Turn Off Indexing...Optimize..PC... series contd

HELPPCONLINE KNOWLEDGE SHARING

Turn Off Indexing to Speed Up XP

Windows XP keeps a record of all files on the hard disk so when you do a search on the

hard drive it is faster. There is a downside to this and because the computer has to

index all files, it will slow down normal file commands like open, close, etc. If you do

not do a whole lot of searches on your hard drive then you may want to turn this feature

off:

·         Open My Computer.

·         Right-click your hard drive icon and select Properties.

·         At the bottom of the window you'll see "Allow indexing service to index this disk

o for faster searches," uncheck this and click ok.

·         A new window will pop up and select Apply to all folders and subfolders.

·   It will take a minute or two for the changes to take affect but then you should enjoy slightly faster performance.

Clean Your Prefetch to Improve Performance

This is a unique technique for WinXP. We know that it is necessary to scrub registry and TEMP files for Win9X/ME/2000 periodically. Prefetch is a new and very useful technique in Windows XP. However, after using XP some time, the prefetch directory canget full of junk and obsolete links in the Prefetch catalog, which can slow down your computer noticeably.

·         Open C(system drive):/windows/prefetch, delete those junk and obsolete files,

reboot. It is recommended that you do this every month.

Remove Hibernation File

If you do not use hibernation, make sure you do not have it enabled, which reserves

disk space equal to your RAM. If you have a hidden file on the root directory of your

·         C-drive called hiberfil.sys, hibernation is enabled. To remove that file:

·         Go to Control Panel, select Performance and Maintenance in Power Options, Hibernate tab, and uncheck the Enable hibernation box.

Performance Increase through My Computer

Easy enough tweak to usually find out about it on your own, but still, some of us

still don't find it right away. So here it is:

·   Start > right-click on My Computer and select Properties.

·   Click on the "Advanced" tab.

·   See the "Performance" section? Click "Settings".

·   Disable the following:

§  Fade or slide menus into view

§  Fade or slide ToolTips into view

§  Fade out menu items after clicking

§  Show Shadows under menus

§  Slide open combo boxes

§  Slide taskbar buttons

§  Use a background image for each folder type

§  Use common tasks in folders

There, now Windows will still look nice and perform faster.

Reduce 10 Second Scandisk Wait Time

o Start MS Dos Prompt (Start run CMD), and type: CHKNTFS /T:4

where 4 is the amount of wait time.

CHKNTFS /?  for more info.

........Helppconline support continues