk... overclock