What can I do to speed up my PC?

[ajl917]

Hey,

Well my computer is nice, but old and slow by today's standards. Im pretty sure my computer is from 2002. I am running Windows XP (love it), but that isnt the problem. My hard drive space is just about 60 GB which I am slowly but surely approaching. (Im at about 50 GB used so far) From right clicking on My Computer, Intel Pentium 4 CPU 2.66GHz 2.65GHz, 256 MB RAM. What can I do to speed up my computer while keeping the same computer and how would I go about getting more hard drive space? Thanks guys

-Andrew

[Poseidon79]

I reformat my OS drive/partition and re-install XP every 2 years or so. Over time windows slows down due to MANY MANY factors. No amount of defrag, spyware, registry cleaner.. etc.. is going to speed it back up to 100% other than a fresh install.

If your 60GB HD is all one partition then you're gonna lose EVERYTHING unless you have an external or disks to back up all your files. Yes you will have to re-install ALL your software (only takes a couple hours but WORTH it). 60GB is really small... I suggest you buy a second hard drive... install it first... move all your files over.. then reinstall windows on your 60GB drive.

[BLOWNCO]

buy a mac lol

[CaptainChaos]

You should get another drive, shift everything over to it that you want to keep and then reinstall XP on the 60GB. I bought a 320gb external for 140$ at bestbuy. I keep everything on there ie Music Vids Photos etc and reserve my OS hard drive for installing the apps I like. You can also check and see if your computer can support more RAM.

Defraggers make a difference too as you can defrag using various methods that can speed up your processing. For example...you can now defrag and set up the drive alphabetically, or set it up to where it puts your most used stuff first, etc etc. I use O+O Defrag.

The thing that helps me the most though is that I keep my primary drive free of clutter.

[one1]

Apple Store (U.S.) - iMac

Anything on that page will do it

[ASar08]

256 MB ram is not enough. These days you want at least 1 gig. It won't even matter if you reinstall windows, you need more memory. (it will help a little, but the memory will make more of a difference)

Here's what I would do (before you re-install windows... this will be a pain in the *** if you only have your computers internal HD, and no external backup)

1) Upgrade your memory to 1 gig. Tigerdirect.com has decent prices for memory.

2) Download a program like CCleaner, or something equivalent. CCleaner - Home. Let it clean up your HD and registry... also take a look through your startup programs and remove junk stuff.

3) Use a program like Auslogics Defrag, or Defraggler to defrag your drive. Windows defrag doesn't work all that well.

4) Upgrade to SP3 if you haven't done so already.

Good luck!

[Muggz5]

In conjunction with what Poseidon is saying here's my tip....
I actually use an older PC same 2002 ish on XP media. Get an External HD. I put all artwork, themes, music, video, anything other than OS and application files on my external HD. So my 120 GB internal has plenty of room. If you have pro go to your system info and in the advanced settings of performance options, increase your paging file. This will help stretch your older slower pc.
Right-Click "My Computer" ->properties>advanced>performance settings>choose best option under "visual effects tab"> then go to "advanced tab">increase paging file.

1) Upgrade your memory to 1 gig. Tigerdirect.com has decent prices for memory.

2) Download a program like CCleaner, or something equivalent. CCleaner - Home. Let it clean up your HD and registry... also take a look through your startup programs and remove junk stuff.

3) Use a program like Auslogics Defrag, or Defraggler to defrag your drive. Windows defrag doesn't work all that well.

4) Upgrade to SP3 if you haven't done so already.

I agree with all of this except, you need to check the maximum allowed RAM on any particular machine. I ran into a problem with one of my pc's, this particular one Im using it maxed out at 768.
Buy a MAC you'll get spoiled, this isnt a slow machine but compared to other DualCore 3GB RAm pc and the Mac, this is like archaic.

[tyfly867]

As much ram as that baby can hold. Relativley cheap for the gains it acheives.

