by Jonathan Nweke

Created on: May 09, 2009   Last Updated: May 16, 2009

Have you ever wondered why your computer becomes slow as the day goes by, suddenly your programs take longer time to come up, it can be really frustrating. Before you start complaining that your computer is slow, you need to check your system spec if you have a fast computer or a slow one.

The speed of a computer depends on two devices which are, the processor and the RAM.

The processor does the processing of data while the RAM is the memory that holds the current programs. Now if your computer processor and RAM Is low how do you expect the computer to be fast?

The first thing to check is the when your computer is low is the processor speed and the size of the RAM. If the capacities of the devices are ok then take the following steps and increase the speed of your computer.

1. Cleaning temp folder, cookies, temporary internet files, and performing disk clean up. These locations take as much as 2GB of your disk space and your ram needs to run these programs instead of running the important programs you use to for your work.
To clean up these files double click on my computer icon -> drive C: -> document and settings-> select the user profile folder that you are using, open local settings, if you don't see local settings click on tools menu, folder option check show hiding files and folders, click apply and then ok to show all hiding files

By now you should see local setting folder.

Open the folder, open temp folder; you will see the files that it contains. To view the size of the temp folder select all files using CTRL + A, right click on any file and click properties you will see the disc space that its occupying, close the property box and delete all the files. If some files refuse to delete, it may be that the computer is making use of those files at the moment, do same clean up for the temporary internet files and cookies folder, after deleting these files do same for other user profiles in your computer. When that is done you have to use the disk cleanup to clean those files from recycle bin any other location where they may be. Now click start, point your mouse to program files, and to accessories and to system tool click disk clean up

Select the drive where you have your operating system click ok, it will scan the files and show you a dialog box, check the boxes with size above 0 kb then click ok and another dialog box will open asking you if you really want to delete these files click yes. In addition, it will clean all the location. After cleaning including recycle bin your computer should faster than before.

2. Increase your virtual memory. A virtual memory is an area of the hard disk that the computer uses as ram. If the virtual memory of your machine is low, your computer will become very slow when you try to use some application simultaneously. increased virtual memory of your computer will also increase your system speed, Right click on My Computer, click properties, click advance tab, click settings under performance option, click advance tab on performance option, click change, now change the number there to any number close to the system highest memory . Click set, OK and closes the dialog boxes

Now, restart your machine you will notice that the speed of your machine has increased.

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