Well, it's still useful to us, although, yeah, he did tend to omit stuff about defragmenting and made an army of <'s and >'s. Sure, give constructive criticism as much as you wish but if you'd say something along the lines of "Oh, that is so below me," or, "I can do better than that," then, by all means, feel free to do so in your own thread instead of other people's threads.

I mean, the guy's just trying to help and this is what people get for their efforts?



Oh, by the way, temp files are actually there to speed up your system. Those kinda files eat hard drive space more than processor cycles. Oh and please refrain from typing in CaMeL or ALL CAPS; it is simply barbaric and totally uncivilized.

How much of this actually works?
I'd rather not tweak areas that shouldnt be messed with if its going to Muck up another area on my comp. I've probably tried 101 ways to improve it but i guess it can only done proffesionally, - because that way you can trust that your not messing anything up in the long run & that it IS actually doing something, i dunno.. has this worked for anyone in particular? =/ i wouldnt bother, no offence, nice tips though mate, slightly confusing with all the funky >>xx but thanks anyway I might look into it because my comp has deff. slowed down because of the amount of usage & programs i run,..

Things that really make computer "faster". I put "faster" in quotes beacouse none of those things make your programs faster just a bit more stable. Disableing some of those services can mess some of the windows properties if user might need them.

Here are few basic things to have stable and neat windows XP

1. 512 Mb RAM at Least

2. Windows installed in partition made specifically for windows and not any other program, with 10Gb of disk space available.

3. Limiting Virtual Memory to 1Gb MAX and MIN size (Right Click My Computer --> Properties --> Advanced Tab , choose Performance Settings --> Advanced Tab, under virtual memory chose change.)
You can chose partition for virtual memory, and if you are a real freak you can even partition your hard drive to have special partition for virtual memory (use at least 2Gb, for 1Gb couse of those annoying XP ballon tips showing lack of disk space if you use exactly 1Gb or a bit more). Chose same size for maximum and minimum, the best ratio is double your RAM (if you have 128 choose 256, for 256 choose 512..) But if you have 2Gb of RAM you probably don't even need virtual memory, and if you set it you don't need more than 2Gb, couse max memory limit for 32 bit computers is 4Gb. NOTE: After you set your virtual memory you will need to restart your computer!

4. Use Disk Defragment to Defragment partitions in which you run programs often (especially Windows partition, most often C: ). You can download special Defragmenting tools or just use windows standart located at (ALL programs, Accesories, system tools --> Disk Defragment)

5. Also, the smartest thing to do is to make special partition for your Programs And Games, and for "static" files like MP3, Video etc.. You most often use only 20% of your hard drive for Programs And Games, and Rest for "static" content.
If you have hard drive of 120Gb and use only 10 for Windows and 110 for the rest, when you come to defragment those 110 Gb it can take a lot (and trust me LOT's) of time. So use about 20-30Gb for your games and programs..

Small notice..
This things i mentioned are NOT going to make your computer faster, but are going to help you to have fast and stable computer for a long period of time.

Also when uninstalling software use Control Panel -> Add Remove Programs, couse that deletes those programs from Windows Registry (winkey+r , type regedit). Large registry can make your computer go much slower.

Also, changing windows services, and tweaking registry are rearly going to make your computer go faster, it can do that for a short period of time, but trust me, for some time weird errors are going to pop-up and sooner or later you will have to format your C drive.
If you are going to experiment with those things, try it but after that try some of the things i mentioned here, and you will see the real result.

Smart, and neat user creates smart and neat (fast and stable) computer!
Respect, and thanks for all the fish

some of what you said will make the computer faster when only one program is working. but windows os is designed to be multitask so when you have 2 programs running it will be the same as before without the tweaks

paging file is one i know that really works. and maybe overclocking if your a pro.