# How to Speed up Windows



## Aastii

A slow computer is generally like that because it is lacking resources, be it hard drive space, memory or processing power. There are general things you can do to alleviate these problems, and there are also specific things that can be done for different versions of Windows,none of which require money or extra hardware, just time and a little reading. 

There will also be links to programs to download. These links can be found at the bottom of the guide in the Download Links section. Where there is a link, words will be highlighted in *RED*

*Contents*:


General Fixes
XP Specific Fixes
Vista Specific Fixes
Win 7 Specific Fixes
Download List

*General Fixes*

First step should always be to get rid of all of the useless stuff that you have on your system, rather than work around it, which would make the clean up process less efficient and more time consuming.

If you are running XP, go to:

Start > Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs

If running Vista / 7

Start > Control Panel > Programs & Features

Wait for the list to load and go through each of the programs and uninstall all programs that you do not use. 



> Tips:
> 
> DO NOT uninstall programs if you do not know what they do, first find out if they can be removed without causing problems with your system. Don't just leave them though, as can potentially just be wasting space and resources.
> 
> If you have an OEM system (One built by Dell, HP, Gateway, Acer etc) these nearly always come with useless pieces of software such as help suites or start guides. All of these can go, they are never required for the system to run and just waste space.
> 
> If you have not used a program for more than 2 months, you do not need it. If you may need it in future, back it up with all saved files and uninstall it, you can always install later, but until then, it is just slowing you down.
> 
> If you are running a firewall/antivirus program that you have to pay for, such as Norton, Panda, McAfee etc, these will generally be bloated with features you don't need and fancy interfaces which will be slowing your system down. Uninstall them and replace them with Avast! .For higher spec computers, this isn't totally necessary, as there should be enough spare resources for the difference in speed to be negligible. For older or slower systems however, it is recommended to replace the security software with the lighter freeware, because the performance difference will be much greater



2. Go through all of your files/folders, ordering and tidying them up. By ordering them, you will find files that are outdated and no longer needed and can be removed, as well as making your file system much more efficient, so it takes you less time to find what you need. The computer doesn't have to be slow for tasks to take a long time to do, it can be thanks to your inefficiency that things take longer than they need to.

When you have deleted files and folders, remember that they are not actually gone, they have just been sent to your recycle bin on your desktop. To empty the recycle bin, and get rid of the files you want deleted, right click the recycle bin and click empty

3. Download, install and run Ccleaner. It is a program which gets rid of all cookies, temporary files, just the junk that you don't see.

4. Download and install Auslogics Defrag. The ]defragmentation software that comes with Windows isn't very good. There are paid suites that can do the job much better than free ones (If you are willing to spend money, I recommend O&O defrag), however the free ones are much better than the Windows ones. 

5. Open up run and type in msconfig. From the services tab, check the "Hide all Microsoft services" box at the bottom of the Window, and any programs which are set to load which you do not need or use regularly, remove them by unchecking the check box. You can always start these programs later, and the services will be loaded for them, but making them begin at startup will simply increase boot times and increase total resource usage

*XP Specific Fixes*

*1. Disable Indexing Services. *

The search feature of Windows XP, which is used by very few people, is sped up by the Indexing Services. It is a small program, but it uses a lot of system memory. Even if you do use the search feature a lot, it is still uneccessary to have it enabled. To disable it:

Go to Start > Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs
On the left, click Add/Remove Windows components
Uncheck Indexing Servies and click next

It is now disabled.

*2. Remove Display Extras*

If you do not mind having a less fancy looking system, removing display "extras" can save a lot of resources

Right click My Computer
Click the Advanced Tab
Click performance tab and then click settings
Untick everything except for:

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

*3. Disable Network Files/Printers*

Whenever you open My Computer, or any other Explorer Window (for example, My Documents) it searches for network files and network printers automatically, which can cause a sometimes substantial delay. To remove this:

Open My Computer
Click the Tools menu, then Folder Options
Click the View tab
Uncheck the Automatically search for network folders and printers check box
Click apply
Restart your computer.

