Aesop moralized that slow and steady wins the race. But in today’s supersized world of instant everything, speed is essential. Especially with computers, slow and steady only gets you passed. If your PC is more tortoise than hare, here are a few easy fixes to pump it bigger than Barry Bonds.
First and easiest is to clear the temporary memory and defragment your hard disk. Whenever you create, save or alter files on your computer, the information is written to a specific location on your hard drive. After a while, these files pile up and slow down your computer.
Defragmenting compresses all the bits of information into an easily readable block, improving performance. It’s recommended to defragment and wipe temporary files once a week, preferably Friday or Saturday night, when you’re more likely to be pursuing “non-computer activities.”
More intermediate is to disable unneeded processes that waste valuable memory. Running “services.msc” from the Start Menu will list all the processes your computer uses and a brief explanation of each. Read the descriptions, and if you don’t need that particular process, disable it. “Services.msc” only lists non-vital processes, reducing the chances of permanently harming your computer to near zero. This takes only a few minutes, and Web sites such as blackviper.com can walk you through it.
If the above fails to swap your turtle for a bounding bunny, then give your PC some extra hop by adding Random Access Memory (RAM). If the hard drive is your PC’s brain, RAM is the muscle to make it go. Tinkering with your computer’s insides may sound like a complex task requiring extensive training, but adding RAM is usually simple as fitting a cartridge into a slot. Web sites like eHow.com and Ask provide easy to understand, step-by-step instruction for a variety of computer makes and models.
First, determine what kind of RAM your computer requires. Googling your PC’s model number (i.e. “Dell Dimension 2400”) should bring up a host of sites selling your particular kind of RAM. If your PC came with one 512 Megabyte RAM module, purchasing an additional 1GB module will triple your memory for a mere $50! Once you have RAM in hand, slide the cover from your PC and plug your RAM into the open slot. On your next start-up, a message will say the internal memory has changed. Right click “My Computer,” and Properties should show your increased memory.
So Aesop be damned, because faster is better. Adding RAM, stripping down your running processes and defragging the Hard Drive will pump computing steroids into your PC. Simply follow directions and your crawling tortoise will be a bounding hare in no time.
