How to Improve Laptop's Performance

If your laptop is becoming sluggish, you may want to upgrade some parts. But that isn't always necessary. Chances are, you can still improve your laptop's performance by just tweaking your system's configurations without replacing or adding some hardware.

Here is a compilation of tweaks that you could apply on your computer. I've tried these tweaks on my 4-year-old laptop. My laptop did improve. Take note, these steps are specifically for Vista and Windows 7. So if your laptop is running XP, the steps required may be slightly different. A word of caution: Create a restore point on your system first before attempting to make any changes on your system.

Note: To create a restore point, simply type System Restore on your Start menu then click System Protection. Create a filename then choose Create. When the process is finished, click OK and when you return to the main window of System Restore, click cancel. You have now created a Restore Point where you could go back to when something goes wrong to your laptop.

Disk Cleanup

Your machine may have stored a chunk of junk files on your system automatically. Free up more space by deleting these unwanted files. Click the Start Button, type Disk Cleanup. Click OK which would start the cleanup process.

Windows Temporary Files

Delete these files by typing %temp% on your Start menu. Select all icons by typing Ctrl+A then hit the delete key.

Virtual Memory

Adjust your machine's virtual memory according to the recommended file size. Once again, go to Start menu, type SystemPropertiesPerformance. Go to the Advanced tab then click Change under Virtual Memory. Choose the drive from the list, then set the custom size of both Initial Size and Maximum Size according to the Recommended file size indicated under Total paging file size for all drives. Restart your laptop when prompted.

Recycle Bin

Adjust the allotted space for the recycle bin in the Properties window. Right click the Recycle Bin icon, the choose Properties. Change the Custom Size to 2048MB then click Apply.

Services

Your system may have unnecessary services running on the background that slows down your laptop. Type services.msc on the Start menu. Look for the Indexing Service and Remote Registry. Disable these two services by right-clicking then choosing properties. Choose Disable in the window that appears.

Startup Items

When you install new programs, they may be automatically launched each time Windows start. Adjust the settings by typing msconfig on the Start menu. In the window that appears, select the Startup tab and uncheck the programs that you find unnecessary. Restart your system. Adjust your settings when you find some components not working properly by going back to the msconfig window.