They are now disabled

*4. Optimizing your page file.*

Every system uses a technique called paging to save on memory space. This where it will dump certain data that hasn't been used for a long time from memory to a reserved space in your hard drive. As more data is put there, the page file in your hard drive must be resized, which uses processing power that could, and should, be used for other things. To alleviate this issue, you can make the size of the page file fixed. To do so:

Right click My Computer and click Properties
Click the Advanced Tab
Click the settings button under performance
Click the Advanced Tab
Under Virtual Memory, click change
Highlight the drive containing your page file and make the initial Size of the file the same as the Maximum Size of the file.

If you have 512MB of memory or less, make the maxiumum size 150% of the amount of system memory. So, for instance, if you have 512MB system memory, you would make the page file 768MB

If you have greater than 512MB system memory, make the page file 100% of the system memory. So for instance, if you have 1GB (1024MB) system memory, make the page file 1024MB

The next 2 are optional, but if your system is comparable to a snail, they are essential

*5. Remove your desktop background picture*. 

It will make the desktop a little more boring, but will free up a chunk of memory.

*6. Remove Fonts.*

Fonts use up a fair amount of hard drive space and resources. You can remove them all but the ones which applications need and the ones which you use regularly to free up these resources.

Go to Start > Control Panel > Fonts
Move the fonts you don't need to a temporary folder and back them up in case you need them in future
Uninstall the ones you don't need

*Vista Specific Fixes*

*1. Disable User Account Control (UAC) *

This is easily the most annoying and pointless feature ever implemented into any piece of software. It asks you if you are sure you want to do something, every times you try to do something. It not only makes things a heck of a lot less anoying, it cuts down on the time it takes to click yes I am sure, and the time it takes for the screen to fade and the UAC Window to come up.

Click Start
Click your profile picture (top right of the start menu)
Click change user account control settings.
Set it to disabled
Restart

*2. Disable Windows Aero. *

Aero uses a lot of system resources, especially memory and graphical processing performance. Windows Aero makes windows appear translucent and adds some fancy curved edges. To disable it:

Right click your desktop and click Personalize
Click Windows Colour and Appearance
Click Open classic appearance properties for more color options
Change colour scheme from Windows Aero, to Windows Vista Basic
Click Apply

*3. Disable Search Indexing.* 

Like XP, search indexing just speeds up searching. The search feature on Vista is much, much better and more useful, but also uses a large chunk of resources like it did on XP. It may be better to ween out searches you don't need, such as your documents, music, videos etc that you know how to navigate around, and keep the rest. If you never search, then just remove everything. To do so:

Go to Computer
Right click your C:\ drive and click properties
On the general tab, uncheck  Index this drive for faster searching 
Select Include Sub folders and files

*4. Disable the Windows Sidebar. *

If you use the sidebar, disable it anyway, just stay with me for a sec and see why. To disable it:

Look at the bottom right of your toolbar, where the clock is. The Sidebar icon will be there (you may have to extend the icons by clicking the arrow)
Right click it and click properties
Uncheck the box "start sidebar when windows starts"
click ok
Right click the icon again and click close

If you want a sidebar, install either Google's or Yahoo's instead, they have the same features, but use much less resources

The final ones requires a USB stick, but gives excellent performance gain:

*5. Enable ReadyBoost.* 

If you are running a system with less than 2GB of memory, you can utilise a feature called ReadyBoost. If you have a USB memory stick, you can use it as extra memory, which can make your system much more responsive. To do so:

Plug in your USB memory stick
When autoplay comes up, select the drive for ReadyBoost
If the option doesn't come up, or if you have disabled the device for ready boost,

Go to Start > Computer
Right click your memory stick
Click enable this drive for ReadyBoost

The way to get best performance is to have a USB drive equal to or greater than the amount of system memory. So, if you have 1GB RAM, a 1GB memory stick or greater is the best option.

*Win 7 Specific Fixes*

*1. Increase Boot Cores. 
*
This only applies to systems with multi-core processors (dual core, quad core etc) but is easily one of the best features for improving boot times..

Open up run. To do so hold down your start key + R on your keyboard, or go to start > all programs > accessories > run
type in "msconfig" without ""
Click the Boot tab
Click the Advances Options button
Check the number of processors box
Click the drop down menu blow and set it to the highest number.
Click Ok
Reboot

*2. Disable Search Indexing.*

Click Start
Type in "services.msc" without ""
Find and right click Windows Search
In the startup type field choose disabled.

