A Gardeners Forum Forums General Discussion The Banter Hall Ask Mr. Gremelin Slow Computer

My computer's slow.Sometimes Windows fails to start and I have to use System Restore to get it to start.How do I get my computer back to normal?

Well the basics are do you delete a lot of the old stuff and run Disk Cleanup and Disk Defragmenter a lot?

How old is your computer? Does it run on XP? I guess this is a good question for James. Mine is getting slower and slower with age......

While here I have a question myself. My page file usage history is getting higher and higher....is that just from cookies and temporary files? I have no idea what it even is....

I have Vista.What's disk defragmenter?

Well in XP you go into your start button.....then accessories, then system tools.....I do a disk cleanup first to get rid of unnecessary stuff, then a disk defragmenter scan. It puts files back into place that sort of got out of place. While running it I shut off my screensaver.

BTW, one of my friends had NEVER run it, hadn't even heard of it! It took her computer ALL day to run defrag......it did help her though.

So, I don't think I have ever run mine either. Went in to see what it was it all about and ran analyze. It told me I didn't need to defrag. I guess all of the other stuff I run keeps it cleaned up. I clear cookies several times a day. I run ad-aware every week or two and Ccleaner every other month. Mine only lugs down after my teen gets on and goes to mtspace or utube a lot. Then a reboot and cookie/history cleanse usually picks it right back up.

I found disk cleanup and disk defragmenter.I'm running them now.Hopefully, in a few hours' time, my computer will be back to normal.

I run the disk defragmenter but what/where is disk clean-up??

where do I go to delete my cookies, and what will THAT do to my computer??

((one cannot delete the web addresses in my DH's frequent list ya know))

Disk cleanup deletes unnecessary file in your hard drive.

Disk clean up is right above my defrag option in accesories/tools as listed above.
Deleting cookies can be done in tools (probably located on the top of the page you are reading in now.) It may toss you out of garden helper and you would have to log back in. So remember your passwords to everything if you tend to stay logged in most of the time. It only takes seconds. You can delete cookies, history and temporary internet files. Those won't mess with your fav list or addresses or things. Not all cookies are bad. But even the good ones tend to build up and slow down your computer. This is why I love firefox. I have it set to clear all the cookies every time I log off/in.

What it deems unnecessary, which is stuff you haven't played with in 6 months or so... myself I have a lot of files archived that are well older than that lol... I never run cleanup :/...

As for slowdown issues, you may check what is causing issues, right click the task bar and choose task manager then click the column named "memory" and note what is the largest consumers; then do the same for cpu; those will be the programs hogging your resources on your computer...

Hi if you go to my computer from the start menu and open it.you can right click on your C drive go down to properties.there is a tool tab there that you can open it will bring up error checking.click it it will have two boxs check the first one that says Aotomaticlly fix file system errors it will ask you do you want to start it when you reboot click yes.then check the second box.marked scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors check it.then click start now.this should help fix any bad files on your computer.i use this about one time a mounth it seems to help alot.
Also you can open your control panel and deleat cookies and temp files from internet options.but rember all your pass words for the sites where you need one
because you will have to log bake in on any site where you need a pass word.
hope this will help speed up your computer.it works for me.your friend in gardening.mike57

Sounds like you might be infected too with a virus. I would try AVG Antivirus free edition for that.

I would also put on Auslogics Disk Defragmenter, it works 10 times better than the Windows disk defrag and is faster. I do disk defrag and disk cleanup once a month, but for you mabye every 2 weeks do it. At first it may take a while, but once it's cleaner it will be fast.

CCleaner & Cleanup will clean up junk files and make your computer run faster.

If it's Spyware,Malware,Trojans, or Worms you have, Spybot Search & Destroy and Malwarebytes will get rid of those.

All of these programs are free!