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My Computer Runs Slow

Author: Buildacomputerguide.com Editors

If your computer is running slowly, there are several things that could be causing problems. Let's take a look at the most common problems leading to a slow computer:

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  1. Unoptimized hard drive
    When is the last time you ran defrag on your hard drive? Do you know what degrag is? Defragmentation optimizes your hard drive by placing similar files closer together or contiguously so they can be accessed faster. As you add and delete files, they become scattered all over the drive, knows as fragmented files. If you have not recently run Windows defrag, or have never run it, it is definitely time to do so. A computer is like a car, it requires ongoing maintenance. Setup defrag to run on a schedule, and you won't have to worry about it.
  2. Unnecessary 'background' applications running
    Many programs, after you install them, will set to run at startup or as you boot into windows. Some of these are visible down on the bottom right part of your toolbar as small icons. Others however, run in the background and are not necessary at all, and can be opened manually as you need them. These unnecessary programs running in the background will take valuable processing and memory resources away, causing the programs you open to run slowly. Think of it as trying to run many programs all at once - it obviously slows things down. You will want to remove these programs from your startup. Using the msconfig utility is an excellent way to remove unwanted programs that aren't system critical.
  3. Clean and remove temporary files
    The easiest way to do this is to run the Disk Cleanup program that is built into Windows. These files are taking up space on your drive and probably don't need to be there.
  4. Check for spyware and viruses
    The internet is becoming a scary place, as it is very easy to pickup unwanted spyware or viruses that are installed onto your machine. Both viruses and spyware can be picked up through e-mail, or browsing the Web. Consider installing both spyware and virus programs and running them on a schedule, to catch any problems. There are excellent free programs available if you do not want to pay for them. Both spyware and viruses have been known to considerably slow down a machine, so get them removed!
  5. You might need to upgrade hardware
    If your computer seems slow when opening multiple programs, you may want to invest in more memory. RAM has gotten very cheap lately, and is a quick and easy way to improve performance. Windows Vista, for example, seems to be a bit of a memory hog, and requires 2GB or more to function well. Your video card could be another source of a bottleneck in your system, especially if it does not have adequate memory, or is sharing system memory. If you are a gamer or graphic designer dealing with high end graphics, a video card upgrade could do the trick.

There are many other things that could be causing your computer to run slow, but those are five basic things you can check.

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