*3. Disable system sounds.* 

Self explanatory, but most system sounds aren't needed or wanted by most users, but use up system resources.

Open the start menu and type in "mmsys.cpl" without ""
Click Sounds tab
In the sounds scheme drop down box, choose no sounds

*4. Disable Windows Aero*.

 Like on Vista, Aero uses a lot of resources that can be otherwise freed up. To disable Aero:

Right click your desktop and click Personalise
Click the Windows Colour tab
Uncheck Enable Transparency
Click Open classic appearance properties for more color options
Choose either Standard or basic from the popup box

*5. Disable Windows Services* 

A lot of services are a complete waste of resources, hogging system memory and processing time when they don't need to. Not all can, or should, be disabled, however, the services can be optimized to give decent improvements to system speed. To sort out your services:

Right click your clock in the bottom right and click Task Manager
Click the services tab
Using this table: Windows 7 Service Pack 1 Service Configurations by Black Viper
Follow the Safe column to get the best performance without affecting your system.

*6. Disable Boot GUI*

The Windows logo at bootup doesn't affect system performance once the system is actually booted, but can save a good few seconds on the boot time.

To do so, press your Windows key + R at the same time to open up run. Type in msconfig.
Click the boot tab
Check the "No GUI Boot" box
Click apply, then Ok and restart

The following are more advanced, optional extras. They will improve performance, however for the average user, I would put a warning out that doing this incorrectly can cause issues to arise with the system. If you follow the guide exactly, your system will improve, but any problems caused are the users fault, not mine, the guide is given as advice only.

*7. Faster Toolbar Thumbnails*

To make the thumbnails that appear when you hover over programs appear quicker:

Press the start key + R at the same time to open run
Type in regedit
Go to:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER
Software
Microsoft
Windows
CurrentVersion
Explorer

Right click Advanced and click New DWORD
Enter the following value: ThumbnailLivePreviewHoverTime
Right click ThumbnailLivePreviewHoverTime
Click Modify
Choose Decimal Base
Enter the new number in milliseconds. For instance, 500 would be 500 milliseconds, or 0.5 seconds
Experiment and find a time that you like
Click OK
Restart your computer

*8. Reduce shut down time*

Reduce the Windows shut down times by reducing the time it takes for Windows to shut down programs that are still open:

Press the start key + R at the same time to open up Run
type in regedit
Go to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEM
SYSTEM
CurrentControlSet
Control

Right click WaitToKillServiceTimeOut and click modify
Change the value to a lower value in milliseconds. By default it is at 12000, 12 seconds.

*Download List:*

Note: All programs listed are 100% free of charge with out any fees.

Avast! Anti-virus: Avast Free Antivirus - Reviews and free Avast Free Antivirus downloads at Download.com

Ccleaner: CCleaner - Standard

Auslogics Disk Defrag: http://www.auslogics.com/en/software/disk-defrag/download/


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## linkin

Very nice. I'm tired at the moment, I will edit and post some more feedback later.


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## dave1701

Thanks.  This will be a useful reminder.


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## tremmor

Nice reference. should be another sticky for house keeping.
Gets done often enough and lots just don't know.
cheers for the work.


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## Aastii

Thanks for the feedback guys and gals.

If anyone has anything they can see wrong or think can be added or whatever just say, neither the guide nor myself are perfect, so there will probably be errors in there, be it typos or otherwise


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## johnb35

I'm gonna stick this thread for awhile as it has good info in it.   I will also when I'm not so tired and having a fresh mind offer more info to be added.

Good Job again Aastii  :good:


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## Dramen

This info came at the right time for me because I noticed things were slowing down somewhat.  
I installed and ran Ccleaner, Defraggler and Soluto and the difference in speed has been really significant. I've just been using the windows defrag and didn't really think about other options. 
As far as Soluto goes, I love it when smart people get together and create a product and do a great job from start to finish, I was really impressed with their efforts.  Thanks for the post.


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## linkin

The information is solid, I think you need to split/bold/italic and whatever formatting for different OSes. Maybe even colour formatting to make it easier to find when scrolling etc.


