Some Quick Tips on How to Speed Up Your Computer - Simple Ways to Make Your Computer Run Faster

It is 2010 and if you look back over the past thirty years it is amazing how our lifestyles have changed. Who would believe that the majority of us now consider a computer as an essential commodity in our lifestyles and we would be unable to work properly without one. One of our common questions these days is how do you speed up your computer?

As so many of us rely on computers for our work, if our computer is running slow then our work suffers and we cannot complete our job in the allocated time. This leads to frustration and annoyance and in order to resolve this we look for ways to speed up the computer. If you do not know anything about computers your first option will probably be to contact a computer engineer to sort it out and speed up the PC. This can be an expensive route and in reality there are a few things you should try yourself first which should prove a lot less expensive and should help speed up your computer.

Over time I have learned many simple ways to speed up my computer before I even think about asking an engineer to check it out.

1 The first thing you should check for is how much memory your computer has. I remember one of my first computers had a RAM of 2 Meg. Although at the time I thought this was fantastic, things have moved on from there and now the average computer has 1 to 2 gigabyte of ram as our requirements and usage of the PC has increased dramatically. If your computer is running slow then you should see if you can increase the memory first and you will definitely see that this will speed up your computer. Some motherboards will accept up to 4 gigabyte so it is worth looking into that.

2 If you are working on your computer all the time you will have collected a lot of unnecessary files over time. By just deleting all these unwanted files will help speed up your computer.

3 Defragmentation of your computer is another way to increase the speed of the PC. Although this sounds like a complicated thing to do it is actually very simple but it can take quite a few hours to complete so I would suggest you set this task to perform overnight, unless you have several hours to waste. In order to defragment your computer you need to access your disk defragmenter. You will find this if you go to all programs, click on accessories then go to system tools, you will find the defragmenter there. This should speed up your computer as well.

4 After implementing these steps and your PC is still running slow then your next step should be to scan your registry for errors. You can get a free registry scan to find out if your registry has problems,you should be aware that maintenance of the registry is a necessity and if it shows errors then you should run a suitable registry cleaner for your computer on a regular basis. Make sure the registry cleaner you use has a back up facility just in case it deletes any important data. If you do this you will find that this will help stabilise the speed of your computer.

Hopefully by implementing these steps you will notice a significant change in the performance of your PC.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Lilian_Dabrai

Computer Performance - 7 Ways to Speed Up Windows Computers

Are you sick and tired of it taking forever to open a website, file or program? Did your computer seem to run a lot faster when you first got it? If your answers to these 2 questions were yes, then please read on. In this article I am going to give you tips to speed up your computer. They can all be done today, even if you are new to computers. The 7 steps that I am going to share with you are so easy, believe me you can do it! These are techniques that computer technicians in several different support organizations do and some charge a lot of money for their walking you through these processes. You are going to get them today at no charge. Are you ready? Then let's begin!

Step 1: Scandisk

You should run scandisk at least once a month. This will make sure that your computer can read all of the information on your disk. How will this speed up my computer? I'm glad you asked! You see your computer has in it's hard drive what the technicians call redundancy. What I mean is if your computer is trying to read a file and the data isn't read correctly from the disk, the computer tries to read that information again and again a set number of times. This results in slower loading times. When scandisk is ran regularly this keeps your disk free of these storage errors and thus enables the computer to get the information it needs from the disk as fast as possible. Scandisk should be run before the next step each and every time.

I know you're asking, how do I run scandisk. It's simple. Find that icon on your desktop or in your start menu labeled 'My Computer'. In there you will see a listing of all the drives in your computer. Right click on the drive you want to scan and go to properties. There, you will have a tools tab. Click on it. You will see a button that says check for errors. This is scandisk or also called checkdisk on different versions of windows. There are 2 different modes, Standard or Thorough. Standard checks and makes sure that all the bits and pieces of your files are in the spot on the disk where it thinks they should be. In other words, it checks for filing errors. Thorough does a standard check as well as it tests each spot on the disk where the drive can write something and makes sure that what it writes, it reads back the same thing. If it doesn't read the same information back, it marks that spot as bad so that it is not used. This keeps down that redundancy thing we spoke of earlier. Wasn't that easy? Now, on to Step 2.

