Simple ways to increase your computer’s performance – Save hard disk space! Do you have a computer that doesn’t have a huge hard drive, but you store a lot of pictures, videos, or other large files that’s getting your free space low? Once your computer gets low on hard disk space, normal processes begin to slow down and your computer will run painfully slow. There are of course lots of other reasons why your computer might be running slowly, but this post is specifically for those who know they are running short on disk space. So instead of having to delete files or move things off to USB sticks or external hard drives, you can first try to free up some space on your computer that may be taken up by useless temporary files or system processes. There are usually three big space “killers” in Windows that are set by default to hog disk space and should be reined in as soon as you can!
1. Here’s how to fix space killer #1. On the Global tab, you can choose Use one setting for all drives or Configure drives independently. 2. Click on the System Restore tab. 3. 4. 99 ways to Make Your Computer Blazingly Fast. Over the last several years working in IT for various companies as a Systems Administrator, Network Administrator, and Help Desk professional, I’ve written and learned about many ways to increase the performance of not only my PC, but also of the many PCs on my networks ranging from Windows 98 to Windows Vista. In this article, I hope to compile a complete list of all the different methods and tricks that I’ve used to get the last bit of juice out of a slow PC. Whether you are using an old PC or the latest and greatest in hardware, you can still use some of these to make your PC run faster. Note that since I write two blogs, Help Desk Geek and Online Tech Tips, I have previously written about many performance tips already which I will link back to throughout.
If I have not written about it, I’ve throw in a link to a relevant article from some of my other favorite sites. This list is in no particular order, just written in the order that I could think of them. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. True X-Mouse Gizmo for Windows. New version was posted on 15th of April 2005! X11 is better for fingers. Copy with mouse. Paste with mouse. Focus without clicks. Raise and lower windows. So called X-Mouse. One and only... Have you ever paid attention to striking difference in the thickness of forefingers in X11/Unix and MS Windows users, respectively? The explanation is simple: all X11 users benefit from the fact that no significant effort is needed to place a selected chunk of text into the clipboard and to fetch it from there.
Over the years Microsoft (being under the user community pressure) has undertaken some half-hearted attempts to bring the fewer-clicks functionality to Windows. Keyboard focus follows mouse pointer instantly (the only one that can be achieved with TweakUI, annoyingly enough accompanied by the "quality" to raise the window upon click). All of the above is what this "True X-Mouse Gizmo" is about:-) Recommended usage. Recommended usage. The Gizmo is designed to work on 98/Me/2000/XP/.NET/2003. TreeSize – Free utility to find, view and free up hard disk space.
Trying to figure out where all of your hard drive space has disappeared to is often quite a challenge in Windows with all of the hidden folders and temp directories! As an IT Professional, one tool that I use almost every other day is TreeSize, a small utility that tells you exactly where all of your hard drive space is currently allocated. Using TreeSize Free edition, you can immediately see which folders and subfolders are taking up the most hard disk space. Once you have that info, it’s a piece of cake to quickly free up hard drive space taken up by temp files or other useless data.
TreeSize doesn’t even require any installation, you can just double-click on the EXE file to run it. Once installed, click on the Scan menu item and choose a drive that you would like to analyze. Wait a couple of minutes while the hard drive is scanned and then click on the sort by size button at the top right of the screen. So download it and clean up your hard drive today! 4 free ways to tweak your mouse and increase productivity. Ever heard of tweaking your mouse ? Just about everyone has a desktop and along with that a mouse to perform any task on the computer.
We spend so much time using a mouse, but usually spend no time trying to make sure we are getting all the juice we can from that little controller! However, you can greatly increase your productivity with a few simple mouse tweaks in Windows or via some third party apps. I’m going to go through a couple of apps that I’ve run across over the last few years that make my mouse into something more than just a roaming pointer!
How to Copy and Paste Faster Most people don’t use their mouse for copying and pasting, it’s simply too much clicking. Not so with True X-Mouse Gizmo ! It has a tons of settings you can configure, but it’s not for the faint of heart! How to Add Commands and Functionality to Right-Click Options Everyone knows that when they right-click on something, it gives them a few menu options that are related to whatever they right-clicked on. 1. Tweak Windows XP settings with TweakUI. Since I just wrote a post on how to tweak Windows Vista, I thought I would throw in some power toys for the Windows XP users. Windows XP is not going to disappear any time soon, so if you still have not gotten around to customizing it the way you want, take a minute and read through this article.
One of the best programs for tweaking Windows XP is the TweakUI PowerToy utility from Microsoft. Using this nifty little program, you can fine-tune many Windows settings quickly and easily. You can many settings, from how to group items in the taskbar to disabling or getting rid of those annoying shortcut icon arrows on the desktop. Here’s a quick overview of some of the other settings you can configure: Tweak number of applications for the Alt + Tab dialog This if very useful if you’re like me and always have about 20 windows open in your taskbar. Change number of lines your mouse wheels scrolls Reduce the quality of thumbnails in Explorer to increase performance Repair Windows files.