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## Fatback

Looks great man. The only thing I would have to disagree with, is that paid AV's are slower then free ones. As far as I have seen, and tested they are all basically the same speed, with no more then a few seconds difference. Then again I have a pretty decent computer, maybe you should note that it may only help if your running older hardware?


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## Aastii

linkin said:


> The information is solid, I think you need to split/bold/italic and whatever formatting for different OSes. Maybe even colour formatting to make it easier to find when scrolling etc.



I agree, I was reading through yesterday and when scrolling fairly quickly, it is difficult to tell where the OS headings are. Will change it now



Fatback said:


> Looks great man. The only thing I would have to disagree with, is that paid AV's are slower then free ones. As far as I have seen, and tested they are all basically the same speed, with no more then a few seconds difference. Then again I have a pretty decent computer, maybe you should note that it may only help if your running older hardware?



From experience, Norton especially, on any system is such a resource hog. Then only half alright payed for AV that I have used is Panda, and out of choice I wouldn't have used it, a friend got a buy one, get one free on a 3 user copy so gave me one. Once the 12 months was up went back to Avast. 

I think if you have a quick computer, the guide is sort of useless, the only time people will be using it with a fast system is if it slows down a little from normal, or if they want to squeeze every bit of performance that they can out of it.

Instead of removing it, I will say it is a low priority because with higher spec systems, the performance different will be very little, however on slower computers, putting in lighter freeware software will have a much more significant impact (or words to that effect).

Thanks for stickying John


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## Aastii

Updated:

Layout changed
Added disable GUI to Win 7


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## spynoodle

Nice thread! :good: Definitely a nice resource. I'd never heard of Soluto before, I might try it out next time I work on someone else's computer.  There is one thing I'd like to mention: when I went to disable indexing service, it was already disabled. Was it in a Windows update or something?


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## tracykuraki

Good job, Thanks~


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## Aastii

spynoodle said:


> Nice thread! :good: Definitely a nice resource. I'd never heard of Soluto before, I might try it out next time I work on someone else's computer.  There is one thing I'd like to mention: when I went to disable indexing service, it was already disabled. Was it in a Windows update or something?



That may be the case, I've not reinstalled an updated version of Windows for a while now so don't know.

I have a new blank drive, when I have my computer back I'll install another copy of Windows on it and check if it comes with indexing disabled from the start, or if it comes with an update


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## linkin

I'm pretty sure it's enabled by default, I can't remember if you can edit this while installing... It's been so long.


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## russb

How do you remove your desktop background picture then Aastii.


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## Aastii

russb said:


> How do you remove your desktop background picture then Aastii.



Go to your desktop settings (it differs between XP/Vista/7, but it is always right click desktop, click the bottom option). 

If on XP, click the drop down menu and select the top option of None. You will have a blank blue background.

On Vista, I am fairly sure it is the same, give it a try and see, I can't remember off the top of my head if it is drop down or blocks like Win 7 is. I will check tomorrow and confirm it for you.

On 7, click desktop at the bottom, then change to a solid colour of your choice

Done


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## spynoodle

Aastii said:


> That may be the case, I've not reinstalled an updated version of Windows for a while now so don't know.
> 
> I have a new blank drive, when I have my computer back I'll install another copy of Windows on it and check if it comes with indexing disabled from the start, or if it comes with an update


I'm running XP Pro SP3. I checked on another one of my comps, and it was also disabled by default. Maybe Microsoft listened to you.


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## Aastii

spynoodle said:


> I'm running XP Pro SP3. I checked on another one of my comps, and it was also disabled by default. Maybe Microsoft listened to you.



One can only hope to be so influential


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## Troncoso

May or may not want to mention, For those looking to free up resources (hard drive space) you may want to be sure when they are deleting their files that they either empty the recycling bin when they are done or hold shift + click delete when they are deleting their files.

I've come across so many people trying to free up hard drive space by putting things in the recycling bin...

Then again if they decide to run ccleaner that will empty it for them.


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## Aastii

Troncoso said:


> May or may not want to mention, For those looking to free up resources (hard drive space) you may want to be sure when they are deleting their files that they either empty the recycling bin when they are done or hold shift + click delete when they are deleting their files.
> 
> I've come across so many people trying to free up hard drive space by putting things in the recycling bin...
> 
> Then again if they decide to run ccleaner that will empty it for them.