Step 2: Defrag

Defrag should be run once a week if you use your computer more than 14 hours a week. This equates to about 2 hours a day. Most people who actively use their computer will fall into this category. Defrag, whose real name is disk defragmenter, is your best friend for speed. You see when your computer writes something to the disk; it starts the disk to turning and drops bits of the data you want to write wherever there is a hole. It then tells the filing system where it placed that piece. So your file could be literally broken into 20 pieces! Your disk takes longer to load the file because it has to jump around to different spots to gather the pieces together when it needs it. Defrag takes care of this by gathering the pieces all together and writing them back to the disk in one piece. This way when you need the information, it's all right there. To run defrag it's the same as where we went for scandisk. You go to 'My Computer' and you right click on the drive you want to run defrag on and go to properties. There go to the tools tab. Click the Defragment button. Wow this is getting easier by the minute! On to step 3.

Step 3: Background Programs

Background programs really slow down your computer's performance. They accomplish this by using up your computer's resources. Resources are the combined power of your processor (brain), memory, and disk space. These 3 are the equivalent to horsepower. This is where you will gain a lot of your speed back as well. If you look at an area of your screen right now, I can show you a fraction of some of these that you never thought of. The area I want you to look at is called your system tray. It is located next to your clock, which is opposite your start menu. If your start menu is on the left side, then the clock is on the right. Next to the clock you will see these little icons or pictures. These are programs that run on your computer whenever it boots. Guess what, these are background programs. They are there to help load things you need faster. If you are following this guide you really don't need most of them. Do you?

Here's how you get rid of them and most of the others that you can't even see as well. Sorry folks who are on Windows 2000, this step won't work for you. If you read to the end I will give you a bonus that will make up for it, I promise. Ok, for the rest of you, click on start. Click on run. Type msconfig. Click ok. You should get a system configuration utility. Be very careful here and follow my instructions exactly. Click on the startup tab at the top. You will have a list of all the programs that run when your computer boots or starts. If you look down the list there will be some names that are familiar to you. When you see those names I want you to think: "Do I really need this program running all the time?" If the answer is no, uncheck the box. For example, some of you may have heard of RealPlayer. There's a smart start icon associated with it. You really don't need real player running when you are only going to be playing FreeCell now do you? :) On to step 4.

Step 4: Temporary Files

Temporary files hold up space on your disk. These files are most of the time useless. Temporary files are just that; files that were temporarily created by a program or installer. They are supposed to be deleted when not needed any longer, but a lot of programs do a poor job of cleaning them up. Helping them out will get you more speed for your horsepower. For example: let's take temporary internet files. When you go to a website every element of that website's decorations are stored in a temp file on your computer. Your computer does this to help supposedly. It's supposed to help by when you visit the same site again; the elements of the website will already be on your computer and therefore don't have to be downloaded again. This in theory should speed up your surfing right? Wrong! Here's what really goes down. For every element of the website, your computer reads every temp file to see if it matches. Every single file in your temporary internet files folder! To get a grasp of this here's what I want you to do. Open internet explorer. Go to the tools menu and click on internet options. Click the settings button. Then click the view files button. Do you see what I mean? Every file! Now...Close the temporary internet files window. Click OK on the settings window. Do you see that button next to settings on the internet options window? It's labeled delete files. Click it. Check delete all offline content. Click ok. When the hourglass is gone, you are all clean! This should be done once a month. This will keep your whole computer running smoothly. The secret lies in Internet Explorer. It's integrated so much into windows, when it has a problem, windows has a problem. What I am saying is when you opened my computer in steps 1 and 2. You were using internet explorer. Ok. Nuff said. On to step 5!

Step 5: Antivirus

Good Antivirus software is an absolute must! There are several choices to choose from. Some cost money and some don't. Viruses hide on your computer and wreak havoc. If you don't have antivirus software on your computer, you will never know they are there. They sit and hide out until their appointed time and then interfere with your computer. Viruses are programs written by people with too much time on their hands and not enough morals. They sit and think of ways to make your day bad. Some viruses will sit on your computer and do nothing but open up connections to other servers all over the internet. What does that do? It slows your computer down drastically! Nuff said. Your choices are to get paid antivirus software like Norton, Mcafee, or Computer Associates. If you don't have the cash to spare then you can go to your favorite search engine like Yahoo or Google and enter in 'free antivirus download' and get a list of all kinds of scanners. Some is far better than none. Some of the best free software that I have found are AVG, Avast!, and ClamWin. If you have a fear of installing software, never fear. There are also free online virus scanners. Again, you go to your favorite search engine and type in 'free online virus scan' and you will get plenty of results. Beware though, with these scanners you run the risk of getting infected still. The reason is you have to go to the site and scan the computer yourself, preferably once a week. In that time a virus could have already infected your machine. Antivirus software that you install on the computer checks every file, every time it's used thus drastically decreasing the chances of infection. It's like a flu shot. Some of the good online virus scanners are Norton, Panda, and BitDefender. Now, on to step 6.

