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To speed up your computer, follow these steps to easily make quick configurations that you can perform right now. These take the least amount of time and cost nothing to perform:

This list assumes you are using a PC with Windows XP.

1. Type CTRL-ALT-DELETE. This will bring up a list of programs and services currently running in the background on your PC. If you know which services are which, you can "end" a good chunk of them by clicking on the name and clicking the "End Process" button. If you're a beginner and have no idea what these services are, you can look them up (http://www.processid.com/proc esses.html) and decide which ones you need and don't need. This is something you can do right now while reading this article and should free up some memory and give you a little extra boost in speed.

2. If you don't mind changing the theme of your Windows desktop, you can change it to an earlier version which speeds things up a bit. To do this, right-click on your desktop and select "properties". There will be a tab labeled "Themes". Click on that, then click the drop down box labeled "Themes". Select the option "Windows Classic" and hit OK. Your desktop will revert back to the old Windows theme, which doesn't look as great, but makes things run smoother.

3. Go to Start > Run and type "msconfig" in the text box. Click OK and a new window will pop up. Select the "Startup" tab. This will display a list of services and program that are started when Windows first boots up. A lot of these you probably don't need and show up as little icons on the bottom right of your screen on the taskbar. You can check or uncheck which ones you need or don't need. Sometimes it is safe to uncheck all of them and let the programs configure themselves. If you are not sure, go ahead and look up which program you need or don't need when starting up Windows. Once you uncheck the programs you don't need, click the OK button and it will ask you to restart the computer. Next time Windows boots up, you'll notice the time it takes to load the desktop will be much faster and things will run a little smoother.

These are just three quick things you can do to speed up your computer a little. There's obviously a lot more ways to speed it up, but they may take longer and get a lot more involved. This should give you a nice little extra boost at no cost and shouldn't take up too much of your time. Enjoy!

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