I've put it in just to be on the safe side.

Thanks


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## esmphoto

*Thanks for the vast amount of information!*

I've been formatting drives and doing complete re-installs on some 35 workstations where I work, but there are some tips up here that are new to me, I may have to try a few before I wipe my next hdd.


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## Metal Man 2

THANKS Aastii!


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## linkin

While it only helps to speed up how fast windows boots:

Start > msconfig > Boot > Advanced > Numproc

sets how many cores windows will use when booting 

A lot of people buy SSD's and don't even know how to set that!


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## FrillyBits

*BlackViper for XP*

Great guide :good:
Maybe an oversight?
I see under the heading *Win 7 Specific Fixes* you have recommended *5. Disable Windows Services * using the settings supplied by BlackViper but BlackViper is not mentioned under *XP Specific Fixes*.
Using the BlackViper *Safe* settings on my XP (32bit) has sped up my startup time and general PC usage, love it 

http://www.blackviper.com/wiki/Main_Page


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## Aastii

linkin said:


> While it only helps to speed up how fast windows boots:
> 
> Start > msconfig > Boot > Advanced > Numproc
> 
> sets how many cores windows will use when booting
> 
> A lot of people buy SSD's and don't even know how to set that!



It is already in there

@Frillybits Loving the name  and also, thanks very much for the advice, will get it in there next update, thanks


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## ZachSand

What exactly does the ReadyBoost do?


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## gamblingman

Did you mean to mark the links at the bottom in RED also?

I like your guide, its arranged nicely and has a lot of useful info. Have you thought of adding a "context" to the beginning of the guide? So that people looking at the guide know what is included and a general location of each section.

These are some of the items I would add to the cleaning. I didnt go into tremendous detail because I'm just trying to give an idea of the things I thought might be beneficial to add. I would add the majority of these suggestions toward the beginning of the "general fixes" area. They are numbered for clarity and for general order of being done, but of course its us to you Aastii.

*1.* Run CheckDisk first to be sure you aren't trying to reorganize a damaged hard drive.
*2.* Run Malwarebytes (post it and HJT log in computer security if anything is found by MWB)
*3.* Run SuperAntiSpyware
*4.* Check for updates and/or new versions of: 
the anti-virus program (it should be doing this by auto, but it cant hurt to check for updates manually.)
Java 
Adobe
Apple
Windows
Real Player
DivX
Google Software
your brower(s) and check for updates on your add-ons
any cleaning/repair software you have
check for patches/updates to games
Check for updates/new versions/patches of any other software not mentioned but which may require occasional updating.​
*5.* For safety, turn off remote assistance: "dont allow this computer to be controlled remotely"

*6.* Disable Microsoft error reporting

*7.* Make or Order the system restore and utility disks for the OS.

*8.*  Turn off fast user switching

*9.* Turn off Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service


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## Aastii

ZachSand said:


> What exactly does the ReadyBoost do?



Because solid state memory has a retrieval time of near 0 seconds, rather than put data into the hard drive cache, which in comparison has a huge retrieval time, your USB device will be there for putting data into from primary memory (RAM). It acts as extra memory, just like the cache does, but gets rid of retrieval times.

If you don't know what caching is, just think of ReadyBoost as giving your system extra RAM without putting RAM in your system.

Caching is the process of moving data that has not been accessed for a long time (in computer terms) from RAM into a reserved section of secondary storage for the purpose of freeing up primary memory. It does this so more important data can take advantage of the speed of RAM and also so it can be directly accessed by the CPU (data not in primary memory can not be accessed by the CPU, data must first be loaded into RAM to be processed), and to increase your overall system memory so you can have more "stuff" open at once and to have a section of RAM available for a new program or piece of data to be loaded into.

There is, however a disadvantage to this, which is speed. By moving data, you are taking up processor time which could potentially be used for other more useful means, and when you load and unload data from secondary storage (hard drive, CD/DVD etc) you are bottlenecked by retrieval times and, in some cases, read/write speeds. 

