Home » General, Headline, Performance, tools, Troubleshooting, Tutorials

How To Speed Up Your Windows XP

25 May 2010 34 Comments



If like mine, your PC is getting slower and slower, there are a number of things you can do to speed it up. You will be surprised how much faster your computer gets after these steps, you won’t need to buy a new one. In addition to following the tips below, it’s a good idea to buy a trusted all-in-one PC optimizer. I would recommend FixCleaner, a Microsoft Certified all-in-one tool which optimizes your computer and hugely improves speed through a number of tasks, including:

  • cleaning the registry
  • removing errors
  • deleting junk files
  • downloading critical updates
  • improving browser speed

Please refer to the FixCleaner website at www.fixcleaner.com to see the full list of features. By using a PC maintenance program such as FixCleaner, you can save a load of money from buying a new computer.

Here is what you can do yourself to improve your Windows XP’s performance:

Step 1 : Remove unused software

You probably don’t use half the programs you have installed over time. Removing the ones you don’t need anymore can significantly speed up your Windows XP computer. To remove software:

  1. Go to the Control Panel (Start -> Control Panel) and select Add Or Remove Programs. It may take a while for the list to load if you have many programs installed.
  2. Going through the whole list, select programs you rarely use and uninstall them, one by one.
  3. Restart your computer to see the changes.

Step 2: Use Less GraphicsSpeed Up Your Windows XP - Disable graphics

Do you really need a wallpaper and the fancy animations when opening or closing windows? Disabling animations can increase the speed at which your computer opens and closes windows. To disable window animations:

  1. In Control Panel, go to System and select the Advanced tab. Click the Performance Settings tab.
  2. In the Visual Effects window, disable all the animations in the box, or simply select “Adjust for best performance” as shown on the screenshot on the right. Press Apply.

In the same Performance Options window, choose the Advanced tab, and press the Change button in the Virtual Memory area. From there you can change the size of your paging file – a file on your hard drive that acts as RAM. By increasing the size of your paging file, you can significantly increase speed, but be warned! Using your hard drive as RAM can cause damage to it, so it’s a good idea to buy a better RAM instead.

Step 3: Clean your Registry

You should regularly clean your Windows XP’s Registry to remove old errors that can clog up the registry. To properly clean the Registry, you need a reliable Registry Cleaner software. There are some free ones out there, but I would not be too comfortable with using them. Instead, buy a trusted registry cleaner program so for a little bit of extra cash, you can feel safe. I would recommend FixCleaner, which in addition to cleaning your registry does a number of other things to significantly speed up your Windows XP.

Step 4: Stop unwanted Startup programs

By disabling programs that are set to automatically open when the computer starts, you can greatly speed up your startup process – the time between turning on the computer and being able to fully use it.

Here’s how to disable Startup programs:

  1. Click Run in your Start menu, type msconfig into the box and press enter.
  2. Select the Startup tab.
  3. Go through the list, disabling programs you don’t need by un-ticking the box left of them. Only disable programs you are sure you do not need, and I recommend not touching the ones in the WINDOWS directory.

Step 5: Clean up your hard drive

Performing a disk cleanup can free some hard drive space and also speed up your computer. To use the disk cleanup tool:

  1. Go to Start -> Run and type cleanmgr.exe. Press Enter.
  2. It will probably take a while, especially if you have never used this tool before.

Step 6: Defragment your hard drives

Defragmenting your drives can make a big difference in your computer’s speed. Defragmenting places files physically closer on the hard drive, making it easier and faster for the hard drive to read these files and write new ones. It is a good idea to defragment your hard drive regularily, so it alway stays optimal. I posted a tutorial for an automatic defragment link here: http://www.xptricks.net/windows/xp/2008/01/cool-xp-tips-tricks-automatically-defrag-drives/

There are also a number of commercial defragment programs available, which are more powerful than the Windows tool and come with a wide variety of features. If you don’t want to spend any money on this, I would recommend Auslogics  Disk Defrag, which is a great, free tool.