Step 6: Recycle Bin

It is very important to keep your recycle bin empty. What I mean is this, you don't want to have hundreds of files sitting in your recycle bin that you deleted 6 months ago. They are taking up valuable space. Windows uses your drive as memory to run programs. When you run out of physical memory, it uses what's called a page or swap file and stores it there. These recycle bin files are taking up space that windows could be using for memory. Every bit of memory you can get adds to your horsepower. So for God's sake, please keep your recycle bin tidy. Get rid of things that you are sure you won't need again. When you go to delete something, and you are absolutely sure you won't need it again, you can hold down the shift key and press the delete key to permanently delete it without sending it to the recycle bin. And now, last but not least, step 7.

Step 7: Adware and Spyware

I like to call these small time viruses. The industry calls them parasites. Norton calls them extended threats. Do you get my drift? What is adware and spyware you may ask? They are actually quite similar. I'll start first by explaining the ways that you can get them on your computer. Let's say you download a 'free' program to run on your computer that you think is pretty neat. If you are like most of us, you don't take the time to read the license agreement. If you did, you would find a line similar to: by installing this product you agree to install xyz product which will be used to send marketing information to the makers of the software. Do you see how they get you? One of the other ways you can get it is by going to some random website. It doesn't matter what it is, but they have this script that runs as the page is loading and it installs the adware and/or spyware on your computer. The last way that I will discuss here is through a virus. There are viruses out there whose sole job is to download adware, spyware, keyloggers, and other malicious software on to your computer. These things really slow your computer down. Here's how they work.

Adware and spyware install on your computer and watch what you do, where you surf, you know what you are interested in. They then open a connection to a server and report your activities. They are very good at what they do! Where adware and spyware differ is spyware does nothing but report your activities. Adware on the other hand reports your activities and the server it reports to in turn sends it an ad to display on your computer. Now, just like there are antivirus programs out there, there are now very good antispyware and antiadware programs on the market. Noadware, Spybot, and Adaware are a few of the good ones.

In conclusion there are 7 major ways to speed up your computer with simple maintenance and preventative measures. Run scandisk, defrag, get rid of excess background programs, delete temporary files, get some antivirus software, and also get a good adware and spyware remover utility. I hope you have found this information useful. I hope that I have helped someone here with this information and I pray that you will check out some other very useful information at

Anthony Brown

www.BrownsBlessing.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Anthony_Brown_Sr.

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How To Formating Secondary Hard Drive

Formatting a Secondary Hard Drive

Step1

Right-Click on the “My Computer” icon either on your desktop or in the Start Menu and select “Manage.”

Step2

A new window titled “Computer Management” comes up. Select “Storage” from the left hand side by clicking it once, then select “Disk Management(local)” from the right side by double-clicking it.

Step3

Now in the lower part of the main frame (right side) of the window you should see a nice visual of all your hard drives. Each line is a different drive. Each box on a line (with a colored bar at the top and a size displayed in MB or GB) is a partition on the drive. Partitions are separations of space on a drive. Unless you are doing something specific that requires multiple partitions, you only want one partition per drive.

Step4

First you must delete any existing partitions on the drive you are going to format. Do this by right-clicking on the partition's box and selecting “Delete Partition...” Since you already know that you will be deleting everything on the drive, and have already backed everything up, you can safely say yes to any warning the computer presents you with.

Step5

If there are multiple partitions make sure you have saved everything off them since they might each have different drive letters (i.e. “D:” or “F:”). Then repeat the above step for each of them. If you only want to format one partition that is OK and you can continue to the next step without deleting the other partitions.

Step6

The box for the drive to be formatted should now have a black bar at the top of it and should say “Unallocated” under its size (see picture). Right click on it and select “New Partition...” The New Partition Wizard comes up.

Step7

In the New Partition Wizard click next. On the next page make sure “Primary Partition” is selected and click next. Now make the size equal to the maximum (it should already be set to it), and click next again. On the next page the computer will automatically choose the first available drive letter for the new drive. However, if you like you can choose another drive letter from the drop-down menu, and then click next.

Step8

Finally the New Partition Wizard asks if you would like to format the new partition and if so what format. Choose “NTFS” as it is faster and more secure. Leave the “Allocation unit size” as “Default.” In the “Volume label” field enter whatever name you want the drive to have. Simple is better. Avoid using spaces. Lastly, if the drive is brand new and has never been used before check the “Perform a quick format” box. If the drive has been used before leave this box unchecked. Leave the “Enable file and folder compression” box unchecked and click next. Then on the next page click finish.

