How To Easily Speed Up My Computer

by Dave Barry

Written with non-technical readers in mind, this no nonsense guide will help you keep your PC running fast, backed up, and protected from viruses and other "malware". You'll discover how to reverse the slow-down which many PC users experience, clean out your hard drive, and all manner of simple to follow performance boosting tricks.

Supporting all versions of Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP, this book has been written such that anyone with only a very basic knowledge of computers should be able to follow it with ease. You don't need to be a techie to follow the instructions, but a basic understanding of every day computer usage (using a mouse and keyboard, opening and running a program, searching for and copying files etc.) is assumed.

Contents

Introduction - Why does my computer slow down?
Prevention is better than cure

Part 1 - Preventative Medicine
Backups
What data should I back up?
Manual backups
Automated backups
Online backups
Disc images
Viruses and other malware
Proactive malware protection - MSE
Reactive malware protection - Malwarebytes
Snapshot Backups and Rollbacks (System Restore)
Setting a Restore Point
Rolling back to a Restore Point
Keeping up to date
Windows Update
Updating applications

Part 2 - Speeding Up Drives, Files and Memory
Set a restore point before we start
Removing unwanted software
Limit how many programs run at start-up
Deleting files
Cleaning the registry
The Defrag Myth
Scan and fix your hard drive
Defragging a hard drive
Upgrading or replacing a failing hard drive
System file checking
Optimising memory
Optimising memory on Windows XP
Optimising memory on Windows Vista or Windows 7
Upgrading RAM

Part 3 - Other Optimisations
Turn off the sidebar or desktop gadgets
Turn off Aero
Readyboost

Part 4 - Keeping up performance
Run fewer programs at the same time
Reboot often
Run scans and checks often
Run Ccleaner
A faster computer, a happier user
Resources

38 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 29, 2012

Reviews

[Andrew]

This is NOT a Dave Barry humorous book. This is for PC users.