by Marie J Kelley

Created on: April 30, 2008   Last Updated: July 17, 2008

It's terribly frustrating to watch a computer begin to start up only to have to wait another ten minutes for it to become usable, but thankfully for everyone who is impatient, there are ways to decrease the amount of time it takes for your Windows Vista computer to start up.

The best way to speed up any computer is by adding additional memory, but often times that means opening your computer up and performing computer surgery which of course, not everyone is capable of doing. For those of who want to add memory to their Vista computer without worrying about purchasing and installing memory, Microsoft included a tool called ReadyBoost in this new operating system. By purchasing a USB flash drive, it can simply be plugged into a USB port on the computer and ReadyBoost will recognize it automatically as additional memory. For example, if you purchase a 2 GB flash drive and plug it into your USB port on your Vista computer, your computer should recognize another 2 GBs of memory.

Another reason it can take a computer time to boot is because it is attempting to start all of the programs that it's been told have to start at startup. If you look at the right, bottom corner of your screen you'll see your time and to the left of that, numerous icons. Typically, every icon represents one program that has been told to start each time you start your computer up. If you see that you have three instant messengers attempting to start you can speed up your computer by turning these off and only using one.

To do this, click your start button and then Run and when the next box pops up, type MSCONFIG and hit OK. This will bring up your System Configuration Utility where you can change your startup settings. Next, click the Startup tab and here you'll see various programs that you have opening at startup. Uncheck what you don't want to open automatically. Programs you may want to consider include messengers and Adobe. Once you've unchecked all that you need to, click the Apply button and then click on Close. If you do not want to restart your computer right away choose Exit Without Restart on the next prompt and the next time you decide to restart your computer fewer programs will try to start up!

While there are many other ways to improve the speed of your computer, these two methods do not require one to be a computer expert and will specifically help increase your startup speed either permanently or just while you need it increased.

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