Step9

The wizard will now spend a little while formatting the drive. On old or large drives this may take a while. Do not close the “Computer Management” window until it finishes. You will know it is done when the word under the size of the drive changes from “Formatting” to “Healthy” and the name and drive letter you chose for the new drive show up. After it is finished you can proceed to use your newly formatted drive.

Credit TO:www.ehow.com

How To Format Mac OS 9

Formatting with Drive Setup

Step1

Use the Drive Setup application with Mac OS 9 whether you're setting up a secondary drive or reformatting your system drive. The main difference is that if you are going to reformat your system drive, you must boot off a system CD because you will have to reinstall the Mac OS 9 (or whatever operating system you are going to use). If you are not formatting your system drive, skip the next step.

Step2

Insert the system CD into your CD drive and restart your computer to boot off of it. From the second the screen goes blank and starts to boot, you must hold the 'c' key down until you see the little happy Mac picture come up. On some older (pre-G3) Macs, you hold down the open-apple (aka Command) key down instead of 'c'.

Step3

Insert your Mac OS 9 System CD if you haven't already because you booted off of it. Open the CD and open the “Drive Setup” program, which is in the “Utilities” folder (also usually in a “Utilities” folder on your main hard drive).

Step4

Click on the drive you wish to format and press “Initialize...” after the Drive Setup window opens showing you a list of the drives installed on your computer.

Step5

Click Custom Setup at the bottom of the “Initializing will destroy all data on the following volumes:” window that pops up.

Step6

Select “1 Partition” from the “Partitioning Scheme:” drop down menu unless you are formatting the drive for some sort of special setup (such as a future installation of OSX). Select “Mac OS Extended” from the “Type:” menu. In the “Size:” field, enter the number from “Total Capacity:” (the computer may change the number to make it slightly smaller to properly fit). Now press “OK.”

Step7

Click “Initialize” when you are back at the “Initialize” window. The computer will format the drive and return to the “Drive Setup” window which should say “Formatting...” for a while and once finished display the message “Initialization was successful.”

Step8

Reinstall your operating system, now that your drive is fully formatted, if you booted off your system disk and reformatted your system drive.

Credit To: www.ehow.com

How to Format a Computer with Windows 95, 98, or ME

To reinstall Windows, you will need a Startup Diskette and a Windows Installation CD. 

Download the Startup Diskette Creator

Note: We recommend using the Startup Diskette available on this page. Other Windows Startup Diskettes may not work with the following steps.

1. Once you have your Startup Diskette, insert it into the floppy drive and restart your computer.
   
   
2. Select option #1 - Start the computer with CD-ROM support.
   
   
3. After a minute or so, you will see "A:>_".
   
   
4. Type "fdisk" and press Enter.
   
   
5. If asked to enable large disk support, select Y for Yes. (Note: Some versions of Windows 95 may not be compatible with large disk support. Select N here if it does not support the FAT32 file system.)
   
   
6. Select Option #1 - Create DOS partition or Logical DOS Drive.
   
   
7. Select Option #1 - Create Primary DOS Partition.
   
   
8. The drive integrity will be verified.
   
   
9. Unless you are planning to make multiple partitions, select Y when asked if you want to use the maximum available size for the partition and to make the partition active.
   
   
10. The drive integrity will be verified again.
    
    
11. When completed press the Esc key to exit fdisk.
    
    
12. Without removing the floppy disk, press the reset button on the computer or press the keys Ctrl then Alt then Delete and release them together. This will restart the computer.
    
    
13. Again, select the option to Start the computer with CD-ROM support.
    
    
14. When you see A:>, directly above it is a message about your CD-ROM drive. It will tell you the letter assigned to your CD-ROM drive, take note of it. 
    
    
15. At the A:>, type "format C:" and press Enter.
    
    
16. Press the Y key then the enter key when asked if you want to proceed with the format.
    
    
17. The format will probably take some time, so be patient.
    
    
18. You will be asked to choose a Volume Label, which is a name for your hard drive. It has no effect on the operation of your computer, you may choose any name you like.

credit to: www.whitecanyon.com

How Does an Anti-Virus Software Work? - The Inside Story

We all know about anti-virus software these days. I guess you have read my comparative study on anti-virus software too. If in case you haven't, here it is. While writing on that article I realized I have been rather superficial on the most important part of an anti-virus column and that is not WHAT cures the disease. Its about HOW they do it. Today let's find out how they actually work.

After a lot of study, I came to know about mainly four different algorithms used by today's anti-virus software to detect viruses:

1. Generic Scanning Technique
2. Integrity Checking Technique
3. Heuristic Search Scanning
4. Interception technique

None of them are individually perfect. However in combination they often prove to be a formidable opponent to any current viruses, trojans and more. Moreover some of the techniques also protect your computer against future viruses.

