getting a more efficient pc

Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there is
no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old. Sometimes
it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep getting those "
virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed up
my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

You maximize the amount of RAM the motherboard will support. You upgrade to
the fastest cpu the motherboard wil support.

"MR" wrote in message
...
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there
is no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old.
Sometimes it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep
getting those " virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet
too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed
up my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

You maximize the amount of RAM the motherboard will support. You upgrade to
the fastest cpu the motherboard wil support.

"MR" wrote in message
...
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there
is no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old.
Sometimes it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep
getting those " virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet
too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed
up my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

MR wrote:

Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there is
no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old. Sometimes
it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep getting those "
virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed up
my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

Faster hardwa
- More RAM. Faster RAM. Follow the manual on how to use dual-channel
mode regarding what memory module/slot configuration is required. Go
to 3GB, or more. If more than 3GB, the rest can't be used by Windows
XP but can be use for very fast temp file space.
- Faster CPU.
- Prevent CPU throttling due to overheat by making sure its temperature
is low (40-60 C). Use Speedfan or an OEM utility to monitor the
temperature and adjust fan speeds, or just have the fans run at top
speed all the time (which is noisier).
- Faster hard disk(s). Move from 7200 RPM to 10K or 15K (the noise will
go up with the faster spinning hard disk).

Faster software (or access to it):
- Use SysInternals (now owned by Microsoft) AutoRuns to find ALL startup
items. msconfig.exe only lists some of them.
- Make sure you are using NTFS, not FAT32, for the file system in the
disk partitions.
- Disconnect USB devices, especially USB-attached drives (hard disks or
flash) since you may have programs accessing them when YOU don't need
to access them.
- Defrag all partitions (drives).
- Disable the file indexing service. Uninstall any file indexers you
installed (Windows Search, Google Desktop, Copernic).
- Get a more efficient anti-virus/malware program. Some will cause
significant impact on responsiveness of the host, even the big
commercial ones (Norton and McAfee). Don't run more than one AV
on-access (realtime) scanner at a time. If you have more than one
installed, disable its on-access scanner and only use it for manual or
scheduled on-demand scans. If it has a time to schedule its updates,
have them occur when you're not there, like when sleeping at night,
since the updates slow the host. Make sure any scheduled scans are
when you are away from the host.
- Uninstall the mouse driver/software for your brand. Revert to the
Windows-supplied standard driver. Retest to see if slowdowns still
occur. Same for any keyboard software, like Microsoft's IntelliType.
- If you have 2 hard disks (2 physical devices), put the lion's share of
the pagefile on the non-OS hard disk. Leave a smaller pagefile in the
OS partition, like 1 times the RAM size. Create a larger pagefile,
like 2 times the RAM size, in a partition (drive) on the OTHER hard
disk. This reduces conflict between Windows trying to access OS, app,
and data files in its own partition and attempting writes for page
swapping to its pagefile for memory management.
- Check the Event Viewer to see if you have recurring and often errors.

Since no one here knows your hardware and software configuration because
you didn't list it, all anyone here can offer are general possibilities.

MR wrote:

Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there is
no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old. Sometimes
it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep getting those "
virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed up
my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

Faster hardwa
- More RAM. Faster RAM. Follow the manual on how to use dual-channel
mode regarding what memory module/slot configuration is required. Go
to 3GB, or more. If more than 3GB, the rest can't be used by Windows
XP but can be use for very fast temp file space.
- Faster CPU.
- Prevent CPU throttling due to overheat by making sure its temperature
is low (40-60 C). Use Speedfan or an OEM utility to monitor the
temperature and adjust fan speeds, or just have the fans run at top
speed all the time (which is noisier).
- Faster hard disk(s). Move from 7200 RPM to 10K or 15K (the noise will
go up with the faster spinning hard disk).

Faster software (or access to it):
- Use SysInternals (now owned by Microsoft) AutoRuns to find ALL startup
items. msconfig.exe only lists some of them.
- Make sure you are using NTFS, not FAT32, for the file system in the
disk partitions.
- Disconnect USB devices, especially USB-attached drives (hard disks or
flash) since you may have programs accessing them when YOU don't need
to access them.
- Defrag all partitions (drives).
- Disable the file indexing service. Uninstall any file indexers you
installed (Windows Search, Google Desktop, Copernic).
- Get a more efficient anti-virus/malware program. Some will cause
significant impact on responsiveness of the host, even the big
commercial ones (Norton and McAfee). Don't run more than one AV
on-access (realtime) scanner at a time. If you have more than one
installed, disable its on-access scanner and only use it for manual or
scheduled on-demand scans. If it has a time to schedule its updates,
have them occur when you're not there, like when sleeping at night,
since the updates slow the host. Make sure any scheduled scans are
when you are away from the host.
- Uninstall the mouse driver/software for your brand. Revert to the
Windows-supplied standard driver. Retest to see if slowdowns still
occur. Same for any keyboard software, like Microsoft's IntelliType.
- If you have 2 hard disks (2 physical devices), put the lion's share of
the pagefile on the non-OS hard disk. Leave a smaller pagefile in the
OS partition, like 1 times the RAM size. Create a larger pagefile,
like 2 times the RAM size, in a partition (drive) on the OTHER hard
disk. This reduces conflict between Windows trying to access OS, app,
and data files in its own partition and attempting writes for page
swapping to its pagefile for memory management.
- Check the Event Viewer to see if you have recurring and often errors.

