Windows PC Tune-Up Guide
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After going through the process what seems like hundreds of times, I've decided to put together
a guide to tuning up a Windows PC. I've seen too many computers that were running at a
fraction of their potential speed, or irregularly crashing, due to spyware/junkware
running in the background. New PC's these days are also coming pre-installed with more and more
software for which most of us have no use (bloatware), and may be slowing the computer down.
This guide will cover steps to strip your PC of unnecessary software and settings which may be slowing things down. It will also walk through procedures for removing spyware, viruses, and any other parasitic software that commonly plagues the average Windows PC.
This guide will detail steps for Windows XP, but most of the same principles apply to all versions of Windows
- Uninstall anything you don't use
- Stop programs from loading at bootup
- Scan for spyware and viruses
- Visit http://update.microsoft.com/
- Stop unnecessary services
- Delete extra files then defragment
- Firewalls and Antivirus
- Advanced Tweaks
- Conclusion
1. Uninstall anything you don't use
To the right is a screenshot of a brand new Dell PC and its list of pre-installed software on the left, and the number of programs (processes) Windows is running on the right. Notice the number of processes (37), and the extra software pre-installed on the PC. Many of these software suites are 15-30 day trials and encourage the user to purchase the full versions. One of our goals is to decrease the amount of software installed on the PC, and especially the number of processes currently running. Later we'll see a screenshot of this new Dell after it has been cleaned up a bit.
Go to Start Menu -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Add/Remove Programs. Here you will see a list of most of the currently installed software. Browsing the list you will probably recognize software you use and want to keep: Acrobat Reader, Printer drivers, Java 2 Runtime, Microsoft Office, etc. Additionally there will be lots of stuff you don't recognize and are unsure about. When in doubt, remove it. Remove everything possible. If you accidentally remove something you need, chances are you can redownload and install it from the manufacturer's website. Step by step programs will want to reboot after the uninstall, but usually you can skip the reboot and continue uninstalling.
Why am I doing this?
As your hard drive begins to fill up access times can start to decrease. To keep your hard drive running
at full speed you want to keep as much free space as possible, and defragment at least once a month.
Also, many of the programs you didn't recognize and want to remove are often linked to spyware and pump out annoying pop-ups.
2. Stop programs from loading at bootup
Many of the processes shown in the screenshot above in step 1 are spawned (loaded) when Windows initially boots. The more processes your PC is running, the slower things can become. The majority of software does not need to have any part of itself load at bootup, but they often do so anyway.
Mike Lin has created a wonderful utility which allows you to see the list of programs that are set to load themselves at startup. To the left we see a screenshot of his program loaded on the new Dell from step 1 above. As you can see, the PC is brand new, yet there are at least a dozen programs set to load themselves when the computer boots. One of the first things I did on this Dell, and on any computer that needs a tuneup, is to stop 99% of the programs from loading at bootup. Windows has quite a few places where programs can register themselves to load at startup, but it's easy to catch most of them using Mike Lin's Startup Control Panel which can be downloaded here.
Additionally Mike offers a program called Startup Monitor which is one of the few processes I keep running at bootup and in the background. Startup Monitor will alert you anytime a program tries to register itself to load at startup. You can then select to allow or disallow this change. This is a great defense against many forms of virus and spyware which often register themselves to load at boot time. Startup Monitor can also be downloaded here.
After we've completed steps 1, 2, and 5 (disable extra services), our running process list goes from 37 to 16! The responsiveness and speed of the user environment was greatly increased on the new Dell. Below is a screenshot of the installed programs and process list after the PC's tune up. Compare the below shot to the first on in step 1, and you can see we've relieved our PC of almost half its concurrent workload:
Notice: There may be software you want to keep loading at bootup, such as printer, scanner, remote control, etc. You can always come back and re-check their entries in Startup Control Panel if you find out you needed them to load at startup
3. Scan for spyware and viruses
There exists a wonderful online utility (free) from Trendmicro that allows you to scan your PC for both spyware and viruses simultaneously. This scanner is called Trendmicro's Housecall and can be found at: http://housecall.trendmicro.com I recommend pressing F8 as your system boots and selecting to start in "Safe Mode with Networking" before running this scan. This will allow Housecall a clean environment in which to do its job.
Many people go to the store and pay a lot of money for expensive protection software. This seems like a waste of money when free software is so widely available. I also prefer to run Trendmicro's online scanner rather than having something like Norton or McAfee running constantly in the background scanning everything my computer does. This not only slows the system down, but can often cause other software to not work or completely crash the system.
If you are suffering from random pop-ups or other spyware related symptoms I recommend the following software:
- HiJackThis - This program runs a detailed scan on your system and allows you to remove rogue software settings
- CoolWebShredder - This anti-spyware utility specifically targets the notorious CoolWebSearch spyware
- Firefox - A free web browser that is less susceptible to spyware than Internet Explorer
4. Visit http://update.microsoft.com/
One of the most important things you can do for your system is to make sure all the latest security updates from Microsoft are installed and working. In your Control Panel -> Automatic Updates you can specify that your PC automatically download and install updates on a regular basis. These updates are generally released and automatically installed on the second Tuesday of each month.
There also exists Office Update which does the same thing for Microsoft Office products.
