Don’t you wish your old beat-up computer was just as new? Running like new several months down the road, without having to reformat it? Well you can help your computer perform its best by following these very simple steps. Before I list out the steps, here’s why I decided to write this article. Since February 2008 I’ve been an Apple guy, following most of Apple’s products. Lately, however, I’ve been using a PC and remember how easy it was to use it. Currently I’m running on an older Dual Core PC on Windows 7. After using it for a while PCs, like any other computers, will tend to get slower, causing frustrations–and who likes being frustrated? Several reasons why your computer performs worse and worse is because of installations, files occupying disc space and all the other unnecessary junk! We will assume that you do not have any virus or spyware on your computer. To eliminate this you need to install anti-virus and anti-spyware software!

So if you’re using Windows here are three things you can do to help your PC run faster.

1. MSCONFIG – Remove unnecessary start-up programs. You will undoubtedly install programs on your PC over time. Those installed programs will sometimes allow themselves to start up automatically whenever you turn on or restart your computer. After a while of installing programs you will get many start-up programs causing your computer to run very slowly. A quick fix is to actually stop those programs from starting up automatically. Click “Start” button > “Run” > Type in “msconfig”. A system configuration pop-up will appear. Click on the “Startup” tab. Here you will see all the programs that currently have a start-up status. Deselect the nonessential programs. Make sure you absolutely know which programs to deselect. Deselecting an essential program can disrupt your computer. As you can see I’ve deselected Acrobat, iTunes, MobileMe, etc. because I know I don’t need to run these programs all the time.
2. CCleaner – ccleaner.com – A “Crap Cleaner” software you can download for free at filehippo.com that allows you to… clean all the crap from your computer. The more you use your computer the more unnecessary files will be kept and therefore will slow your PC down. For example, just by surfing the Internet you could have many many megabytes (MB) of temporary files. In addition with this application you can also clean up your registry. It will help you clean up all the unlinked/unused registries. Be sure to backup your registry before you go ahead doing this! CCleaner allows you to backup your registry very easily.
3. Defraggler – piriform.com/defraggler – Another fabulous freeware by Piriform that allows you to “defrag” your computer. Defragmentation is the process that reduces the amount of fragmented files in systems. As you install and uninstall programs, or add and delete files you will get chunks of files scattered throughout your hard drive. These fragmented files make it less efficient for your computer system to locate the files it is looking for. Defraggler is very similar to the built-in defragmentation application found on Windows OS.

With these simple steps and tools you will have a better experience with your PC.