1. Generic Scanning Technique

Most of the old viruses and some new viruses and trojans have a recognizable pattern or signature (sequence of bytes) which anti-virus software looks for. Anti-virus software has a library of signature against which it matches the applications, boot sectors and other possible locations of infection. If it can detect a match it will then signal the end-user with the virus details and location where it was found. Anti-virus software's update these signatures at regular intervals. Unfortunately mutating and polymorphic viruses evade simple signature detection by continuously changing their code. They are detected by advanced techniques discussed below.

Advantages

Signature detection is simple and fast. Anti-virus software can look for virus signature in large number of files in a very short period of time. This is what makes it a popular option with anti-virus vendors.

Disadvantages

Virus creators today mostly code polymorphic viruses which changes the code, while retaining the functionality, thereby evading signature detection algorithm. There are virus toolkits available for free which allows even a script-kiddie to code a polymorphic virus with minimal expertise. This can be a useful technique only in conjunction with other techniques but not alone. It is in some ways similar to comment spam detection or email spam detection using keyword matching for typical spam words like viagra.

2. Integrity Checking Technique

Some anti-virus softwares can maintain a log file about important files under Windows. The integrity information of those files are stored in their database and are recorded by check-summing. If a virus tries to modify a system file, the anti-virus software at once notifies the user by this technique.

The best part of this technique is, even if a system file gets corrupt (weirdly as it does sometimes without the initiative of Mr. virus) suddenly and tries to change and modify the boot sectors or say registry, the integrity of the files will be violated and the anti-virus will warn the user about that too.

Advantages

• The integrity checking technique perhaps is the most foolproof of them all, as it can determine if a file has been damaged by a virus or not.

Disadvantages

• The problem with this is, not many softwares can implement such precise and perfect technique. A data loss or a damage due to corruption can not be distinguished with a case where the file is damaged by a virus. But, there is a boon in the bane. Not any harmful activities within your computer gets unnoticed.

3. Heuristic Scanning

Heuristic Scanning follows the behavioral pattern of a virus and has different set of rule for different viruses. If any file is observed to be following that set of particular activities then it infers that the particular file is infected. The most advanced part of Heuristic Scanning is that it can work against highly randomized polymorphic viruses too. Heuristic scanning technique has the potential to detect any future virus with ease. F-Secure Anti-virus quite successfully implements this technique.

Advantages

• The advantage of this scanning is that, its very it has the prospect of being the only algorithm of all the anti-virus softwares in the future because it can lead us to very accurate virus detection if properly coded.
• It doesn't need anti-viruses to download weekly virus database because it can detect viruses from behavioral pattern from the set of rules.

Disadvantages:

• Te disadvantages of heuristic search techniques are that they are very complex to implement.
• And again, a virus coder can make a virus that will not obey the set of rules a heuristic scanner hopes it will. Then the virus will be infecting without being noticed.
• Again, chances of false alarms are more with heuristic search techniques.

4. Interception Technique

This is the newest technique which continuously monitors your files for suspicious activities.

Imagine if a virus is hidden in a CD-ROM. Then how on earth would other anti-viruses come to know about it? But interceptors watches all external drives, data devices as well as internet download or even file download from email. That is why it provides real-time protection to your computer. When a virus comes from a DVD or a pen drive, be rest assured that an anti-virus software that has implemented interception technique will detect it immediately and warn you about it. Most of them will prevent you from running infected programs too.

The key feature of an interceptor is that it has to be very fast to avoid degrading user experience. But most of the modern day anti-virus software implementing the technique do it fairly well like for example Nod 32. NAV was at one time known to slow down your computer due to sluggish performance in interception. I heard it has improved over the years.

Advantages

• Gives your computer a Real Time Protection.
• Any chance of a virus coming from an external drive (CD ROM, pen drive etc) is done away with.

Disadvantage

• Interceptors can be very easily disabled if it is not very fast to react against threats and most of the viruses do so with perfection.
• It is a nuisance for a fast and busy user as it keeps coming with logs and warning messages on trivial issues and that too very frequently.

Take home thoughts…

Thanks for reading so far. The two most important take home lessons are:

1. A single anti-virus software may not offer full protection. You may be better protected with two (but not more) anti-virus software as your bases will be better covered. However their interception techniques may conflict. So you may be better off using the real-time scanning of only one of them.
2. Update Keep the virus database file regularly, if possible daily. Many of today's of anti-virus software will do that automatically for you.

As you have reached the heart of the matter, you may want to take a look at this as well. A detailed free Windows anti-virus software here.

Credit to: http://blog.taragana.com