Your computer used to be fast. Over time, it's slowed down until now it runs at the proverbial snail's pace. Before you give up and trade it in on a new model, you may want to perform a few quick maintenance tasks to see if you can speed it up a bit. Here are four tasks that will get your computer moving faster.
Uninstall Unnecessary Programs
Virtually everything you do on your computer is run by a program. Those programs are installed on your computer and remain active as long as they're there. The more programs you install, the slower your computer will run. If you haven't looked at your program list for a while, now would be a good time to do that. Uninstall any programs that are outdated or that you no longer use. It's a good idea to check your programs at least twice a year.
Clean Up Your Hard Drive
Junk files can fill up your computer and make it sluggish. Uninstalling unnecessary programs won't take care of the fragments of information that are cluttering up your system. To clear up space and get rid of the junk that's making your computer run slow, you'll need to defragment the system once or twice a year.
Remove the Start-Up Icons
Take a look at the bottom of your desktop screen. You'll probably see several icons. Some of them you use quite often, but others might not be so familiar to you. Those are the start-up programs that are slowing down your system.
To get rid of the start-up programs you don't use, simply move your mouse over the icon and do a quick right-click. A menu should pop up that asks if you want to unpin the icon. Click on that line. The start-up button will disappear for that program. Keep your start up from getting sluggish by removing unnecessary start-up programs whenever they appear.
Clear Out Your History
Each time you visit a page on the internet, your computer stores it in the history. This history makes it easier to retrieve the page should you want to go back for a return visit. Depending on how much browsing you do on the internet, your history can fill up quite quickly. It's a good idea to clean out your history at least once a week. If you'd prefer, you can set your computer to clear your history each time you exit the internet.
If your computer isn't running as well as it used to, try the tips discussed above. If your computer still runs slow, you'll need a professional repair technician. You may have picked up a computer virus somewhere.