So by getting rid of the retrieval times by using electronic solid state memory, rather than mechanical hard drives, you will be giving yourself extra storage, without using up space in the hard drive or any read/write bandwidth of the hard drive and you will be able to write and retrieve data faster than if you were to use a conventional hard drive

@gamblingman, when I have some more time, I will look over each point in detail and see the feasibility of them, but there are some excellent suggestions in there. Thank you very much for the praise and for the suggestions


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## Perkomate

in reference to the anti-virus slowing down your system, I use Kaspersky Internet Security and it seems to be quite good in the way that it doesn't annoy me or slow my computer down much at all. just my $0.02


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## Aastii

Perkomate said:


> in reference to the anti-virus slowing down your system, I use Kaspersky Internet Security and it seems to be quite good in the way that it doesn't annoy me or slow my computer down much at all. just my $0.02



Not all Anti-virus programs are resource hogs, that is true, however go and look at the resource usage and the speed of Avast compared to say Norton, Mcafee or even Panda


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## wolfeking

Aastii... 
Just wanted to point out that in Vista, you can still increase the boot cores the same way as it works in 7.


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## mobobs

You're a lifesaver. I tried these and the increase in speed is crazy!!!!


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## CraigEvander

Just found out that apparently Avast is the more Windows friendly and at the same time safe antivirus on the market so far.


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## 2048Megabytes

If a system has 768 megabytes or more of RAM I set the pagefile size to only 900 megabytes in size.  I have yet to have any problems doing it this way.  Is there anything wrong with doing this?

Edit: Why does Windows recommend you have such a large pagefile?  A laptop I am on right now has 3 gigabytes of RAM.  It is recommending I set the pagefile around 3 to 4 gigabytes.  I set it at 900 megabytes.


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## Aastii

2048Megabytes said:


> If a system has 768 megabytes or more of RAM I set the pagefile size to only 900 megabytes in size.  I have yet to have any problems doing it this way.  Is there anything wrong with doing this?
> 
> Edit: Why does Windows recommend you have such a large pagefile?  A laptop I am on right now has 3 gigabytes of RAM.  It is recommending I set the pagefile around 3 to 4 gigabytes.  I set it at 900 megabytes.



No, there is nothing wrong with doing this. The 1.5x the page file is for two reasons - Stability and speed. It keeps memory free, rather than forcing Windows to store data that isn't being accessed in RAM, which improves speed massively. For stability - if your system runs out of page file space you are going to start encountering problems. You can tell if you are running low on page file space because you will get a message saying "Your system is low on virtual memory". If this happens, I would bump it up to 1GB, to get that ~1.5x the size of the installed RAM. With 900MB being so close to that, it shouldn't make a huge amount of difference unless you have a lot of programs open.

As to why Windows recommends such a large page file, some programs will say "I need x amount of memory" based on the amount of memory installed. If you manually set it to a very low value, which you have, it can stop it from opening, come up with the message mentioned above or crash your system. I would always stick to the 3GB, just for the sake of stability and not wasting memory. To you it may seem like a waste of 2GB of space, but to the computer, it is loving it


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## tlarkin

Does ready boost actually boost performance?  Cheap old flash drives are going to be slower than virtual memory....


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## 2048Megabytes

tlarkin said:


> Does ready boost actually boost performance?  Cheap old flash drives are going to be slower than virtual memory....



I agree.  USB 2.0 devices are going to be slower than almost all hard disk drives that are a few years old.


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## Aastii

tlarkin said:


> Does ready boost actually boost performance?  Cheap old flash drives are going to be slower than virtual memory....



I was skeptical myself and so tried it on my netbook. Intel Atom, 512MB RAM, Windows 7 with a 2GB flash drive, and it improved the speed of the machine a hell of a lot. Everything loaded more quickly and overall was more responsive

How it would work on a system with a fairly quick hard drive, or an SSD (heaven forbid anyone put any decent sized cache on one), I don't know, I haven't tried it on mine to find out, but for older or more entry level machines, it does provide a performance gain


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## tlarkin

Aastii said:


> I was skeptical myself and so tried it on my netbook. Intel Atom, 512MB RAM, Windows 7 with a 2GB flash drive, and it improved the speed of the machine a hell of a lot. Everything loaded more quickly and overall was more responsive
> 
> How it would work on a system with a fairly quick hard drive, or an SSD (heaven forbid anyone put any decent sized cache on one), I don't know, I haven't tried it on mine to find out, but for older or more entry level machines, it does provide a performance gain



I won't buy into it unless I actually see some hard data.  USB dirves are going to be way slower than a hard disk, so it is in return slower than virtual memory.  Plus since Windows caches things out to RAM now on the constant since Vista, if you have 4gigs of RAM it most likely won't do much at all, and probably do nothing.

