Speeding Win XP Performance for the Technical-Minded

Are you searching for a few ideas to help increase WinXP's speed? Well, here are some tips to keep your computer secure.

Obviously, the first thing you need to consider is what programs you want to open automatically on startup. Some of the programs you will install on your computer launch at startup by themselves, sometimes invisible to you. The major ones (like anti-spyware and virus guard) will hide themselves behind your desktop. Other software, like music and other types of players, aren't as vital and don't have to launch at startup. Such programs only slow your booting process, hogging the memory that can be used for other things. Thankfully, controlling what programs launch right away is very simple with XP. Just follow these instructions:

1--Click on the start button, then click on "run".

2--Type the word "msconfig", the in the dialog box click the "startup" tab.

3--This tab will show you all the programs that are currently launching whenever you boot. In order to disable the unnecessary software just uncheck the box on the left. Since the only programs listed here don't affect the basic run process of your computer, it's okay to proceed without worry. If you find you need it after all, you can always go back and check it again.

4--Reboot.

5--When your computer starts up again, you'll get a window that informs you that you've chosen "selective startup". Go ahead and click "OK".

Be sure to enable automatic updates, too. Windows is particularly prone to viruses because of its widespread popularity.

Along with keeping your computer safe, you'll want to get the most use out of it possible. You can remove Windows components via the "Add or Remove programs" option; to get there, click on Start/Control Panel/Add and Remove Program/Windows Components. Uncheck the programs you want to disable.

Some programs, however, are particularly difficult to find and don't show up on the above panel; a well-known example of this is MSN Messenger. To remove programs like this, do the following:

1--In Windows Explorer, go to C:WindowsInf and copy the file "Sysoc.inf".

2--Double-click Sysoc.inf to open it to Notepad.

3-Press Ctrl+H to replace the key ",hide," with ",," and then save and replace it. The hidden files on your computer should now appear.

Sometimes a system file might get corrupted. In this case, you can either replace it from your Windows CD or get software to help recover it. I suggest the latter (and have an article on the issue), but if you choose to use the CD do the following:

1--Go to Start/search. Type the file name, inserting an underscore in place of the last letter (i.e. yourfilenamehere.ex_).

2--If the file can be retrieved, click Start/run; type "CMD" in the text box

3--Type the word "expand", then the path name of the file; remember to use D instead of C, since D is your CD/DVD drive. If the pathname has spaces, put the whole name inside double apostrophes. If the file still isn't found, look for it again with the unmodified file name.

Windows XP has a number of great features, but the more unnecessary ones can really slow down its performance. If you can live without those features, your experience will speed up greatly.