Like that old Volkswagen in your garage, your PC gets slower and crappier over time. Here’s a short guide on cleaning it up without needing a reformat or reinstalling Windows.

How many times have we all turned on our PCs just to sit there for 3 or 4 minutes while it boots up or shuts down? Your applications open like molassas, your harddrive grinding away as Windows tries to populate the icons on your desktop. This isn’t the way it used to be. Your computer used to be impressively fast. You would call people into your home office, and show off your speedy startup. Now it’s all different, and this is no way to live.

Windows 7 is faster than older versions. It can, however, still become sluggish with lots of install/uninstalls of applications. I’ll explain how to improve your computer’s performance and avoid the muck in the future. There are basically a few main culprits hassling your PC’s performance and they get more severe over time and with more installs/uninstalls.

Windows Molassas Syndrome

Windows slowdown is caused by three main causes. The Windows Registry bloats and becomes bigger, DLLs and other junk are duplicated, and hard drives get fragmented. PCs with lots of applications can have a lot of programs installed, running background services without your knowledge. The more programs you load and unload, the bigger your Windows registry grows. As it expands, applications that use it take longer to load. Another issue is incomplete uninstalls. Each uninstall can leave residue in the registry. Windows 7 is better about this, but still not perfect.

Another reason for the slowdown is Associated Application Crud. Different applications require different runtime modules to run. Another culprit for older computers is the unnecessary background services and tasks running without your knowledge. Control panel applets, mouse and keyboard control applets, wi-fi applets, virus scanners, etc all use some of your processing power. Try to avoid using excessive applets when you dont need them. For instance, Adobe PDF reader, USB utilities, etc. Check your task manager for unecessary applets.

Hard drive issues are a common plague for many systems. A machine’s file system gets fragmented eventually. Windows 7 tries to minimize that by running the defragger whenever your PC is idle. However, if you have lots of files being created and deleted, the hard drive will become fragmented. Performance issues are multiplied if the hard drive becomes more than 90 percent full. If this is the case, it may be time to do some spring cleaning, or upgrade to a larger hard drive.

Overheating is an issue for some home computers, especially when the PC is tucked away behind boxes or poorly ventilated in a dusty corner. Modern CPUs will automatically throttle down performance if they get too hot. You can check the system temperature in the BIOS, or with utilities that may have shipped with your motherboard.

Disappearing memory for a computer is like disappearing horsepower for a car. It can happen slowly over time and as a result of use. For instance, over time as memory is used and electricity flows along circuits occasionally performance is hampered, particularly when apps and data are swapped to virtual memory on your hard drive.

How to Monitor My PC

You’ll need some tools to help you diagnose what’s clogging your system. Firstly use a Benchmark, such as WorldBench or PCMark Vantage. Benchmark software doesn’t help current problems, but if you use it when you build a new system, it will track any losses in performance to help you understand when and why decreases in performance occur.

Windows 7 ships with an applet called “CPU meter” and “Resource Monitor”. It’s useful for its memory meter. If the percentage of memory used over time appears to increase, you may have background tasks loading which you may not need or want. Other gadgets that come with Windows includes “Windows Reliability Monitor” and “System-Boot Diagnostics.” This one is useful to see how many tools and utilities are preloaded during boot. This accounts for that (sometimes more than) 10 minute delay before your mouse appears to do anything. Microsoft also offers 3rd party system-monitoring gadgets.

How to Clean the @?%&

If you’re into manually cleaning things yourself, try using the built-in “Disk Cleanup” utility. You can manually clean out old system files (do so with care). After performing a disk cleanup, I recommend performing a defrag. The Windows 7 defrag utility is pretty smart about managing itself, but your system will still slow down a bit while it chews through all that data, rearranging the system to run smoother.

Another tool to know is the “System Configuration Utility.” More commonly known as the MSconfig utility. Using MSconfig lets you manually specify services to run and setup startup applications. Just be careful that you know what you’re doing or you might remove some startup process you really need. The “Registry Editor,” aka Regedit is another tool to use with caution. Deleting items from the registry willy nilly can make your system unstable.

For more automatic solutions from 3rd parties, I recommend Soluto. You can download it free and it claims to shorten Windows load time significantly. Another good tool is Revo Uninstaller. This handy utility is a little more complex. It also functions as a backup manager, browser cleaner, evidence remover, and completely uninstalls software you want removed.

How Do I Stop Future Slowdowns?

As a general rule, if an application has an “advanced” install option, use it. Don’t install things you don’t need. Watch install dialog boxes for options to install new items. Many people just click “next” when there’s really a box they should uncheck for installing unnecessary software.

If a window pops up in your browser asking to install something, make sure you know what it is. It might be a simple tool you want, or something you don’t need. Alternatively it might be malware attempting to put something harmful on your system. If it’s something you don’t know for sure you are better off closing the window, rather than clicking any options inside the window.

Use tools like Soluto and MSconfig frequently to make sure your startup isn’t slowed by useless junk.

Clean your drive frequently and perform disk defrags.

As always, contact GURU for IT consulting. We employ the best experts in the field and we’re always on top of new technologies.