I think it is just a marketing scheme where MS had to put in features that competitors don't support.  If it was truly that awesome of an idea, open source would have had it a long time ago.  Since open source is generally ahead of closed source by several years in terms of technology.


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## Aastii

tlarkin said:


> I won't buy into it unless I actually see some hard data.  USB dirves are going to be way slower than a hard disk, so it is in return slower than virtual memory.  Plus since Windows caches things out to RAM now on the constant since Vista, if you have 4gigs of RAM it most likely won't do much at all, and probably do nothing.
> 
> I think it is just a marketing scheme where MS had to put in features that competitors don't support.  If it was truly that awesome of an idea, open source would have had it a long time ago.  Since open source is generally ahead of closed source by several years in terms of technology.



I agree with what you say about systems with ample memory, for a system with 4+ GB of memory, it has enough to store all programs, and have plenty of space free. However, as I said, on older systems, or lower end systems, especially the likes of netbooks or your very small form factor systems which will generally have very low specs, I have found it helps


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## tlarkin

Aastii said:


> I agree with what you say about systems with ample memory, for a system with 4+ GB of memory, it has enough to store all programs, and have plenty of space free. However, as I said, on older systems, or lower end systems, especially the likes of netbooks or your very small form factor systems which will generally have very low specs, I have found it helps



I am talking about virtual memory, ie hard disks.  A hard drive is already way faster than any USB flash drive stick, therefore it would be slower than virtual memory which is the slowest memory the OS can use.


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## Aastii

I don't know the ins and outs of how it works, however, consider this - what if it helped to share load? It isn't black and white, enableing Ready Boost doesn't disable hard drive cacheing, that still happens. If you are able to cache to the hard drive and the USB flash device, even though the USB is slower, it will still grant greater performance because of the extra bandwidth.

I'm not saying my netbook magically got the speed of a $2000 system, but I am saying that things which would take a few seconds to load, or if I had a few applications running at once, when one of the programs would momentarily hang, or just through general use, everything was much snappier


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## tlarkin

OK, I looked it up and researched it a bit.  Ready boost does in fact boost performance but there are some exceptions where it actually did boost performance.  When it did boost performance it was barely marginal in benchmark scores, which means end users probably won't see much of a real world benefit, unless the task they are doing is very memory intensive.

The time when ready boost increased performance the most is when the system only had 512MB of RAM.  At about the 2gig of RAM mark you see Ready Boost actually hurting system performance a bit.

So I guess in theory, if you have under 2gig of RAM it may help a bit.  Probably won't be noticeable, and if you have 2 or more Gigs of RAM don't bother.


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## Perkomate

and so how do you get this ReadyBoost to work? Do i just have to format the USB to FAT32 and then click on the ReadyBoost option in auto play?


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## wolfeking

yes, the readyboost is in the autoplay options.


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## Aastii

Perkomate said:


> and so how do you get this ReadyBoost to work? Do i just have to format the USB to FAT32 and then click on the ReadyBoost option in auto play?



*5. Enable ReadyBoost.* 

If you are running a system with less than 2GB of memory, you can utilise a feature called ReadyBoost. If you have a USB memory stick, you can use it as extra memory, which can make your system much more responsive. To do so:

Plug in your USB memory stick
When autoplay comes up, select the drive for ReadyBoost
If the option doesn't come up, or if you have disabled the device for ready boost,

Go to Start > Computer
Right click your memory stick
Click enable this drive for ReadyBoost

The way to get best performance is to have a USB drive equal to or greater than the amount of system memory. So, if you have 1GB RAM, a 1GB memory stick or greater is the best option.


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## tlarkin

The only time Ready Boost ever boosted performance is if you have under 2gigs of RAM.  Otherwise it does nothing.  This info is from benchmarks I read off of anandtech.com's website, and a few other people's tech blogs who also ran benchmarks.

