Speed is the key to making sure you can be as efficient and productive as possible. It's also important if you need to run the newest software and applications. But sometimes a variety of factors can affect your computer's performance and make it harder and more time-consuming to complete even the simplest tasks. Luckily, there are many ways to either increase your computer's speed or remove the barriers that are preventing it from performing up to its potential. Here are a few tips and tricks that may help you get back up to speed.
CLEAN UP YOUR HARD DRIVES
In some cases, a slow computer could be the result of a full hard drive. Computers not only use onboard memory (RAM) to run software and applications, they can also use portions of the hard drive. If you're running out of storage space, then your computer won't have access to these additional resources and you might notice a decrease in speed as a result. It's easy to find some unneeded documents and files to delete, but you may also be able to delete entire programs if your company doesn't use them anymore. Windows has a built-in tool called Disk Cleanup that will help you find non-essential files to delete. On Windows 7, go to the Start menu and click All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, and Disk Cleanup. It will let you know how much space you can free up. You also have the option to see what it wants to delete, so it won't automatically remove important files. When an otherwise decent computer starts running slowly, you should also check to see if there are any programs running in the background. Some applications start running in the back ground as soon as you turn on your computer, preventing unnecessary programs from doing this will also help your PC's speed.