Since no one here knows your hardware and software configuration because
you didn't list it, all anyone here can offer are general possibilities.

"MR" wrote in message
...
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there
is no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old.
Sometimes it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep
getting those " virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet
too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed
up my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?


If it is old probably the easiest way to speed it up is with a new bigger
hard drive. This Dell Inspiron 2600 has been much faster since I moved it
from 20gig to 80gig, and my GSX270 pc from 40 to 500. This is the cheapest
way to speed up an old computer, but do check to see what is the maximum
yours can take.

S

"MR" wrote in message
...
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there
is no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old.
Sometimes it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep
getting those " virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet
too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed
up my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?


If it is old probably the easiest way to speed it up is with a new bigger
hard drive. This Dell Inspiron 2600 has been much faster since I moved it
from 20gig to 80gig, and my GSX270 pc from 40 to 500. This is the cheapest
way to speed up an old computer, but do check to see what is the maximum
yours can take.

S

On 8/27/2010 2:08 PM, Spamlet wrote:
snip
If it is old probably the easiest way to speed it up is with a new bigger
hard drive. This Dell Inspiron 2600 has been much faster since I moved it
from 20gig to 80gig, and my GSX270 pc from 40 to 500. This is the cheapest
way to speed up an old computer, but do check to see what is the maximum
yours can take.
S

Did you check to see if the drives are faster, due to rpm or how old or
new they are?

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...ance,1557.html

Conclusion

8:20 AM - March 5, 2007 by Patrick Schmid

We looked at several Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 drives to get down to the
performance nitty-gritty. In doing so, we found that there is hardly any
difference between two drives that only differ in their cache sizes: 16
MB cache has no significant advantage over 8 MB across our benchmark
suite, and this applies both to Serial ATA and to UltraATA drives. We
would have expected that at least the SATA drives would show some degree
of benefit, but in the case of the 7200.10 family, 16 MB cache is a
waste of money if you have a cheaper 8 MB alternative. At the same time,
16 MB cache doesn't hurt either if the price is about the same...

Knowing that there are differences between members of a hard drive
family you should now be able to make a more confident buying decision.
Hard drives whose platter configurations don't utilize the maximum
per-platter capacity show slightly quicker access times, because the
operating range of the drive is somewhat reduced, while units that fully
utilize the maximum capacities offer slightly better data transfer rates.

That said, we have to make clear that the differences between the
quickest and the slowest hard drive model within a product family are
clearly smaller than differences between product generations. In our
experience, a new product will always outperform an older one.

We have inserted the 15 Seagate hard drives into our Interactive 3.5"
Hard Drive Charts, so you can compare them to the rest of the market.
Happy hard drive hunting!

On 8/27/2010 2:08 PM, Spamlet wrote:
snip
If it is old probably the easiest way to speed it up is with a new bigger
hard drive. This Dell Inspiron 2600 has been much faster since I moved it
from 20gig to 80gig, and my GSX270 pc from 40 to 500. This is the cheapest
way to speed up an old computer, but do check to see what is the maximum
yours can take.
S

Did you check to see if the drives are faster, due to rpm or how old or
new they are?

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...ance,1557.html

Conclusion

8:20 AM - March 5, 2007 by Patrick Schmid

We looked at several Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 drives to get down to the
performance nitty-gritty. In doing so, we found that there is hardly any
difference between two drives that only differ in their cache sizes: 16
MB cache has no significant advantage over 8 MB across our benchmark
suite, and this applies both to Serial ATA and to UltraATA drives. We
would have expected that at least the SATA drives would show some degree
of benefit, but in the case of the 7200.10 family, 16 MB cache is a
waste of money if you have a cheaper 8 MB alternative. At the same time,
16 MB cache doesn't hurt either if the price is about the same...

Knowing that there are differences between members of a hard drive
family you should now be able to make a more confident buying decision.
Hard drives whose platter configurations don't utilize the maximum
per-platter capacity show slightly quicker access times, because the
operating range of the drive is somewhat reduced, while units that fully
utilize the maximum capacities offer slightly better data transfer rates.

That said, we have to make clear that the differences between the
quickest and the slowest hard drive model within a product family are
clearly smaller than differences between product generations. In our
experience, a new product will always outperform an older one.

We have inserted the 15 Seagate hard drives into our Interactive 3.5"
Hard Drive Charts, so you can compare them to the rest of the market.
Happy hard drive hunting!

MR, You talk about software and nothing about your hardware. To make a
diagnostic/suggestion it is necessary to know what's inside your
computer case: uP, clock, ram, HD's and so on. Without that basic
information any response is just blah, blah blah.