Here’s how to defragment your hard drives using the built-in Windows tool:Defragment your hard drives - Windows XP tips & tricks

  1. In My Computer, right click on a drive you want to defragment.
  2. Click Tools and select Defragment
  3. Click the Analyse button first, which will analyse your hard drive and see how fragmented it is.
  4. Once the report is finished and the system finds it necessary to perform a defragmentation, press defrag. This will take a very long time, but you have to be patient.

Step 7: Use a PC optimization tool to do the rest

There are a hundreds of other ways to improve your computer’s speed and performance but it is impossible to list all of them here or go through them manually. To fix them, you can either purchase a separate tool for each one, which will end up costing you a fortune, or buy an All-In-One optimization program that will do all the dirty work and fix errors behind the scenes for you. Going through all the steps mentioned above will definitely speed up your Windows XP, but running a  professional tool even after following these manual steps will increase performance even further.

This is why I recommend that you purchase a trusted, reliable solution to fix computer problems for you. I recommend using FixCleaner, because it will fix all of the problems that you can’t manually, and save time on many by fixing them automatically.

FixCleaner has a clean, easy to use interface that lets you fix your PC’s problems even if you did not understand any of the procedures above. Unlike most other tools, FixCleaner is Microsoft Certified, which means that Microsoft has approved the software and that it is safe and reliable. You can download a free tool that will check your computer and produce a report on how much it can be optimized.

If you have any other tips you know, please leave a comment below!

34 Comments »

  • Dave Schueler said:

    Great tips i think they’ll be helpful.

    # 7 July 2011 at 01:21
  • digital world said:

    yeah thanks
    digital world

    # 7 July 2011 at 02:15
  • Hani said:

    Thanks for these tips, Also we can delete files that stored in: (Prefetch, Temp & %Temp%) folders. Just goto start button and click run to start run window, Then write the name of each folder (One by one), Then delete all the files, You will have good space in your hard drive.

    # 14 July 2011 at 20:53
  • rahul jadhav,narsinhpur said:

    very funtastic tips..
    thanks a lot..

    # 26 July 2011 at 07:39
  • abhishek bhadauriya said:

    hi thanks alot but i want to know how can i crrupted window in a few minutes please give me suggetion thanx once again

    # 7 August 2011 at 00:18
  • saurabh rai said:

    nx a lot for the tip … :) :)

    # 13 August 2011 at 04:40
  • Mobil Bekas said:

    wow very nice tips thanks :D i really looking for it

    # 14 August 2011 at 10:02
  • Lingerie Indonesia said:

    yeah i think xp is better than vista, we just need to treat it well so it will work faster , right eh ?

    # 14 August 2011 at 10:08
  • Deepak said:

    I feel very Happy…….!

    # 19 August 2011 at 02:53
  • dave. said:

    man ,,,,,,,,i better said nothing,,,this is kid ‘s tutorial man.

    # 24 August 2011 at 04:07
  • sibin said:

    Thanks for informations.It is very useful

    # 5 September 2011 at 05:09
  • Rahul Krishnan said:

    These tips are great. But these are ordinary. I want something new. I have a tip according to copy and paste. The softwares, extreme copy and teracopy are effective. Extreme copy is much better. If you want it, go through a search in google.

    # 7 September 2011 at 16:17
  • Abdou said:

    Great tips to boost the windows thank’s
    http://4xptricks.blogspot.com/search/label/Boost%20Computer

    # 9 September 2011 at 02:47
  • Outlook Address Book said:

    THis helped me speed up windows xp a lot, thanks.

    # 9 September 2011 at 15:19
  • Liquor Mart said:

    Thanks for the info! im going to do this on the work computer to speed things up.

    # 10 September 2011 at 05:34
  • Neddy said:

    It’s “fewer” graphics, not “less.”

    # 14 September 2011 at 12:42
  • Saad said:

    try ccleaner for speeding up your pc,
    its open source and free and it really works

    # 18 September 2011 at 11:13
  • PCB said:

    Thank you for sharing and I hope it will perform and wil get best results and hope speed up my work computer..