Benchmarks also push systems to specific limits, so a marginal benchmark boost doesn't always affect actual performance in day to day usage.

The charts I saw made it a marginal boost as well, plus since USB ports are a burst speed bus, you are not going to get a constant 480mbps bandwidth to the device.  Upgrading your RAM is far better to boost performance.


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## Perkomate

i was going to try it on my crappy school-provided netbook with Atom 1.6ghz and 1 gig of RAM. hopefully it makes it a bit more bearable. It won't even play 360p youtube on the small screen mode, without changing Google Chrome to high priority in task manager. And even then it lags.


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## spynoodle

Hey Aastii, any idea if putting my page file on another drive would help speed up my Celeron rig? I had the idea a couple days ago, and since I have a relatively small amount of RAM, I figured it might help.


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## linkin

If anyone has an SSD, create a 1024mb pagefile on it and disable all other pagefiles, you will have awesome performance and snappiness all around


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## Aastii

spynoodle said:


> Hey Aastii, any idea if putting my page file on another drive would help speed up my Celeron rig? I had the idea a couple days ago, and since I have a relatively small amount of RAM, I figured it might help.



It shouldn't really matter what drive the page file is on. To be honest, I don't quite understand what you mean.

Are you saying you have more than one drive, so you will have C:\ with OS and whatever on, then D:\ with other stuff and page file? If so, you could try it, but I doubt it would make a shade of difference


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## spynoodle

Aastii said:


> It shouldn't really matter what drive the page file is on. To be honest, I don't quite understand what you mean.
> 
> Are you saying you have more than one drive, so you will have C:\ with OS and whatever on, then D:\ with other stuff and page file? If so, you could try it, but I doubt it would make a shade of difference


Yeah, I was just thinking that if I put my page file on a separate drive, it would reduce the load on my main drive. Ever since I installed Crunchbang linux a few days ago, though, my system's been a crap load faster.  I think Linux handles the PF really well. It seems to create a separate partition called "swap," which I think is the linux version of a page file.

Best way to speed up Windows: switch to Linux.


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## mehul

I use CCleaner


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## Hero

Pretty nice Job, although all of this seems pretty obvious.


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## TFT

This forum caters for all levels of knowledge, obviously our members are way below your level. 
Look forward to your helpful posts.


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## DaveSi677

TFT said:


> This forum caters for all levels of knowledge, obviously our members are way below your level.
> Look forward to your helpful posts.



Toucher!!!!


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## tlarkin

linkin said:


> If anyone has an SSD, create a 1024mb pagefile on it and disable all other pagefiles, you will have awesome performance and snappiness all around



I am not so sure if that is such a good idea...SSD or not it won't be faster than cache or RAM, and I don't think you want all that disk I/O writing to your SSD since that is sort of an issue with a lot of them.


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## Organon

really useful topic .. 

u can use disck cleanup ..


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## Perkomate

dat thread necromancy


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## Jiniix

On Windows 7 (not sure if Vista) open your start menu and type "windows feat" and choose "Turn Windows features on or off". Here you will see a lot of things you don't need, such as tablet inputs, gadget platform and even... wait for it... Internet Explorer!


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## wjames811

That keep more desktop icons in desktop, It will make slow up the system or not...


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## Ischinel

wjames811 said:


> That keep more desktop icons in desktop, It will make slow up the system or not...



Yes since it has more things to load theoretically


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## wjames811

Hi, then my pc while booting its take more time to login whats the problem, I clear unwanted files in desktop then also its slow..


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## turbodiesel

very helpful guide Aastii

well done


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## mime4mime

You have great sense for explanation. Thanks for the post.


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## tremmor

now im curious what the difference is. 
Windows feat and Msconfig/startup?


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## johnb35

johhny said:


> To speed up Windows, you can install PC optimizer.



Thats a joke right?  Those PC optimizer progams do more harm then good.


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## mohan

*Boost process speed*

I am running a single process at a time (like copy a file ), It takes just 10% of my CPU and RAM usage... remaining CPU and RAM is left unsued .... IS there any option or software to make single process(like this) to utilize free memory and CPU


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## voyagerfan99

This thread is attracting a lot of spam, so I'm going to close it. If anyone has any questions on the first post procedures, just start a new thread.


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