How To Speed Up XP Computers For Free

If you know how to speed up XP performance then there is no reason why you cannot keep productively using an XP machine for several years to come. This article goes through some of the key ways to speed up XP without having to spend a penny.

Your starting point should be fine-tuning the applications that are run as Windows reboots. You can disable the non-essential ones you never use using Windows System Config tool. Go to the Start menu, Run application and type in ‘msconfig’ to open the tool.

Next you should improve the effectiveness of running applications. Open the Task Manager (processes) and identify services/programs using a lot of RAM memory. If you do not need them then close down or remove them. If you wish to use them then research online for performance patches, check you are using the latest version and research performance tweaks on user forum.

Any article about fixing computers could not leave out mentioning running virus scans and the Windows update service. One ensures that bugs do not corrupt system files and the other ensures you have the latest, best-performing operating system programs and device drivers.

Finally, you should improve the effectiveness of key hardware resources. In particular, run a disk defragmentation (accessories / system tools) on all drives to speed up XP disk access. Clear out the hard drive of temporary/cached files to keep at least 10% free for virtual memory. You can then reset/check the virtual memory is set correctly using the page file setting (system / advanced /performance options). Set it to three times your system RAM quantity or greater than the value recommend by the OS on the page file settings window.

Hopefully, these tips have shown you how to speed up XP and it is worth completing these tasks monthly/quarterly to incrementally improve the running of your computer.