[njt1]

I had the same problems with my daughters old XP machine,if you go here and follow the thread through there are lots of instructions and tips on speeding up XP (All XP users read this. - Cyber Tech Help Support Forums) like MMI for XP.

The go here and let the system scanner program run it will tell you what RAM capacity your PC has and it will also tell you what is compatible (Memory upgrades, flash media, and usb storage at Crucial.com), this made the most difference for me.

Hope that helps.

[chox99]

Put another Gig of RAM and Larger HDD in there and You'll be fine for another few years. Believe me I have the same CPU and it's flying!. Try fresh install or Windows XP Lite (stripped down) version as well. It's pretty light and nice if you don't do tons of stuff with your Comp. Good luck.

[ToxicFTW]

If you don't want to go buy anything new right away, try this.

Try running disk cleanup and then defragmenting your computer. It will get rid of a lot of uneccesary files and it may even speed up your computer.

[sziklassy]

Has nobody mentioned adding ram? 256mb of ram is just not enough >.<
You should be able to get some fairly cheap ram, just make sure it is of the right type (probably DDR or DDR2). Won;t cost you more than 50 bucks to get 2 gigs on newegg. And that is a HUGE improvement.

EDIT: A bunch of people mentioned ram lol... guess I need to learn to read.

[Napoleon_PhoneApart]

Though it's probably more than you want to do, I'd definitely replace the motherboard with a more current model that supports SATA3 3.0 hard drives. Of course, that will entail a new processor, video card and such. Just my two cents.

[ajl917]

Ok, well I ran the crucial thing and it said my computer had the max amount of memory

Also, Im 99% sure I got XP with the computer, but I dont have the CD for it.

And lastly, anyone who mentioned the Mac, no. 1. I like Windows. 2. I have a pretty good computer, why pay $1000+ for a "solution"?

[ASar08]

Unfortunately, if your mobo only supports 256 MB memory, you're paddling upstream with a broken paddle. It's just not enough to run XP smoothly. If you buy a new mobo, you might as well just bite the bullet and get a whole new PC. I live in Canada, and there are several stores selling decent spec desktops for $200 - $250 (no monitor / OS). Nothing fancy, but if you don't play games, or do anything fancy like video / photo editing, it shouldn't make much difference. If you already have a monitor, then you can just use the XP license from your current rig, and you could have a decent working PC for $250...

And don't tell me that's too much, cause I know how much you paid for your cell phone

Good luck!

[movalwebmaster]

Unfortunately, if your mobo only supports 256 MB memory, you're paddling upstream with a broken paddle. It's just not enough to run XP smoothly. If you buy a new mobo, you might as well just bite the bullet and get a whole new PC. I live in Canada, and there are several stores selling decent spec desktops for $200 - $250 (no monitor / OS). Nothing fancy, but if you don't play games, or do anything fancy like video / photo editing, it shouldn't make much difference. If you already have a monitor, then you can just use the XP license from your current rig, and you could have a decent working PC for $250...

And don't tell me that's too much, cause I know how much you paid for your cell phone

Good luck!

haha im with you on this one, with the amount of cost to purchase a new hdd for more space and "if" you could get more ram, it would cost you maybe 50 more for a new system with 2-4gb ram, dual core processor or something equivalent, faster bus...etc

and if anything take your old hdd and put it in the new system as a slave

but many options listed by others are good things to do to

[Muggz5]

Like I posted earlier, increase your paging file. Get an advanced cleaner and clean your broken registry entries, junk files etc etc. ( i use Advanced Windows Care the personal version is free, Pro isnt) get an external HDD, put all your music, photo, video files on there. Leave OS and application files. Of course Defrag, Clean temp. files, but you should be able to stretch it a little. The problem here is your maximum RAM allowed. This is way too low to run XP. Maybe try Windows 2000 Proffesional. (although I dont recommend it, its about the only thing you could do with low amount of RAM)

[Terrill]

delete programs/songs you dont use