MR wrote:
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there is
no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old. Sometimes
it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep getting those "
virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed up
my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

MR, You talk about software and nothing about your hardware. To make a
diagnostic/suggestion it is necessary to know what's inside your
computer case: uP, clock, ram, HD's and so on. Without that basic
information any response is just blah, blah blah.

MR wrote:
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there is
no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old. Sometimes
it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep getting those "
virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed up
my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

Thanks to all who have responded.
I can give you more info, if I knew how to retrieve it from my pc.(like uP,
clock, ram, HD's, etc)-
Is there a way to get this info to submit it here? Or just look under the
system properties?

I can tell you what I do know; & my specs are nothing to jump about.
My ram is 256 mb, HD is 40g, pentium 4 CPU, 1.80 GHz ....my pc is a 2002
Dell.
Yes a new unit is my best best but I would like to hang on to this until I
am able to get a new one.
Thanks in advance again.....


"Roger" wrote in message
...
MR, You talk about software and nothing about your hardware. To make a
diagnostic/suggestion it is necessary to know what's inside your computer
case: uP, clock, ram, HD's and so on. Without that basic information any
response is just blah, blah blah.

MR wrote:
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there
is
no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start
up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old.
Sometimes
it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep getting those
"
virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed
up
my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in
this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

Thanks to all who have responded.
I can give you more info, if I knew how to retrieve it from my pc.(like uP,
clock, ram, HD's, etc)-
Is there a way to get this info to submit it here? Or just look under the
system properties?

I can tell you what I do know; & my specs are nothing to jump about.
My ram is 256 mb, HD is 40g, pentium 4 CPU, 1.80 GHz ....my pc is a 2002
Dell.
Yes a new unit is my best best but I would like to hang on to this until I
am able to get a new one.
Thanks in advance again.....


"Roger" wrote in message
...
MR, You talk about software and nothing about your hardware. To make a
diagnostic/suggestion it is necessary to know what's inside your computer
case: uP, clock, ram, HD's and so on. Without that basic information any
response is just blah, blah blah.

MR wrote:
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say there
is
no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that start
up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old.
Sometimes
it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep getting those
"
virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to speed
up
my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in
this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

If you're running WinXP on a PC with only 256Mb RAM you are doing very well
indeed - I'm impressed!

However, you might feel less tortured if you bought yourself a bit more
memory.

==

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London. :-)




"MR" wrote in message
...
Thanks to all who have responded.
I can give you more info, if I knew how to retrieve it from my pc.(like
uP, clock, ram, HD's, etc)-
Is there a way to get this info to submit it here? Or just look under the
system properties?

I can tell you what I do know; & my specs are nothing to jump about.
My ram is 256 mb, HD is 40g, pentium 4 CPU, 1.80 GHz ....my pc is a 2002
Dell.
Yes a new unit is my best best but I would like to hang on to this until
I am able to get a new one.
Thanks in advance again.....


"Roger" wrote in message
...
MR, You talk about software and nothing about your hardware. To make a
diagnostic/suggestion it is necessary to know what's inside your
computer case: uP, clock, ram, HD's and so on. Without that basic
information any response is just blah, blah blah.

MR wrote:
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say
there is
no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that
start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I
just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old.
Sometimes
it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep getting
those "
virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to
speed up
my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in
this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?

If you're running WinXP on a PC with only 256Mb RAM you are doing very well
indeed - I'm impressed!

However, you might feel less tortured if you bought yourself a bit more
memory.

==

Cheers, Tim Meddick, Peckham, London. :-)




"MR" wrote in message
...
Thanks to all who have responded.
I can give you more info, if I knew how to retrieve it from my pc.(like
uP, clock, ram, HD's, etc)-
Is there a way to get this info to submit it here? Or just look under the
system properties?

I can tell you what I do know; & my specs are nothing to jump about.
My ram is 256 mb, HD is 40g, pentium 4 CPU, 1.80 GHz ....my pc is a 2002
Dell.
Yes a new unit is my best best but I would like to hang on to this until
I am able to get a new one.
Thanks in advance again.....


"Roger" wrote in message
...
MR, You talk about software and nothing about your hardware. To make a
diagnostic/suggestion it is necessary to know what's inside your
computer case: uP, clock, ram, HD's and so on. Without that basic
information any response is just blah, blah blah.

MR wrote:
Hi, I want to make my older pc more efficient and faster. Lets say
there is
no malware causing the slowness.
It constantly hangs between comands. whether online or offline.
Here is what I have done.
*In RUNmsconfig startup folrder I have minimized the items that
start up
by just 3 items (anti virus for examp)-
*I delete temp folders often and use clean up or ccleaner often. . I
just
think that my windows Xp home edition Dell pc has gotten too old.
Sometimes
it loads up pages fast and other it drags and I alway keep getting
those "
virtual memory low alerts." I have high speed internet too.
What are some NEW things I can still do, besides buy a new unit, to
speed up
my pc.
Can I de-select all the NON windows items that i feel are not need in
this
area? Or some windows items in the Msconfig services tab?