5. Stop unnecessary services
Services can be described as underneath-the-hood processes that are constantly running and ready to handle various tasks that the operating system requires. A good example of a Windows service is the "Automatic Updates" service. This service automatically checks with Microsoft to make sure your system has all the latest security patches and updates. If it finds any that need to be transferred, it will activate the "Background Intelligent Transfer" service which will download the new updates. All of this takes place transparently to the user.
By default, Windows has a few services enabled to run automatically that are unnecessary for the average user. A great example is that the "Wireless Zero Configuration" service is set to automatically load regardless of whether or not you use any wireless networking. This service comes in handy when you want to setup wireless networking, but other than that it can be disabled, along with other useless services, to cumulatively provide a boost in performance by freeing system resources.
To access the services control panel go to: Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> (XP users: Switch to Classic View) Administrative Tools -> Services. You will then see a list of services, their descriptions, and whether they are set to load automatically (at startup), manually (be called by other services/programs), or disabled. If you click the "Startup Type" header, the list will sort itself accordingly.
If you're comfortable editing the services startup list then it's simply a matter of double clicking the service and changing the drop down box to whatever setting you think is appropriate for that service: Automatic, Manual, or Disabled. Each computer is going to have different service needs depending on what its used for. For example a desktop PC in a corporate environment will have different needs than a home laptop. For that reason I can't recommend a one-size-fits all for startup types. If you'd like to browse a detailed list of services, their descriptions, and recommendations on whether or not to turn them off, I highly suggest you check out this article put out by CNet.com.
As an example: to the left is a screenshot of the services loaded on the brand new Dell desktop. On the right is a screenshot of the services after I went through and changed the startup types and rebooted.
Suggested Reading:
• Detailed Windows XP Service Descriptions
6. Delete extra files then defragment
Over time data on the hard drive can become fragmented. For example, if you have a 100 megabyte movie, 25 megabytes can exist in one physical location on the hard disk, while the other 75 megabytes exist on a different physical portion of the disk. This means that when you want to load that file, the hard disk has to physically go to two different places to read the file. Defragmenting would place that 25 megabytes right next to the 75 megabytes, to provide for one continuous file.
It's probably a good idea to defragment about once a month. After defragmenting you may notice your system seems a bit more responsive when accessing files. To defragment go to Start -> Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> Disk Defragmenter.
It's also a good idea to delete all temporary / extra files before defragmenting. As your hard drive fills up closer and closer to its limited capacity, its ability to efficiently manage free space diminishes. This can result in a negative impact on system performance.
Using utilities such as Disk Cleaner (Start -> Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> Disk Cleaner), and other freeware utilities, it's very easy to find and delete temporary files.
7. Firewalls and Antivirus
Everyone's heard of the importance of firewalls and antivirus. Unfortunately they've also heard marketing from people like Norton and McAfee who say you need to buy their products to be secure. Rubbish.
Firewalls
With Windows XP Service Pack 2 came the addition of having the Windows Firewall turned on by default. If you have patched your copy of Windows XP with the latest
security updates, then chances are that your Windows XP Firewall is up and running. To check on it you can go to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Windows Firewall.
If you are using older versions of Windows, ZoneAlarm Basic is a popular software firewall that is available as a free download.
Antivirus
Forget paying money for commercial antivirus software, AVG Free Edition is a very popular antivirus protection suite that works just as well, if not better,
than competing commercial products.
Not only do McAfee and Norton security products (antivirus and firewall) cost money, but they often greatly reduce the speed of the computer by hogging system resources. AVG and ZoneAlarm are not only free, but are not as needy when it comes to system resources, and hardly ever cause problems or crashes like the above mentioned seem to do so often.
I recommend uninstalling any McAfee and Norton (Symantec) security products, and either going with AVG, or using the free online scanner periodically as outlined in step 3.
8. Advanced Tweaks
For the more advanced users (or speed demons):
- Delete Prefetch Files - Delete the contents of C:\WINDOWS\Prefetch and watch your boot time be cut in half
- No paging file - If you have at least 1 gigabyte of memory, you may see a performance boost in disabling the swap/paging file.
- No themes / visual effects - Disable the themes service and under Performance Options -> Visual effects, select "Adjust for best performance"
- Tweak UI - Download Microsoft's TweakUI Powertoy
- View Open TCP/UDP Ports - [ Download ] View what programs are opening ports on your PC
- Google for Tweaks - Windows XP Speed Tweaks
- NirSoft.Net - [ Link ] a unique collection of small and useful freeware utilities
9. Conclusion
The goal of this article is to increase system performance and overall experience by allowing the user to:
- Take control of the operating system
- Dictate what software loads itself at bootup and what software doesn't
- Maximize available system resources
- Eradicate spyware and viruses
- Ensure the computer runs at its full potential speed
- Save money by not having to pay for other people or software to 'doctor' your PC
In the beginning of this article I use a real world example of a new Dell desktop that I tuned from start to finish. Out of the box the Dell came with a lot of useless software installed, and a lot of programs running in the background. Overall the system resources were being hogged and the system was not running at its full potential.
After going through the steps outlined in this article, the Dell benefited from a significant boost in performance and user experience. This article not only applies to new machines, but even more importantly, to older PCs that haven't had a good cleanup in years. You will be amazed at the speeds of which your old computer is capable after doing a thorough cleanup.