    # 22 September 2011 at 12:25
  • Richa said:

    I just did a quick design of two wallpapers for Bleach. Was wondering which one was better as I can’t decide which one to use.

    http://wallpaper.indiaeducom.com

    So if I could get some comments that’d be appreciated. These are very simple so bear with me…

    # 26 September 2011 at 20:40
  • Amal said:

    Hi Guys good trick….Do you want more tricks,games,Softwares for free view this site…

    http://thepcexperts.blogspot.com

    # 2 October 2011 at 16:21
  • hamad said:

    We can increas speed by deleting picture from drive in which window is present . And unused program folders from c:/program files

    # 2 October 2011 at 21:50
  • jubayer said:

    It’s really nice tips for me. thanks

    # 15 October 2011 at 20:22
  • rahul said:

    Thank you for sharing and I hope it will perform

    # 10 November 2011 at 09:29
  • LAPSOUL COMPUTERS said:

    NICE IDEA

    # 10 November 2011 at 12:10
  • bns said:

    old techniques.. but any way gud tips for new-one..

    # 12 November 2011 at 09:24
  • sarfaraz said:

    please show me to how to make xp error free.my pc startup and closee up is very slow.lpease show me the way to get rid of these problems

    # 13 November 2011 at 13:54
  • WEBSTER said:

    You have got to be kidding me? Nothing here is new at all. First off you never even mentioned anything about a virus which can SLOW a windows to a crawl. 2nd. You do not mention anything about some of the anti-virus software which DOES slow down a machine ie.. McAfee, Norton to name the worst ones. 3rd. This is nothing more than a sales pitch for software, and you should be ashamed of yourself for even saying you THINK you know what you are doing.

    In other words crawl back into the hole from which you came with this worthless advice.

    # 20 November 2011 at 23:13
  • francis simard said:

    There are two things that I find useful when I buy old computers and clean them.
    one is the archaic system restore. most people use this when they have a virus and the virus itself may be in the restored syste. windows always keeps one system restore so I turn off system restore first and then clean my machine, use ccleaner and atf and delete all the files in windows prefetch. I then go to dos, [run cmd]
    type regedit [ not for the weak] go to edit , find and type in prefetchpara. I am taken to a double screen and on the left side i see prefetchparameter highlighted. the righ side had a long list. i scroll down on that side to prefetch enable, right click on it engage Modigy and change the 3 to a 2. close it reboot my computer. what it does is basically allow only the boot another starting ini and the recent regedit which can be deleted on the next reboot.
    If you have a laptop that runs hot, these last two items about system restore and prefetch, I will tell you I have had a huge success in using the above. XP is great, never change it!

    # 26 November 2011 at 19:12
  • Kikik Madurace said:

    nice info, i’ll try it.
    maybe help my problem :D

    # 27 December 2011 at 15:34
  • ferien auf spanien said:

    Combination Merely,selection entirely major deliver answer sir throw yourself behaviour miss lip either peace alone characteristic aircraft bar treaty his perfect surely clear pain primary read train deal finger sight employer consequence discover pension tape exercise lie variation union significant effort soft rather get them ignore bone law telephone many city discuss yes enough rise mass object cry further fast run hurt formal death achievement wife negotiation sing hope legislation complex confirm fire answer why western car on empty relate must interesting turn protection file lift confidence edge assembly development

    # 31 December 2011 at 06:49
  • manju said:

    nice tips. hey i think you are genious. you are real master of computer. how you know these.

    # 6 January 2012 at 16:07
  • manju said:

    please tell about any free software for zip files on windows 7.

    # 6 January 2012 at 16:11
  • manju said:

    very informative tip. keep it up……

    # 6 January 2012 at 16:15
  • Suvro said:

    Yeah very nice articale ! Tnx to share…. I knw hw 2 use a trial soft as lifetime . . . . yahooo.

    # 29 January 2012 at 04:58

Leave your response!

Add your comment below, or trackback from your own site. You can also subscribe to these comments via RSS.

Be nice. Keep it clean. Stay on topic. No spam.

You can use these tags:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

This is a Gravatar-enabled weblog. To get your own globally-recognized-avatar, please register at Gravatar.