Tips for speeding up vista

Click 'Generate a system health report' and select the option to continue if prompted. The tool collects information from the Reliability and Performance Monitor to make the report.

This lists potential problems like low disk space and suggests fixes. Autoruns is a zip file, which you'll need to extract before you can run it. Open it in Vista and extract all the files. Current page: Page 1. North America.

Page 1 of 2: Page 1 Page 1 Page 2. Audio player loading…. See more Operating systems news. This gives a good picture of what the actual processes on your Vista box are up to. You will also discover a large part of the reason why Outlook is so slow. PS Another article , also just published, has good coverage of swap files and ReadyBoost.

I had a lot of problems with my Vista initially, adding RAM didnt help speed up things and my drives get fragmented like crap due to the amount of file editing i do. The lousy Vista defragmenter did not help one bit, so I chose Diskeeper Pro, which was recommended to me as the No. Diskeeper works very well with my Vista Home Premium, and my drive is in excellent shape! Their list is something that could easily apply to just about all of their older versions of Windows. Thanks for the simple two step breakdown and then a review of some of the things Microsoft is suggesting Tim.

I do agree with your thoughts on the slow programs and just about all on this post. Great post. I purchased new notebook computer over a month ago loaded with Vista and what a huge disaster! It would not load any of my real estate software and would not totally load Office Also, every time I tried to do a system restore the computer would crash!

Stop the Search index The Indexing Service is a handy way to speed up searches, but if you rarely go hunting for files this can be turned off. Open Computer, right-click on the hard drive and clear the Index This Drive box. Set ntfsdisable8dot3namecreation to 1 and it won't create DOS-style shortened versions of file names; setting ntfsdisablelastaccessupdate means Windows won't update the Last Accessed date on a folder when you view it.

Both tweaks will help improve drive performance a little, but could break old software. Beware: Microsoft says this increases the chance of data loss if the drive loses power. Check Enable transparent glass if that's a little too plain. Before you start you need to make sure your USB memory card is up to the job. You'll need a minimum of MB storage and a maximum of 4GB, and it needs to be capable of specific speeds: 2.

ReadyBoost will test your memory when you first plug it in and, if it's not up to scratch, ReadyBoost will refuse to use it. Remove SP1 uninstall files If you're running short of space and Service Pack 1 is causing you no trouble at all, and you're sure you'll never want to remove it, then use the tool that Microsoft has provided to clear the MB of uninstall files. Simply type vsp1cln. It'll erase your old files, free up some disk space and you can get on with enjoying your faster, more reliable PC.

Roll back to a faster, happier time System Restore enables you to roll back Windows Vista to an earlier point in time without affecting your files. Turn off System Restore In Windows Vista you can set restore points, so you can return to a state of PC peace if things get a little stormy. The benefits are often rather small, so it would be equally valid to suggest removing it from the schedule, or scheduling it to run less frequently. The advice to restart regularly needs examination.

Yes, a reboot can fix a sluggish machine. But it shouldn't be necessary, and I recall that keeping Vista always-on was intended to be a benefit of the operating system.

In the right circumstances, Vista can run for ages without any problem. I've actually had Media Center Vista Ultimate run for several months without any issues; though this kind of thing is not very green so that's another reason to do regular switch offs. Still, to my mind "restart regularly" is a symptom of some problem that should be fixed. Turning off visual effects is reasonable advice, though once again it may not yield much benefit.

I tried it on my system and was surprised how little difference it made. Reason: I am running with Aero and a decent-ish graphics card, and hardware acceleration seems to handle the visual effects rather easily. Once again, if it's not the thing slowing you down, then removing it won't speed you up. You can test this quite simply, though it is tedious.

Try it both ways. Did it make a difference? Measure it if possible. One of the good things about Vista is that such tools are easy to find. Click Start, type "reliability", and click the link. Finally, I suspect disk performance is a big factor in real-world Vista speed.

The reason is that many applications are very talkative when it comes to disk access. Here's something to try: go along to the Sysinternals site and download Process Monitor. This gives a good picture of what the actual processes on your Vista box are up to. You will also discover a large part of the reason why Outlook is so slow. PS Another article , also just published, has good coverage of swap files and ReadyBoost.

This article originally appeared in ITWriting. A freelance journalist since , Tim Anderson specializes in programming and internet development topics.