Housecleaning

[Walter R.]

Running Win XP Sp3. My computer is getting old. It's slowing down
noticeably.

I thought of cleaning out all the clutter that has accumulated over the
years.

What is a good "cleaner" that will get rid of redundant and left-over files?

Should also be "free".

Thanks

 

[Bill in Co.]

Probably CCleaner. Just stay away from the registry cleaning module, as a
general precaution, and be very careful what you delete.

 

[Kevin]

Crap Cleaner is the best!!!

<http://www.filehippo.com/download/f...fa6b9a203363ed7139dde2bfcd1c0b08b332705fe262/>

However, if you want to speed up your system, then the best thing to do is to
start all over again by reformatting the HD and re-installing all the
applications. You do need tocopy all your personal data before doing this as
this process wipes your HD completely. Machines don't become slow even with age
like our Most Valuable Pigs!!!

hth

 

[PA Bear [MS MVP]]

Help! My computer is slow!
http://miekiemoes.blogspot.com/2008/02/help-my-computer-is-slow.html

 

[Pegasus [MVP]]

Running Win XP Sp3. My computer is getting old. It's slowing down
noticeably.

I thought of cleaning out all the clutter that has accumulated over the
years.

What is a good "cleaner" that will get rid of redundant and left-over
files?

Should also be "free".

Thanks

Deleting files from your disk won't speed up your machine but preventing
various add-on tasks from starting will. Use msconfig.exe to have a look at
the various tasks and services that load at start time. However, you are
unlikely to see a big improvement even when cleaning out the list. Virus
Scanners are a prime cause for slow machines because of the sheer number of
viruses they need to intercept. Some third-party firewalls are also a
problem.

Kevin's suggestion of starting afresh is probably your best bet but even
then the improvement is unlikely to be dramatic. If you want to see a big
improvement then I suggest a new machine (depending on the age of your
current PC) with 4 GBytes of RAM and with Windows 7.

 

[db]

if your system is old,

then it is likely you need a
new computer or a new o.s.

however, if your system is
sluggish then it could be for
many reasons.

to see if the o.s is being bogged
down I would start with comparing
the system performance in
safe mode.

if windows works better in
safe mode, then you'll have
an idea where to start your
house keeping.

--
db·´¯`·...¸><)))º>
DatabaseBen, Retired Professional
- Systems Analyst
- Database Developer
- Accountancy
- Veteran of the Armed Forces
- @Hotmail.com
- nntp Postologist
~ "share the nirvana" - dbZen

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Shenan Stanley]

Running Win XP Sp3. My computer is getting old. It's slowing down
noticeably.

I thought of cleaning out all the clutter that has accumulated over
the years.

What is a good "cleaner" that will get rid of redundant and
left-over files?
Should also be "free".

Windows XP ________ with SP3?

My suggestions are pretty simple and free - other than time.

* Get rid of whatever AntiVirus solution you have (particularly if it is an
all-in-one type, unlesss it happens to be one of the two I am about to
suggest) and install either of these:

- Avira AntiVir (free)
- eSet NOD32 (AntiVirus only) (cost)

* Get rid of whatever AntiMalware solution you have (unless it happens to be
the one I am about to suggest) and install and occassionally scan with (or
purchase and use to actively protect yourself with):

- MalwareBytes

* Get rid of any third-party firewall software and utilize the built-in
Windows XP firewall.

* Uninstall all unnecessary software, particularly any search/toolbars you
do not use, any applications that run all the time that you never utilize,
etc. If you have some 'weather' desktop stuff - learn to look outside. ;-)

* CHKDSK

* DEFRAGMENT


Want more details, more stuff to do in order to optimize performance?

Reboot so you start with a fresh machine. For everything here you will
need to logon as an user with administrative (installation) priviledges.

Fix your file/registry permissions...

Ignore the title and follow the sub-section under
"Advanced Troubleshooting" titled,
"Method 1: Reset the registry and the file permissions"
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/949377
*will take time
** Ignore the last step (6) - you'll install SP3 shortly, but not now.

You will likely see errors pass by if you watching, even count up. No
worries *at this time*.

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

Download/install the "Windows Installer CleanUp Utility":
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290301

After installing, do the following:

Start button --> RUN
(no "RUN"? Press the "Windows Key" + R on your keyboard)
--> type in:
"%ProgramFiles%\Windows Installer Clean Up\msizap.exe" g!
--> Click OK.
(The quotation marks and percentage signs and spacing should be exact.)

It will flash by *quick*, don't expect much out of this step to get
excited about.

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

This time (and this is one of the more time-consuming steps) you will be
running (one at a time with reboots in-between each) three different
anti-spyware/anti-malware applications to ensure you come up clean.

Download, install, run, update and perform a full scan with the following
(freeware version):

SuperAntiSpyware
http://www.superantispyware.com/

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

Download, install, run, update and perform a full scan with the following
(freeware version):

MalwareBytes
http://www.malwarebytes.com/

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

Download and run the MSRT manually:
http://www.microsoft.com/security/malwareremove/default.mspx

You can un-install the first two if you want. I'd personally recommend
keeping MalwareBytes around.

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

Download/Install the latest Windows Installer (for your OS):
( Windows XP 32-bit : WindowsXP-KB942288-v3-x86.exe )
http://www.microsoft.com/downloadS/details.aspx?familyid=5A58B56F-60B6-4412-95B9-54D056D6F9F4

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

Download the latest version of the Windows Update agent from here (x86):
http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=91237
.... and save it to the root of your C:\ drive. After saving it to the
root of the C:\ drive, do the following:

Close all Internet Explorer windows and other applications.

Start button --> RUN and type in:
%SystemDrive%\windowsupdateagent30-x86.exe /WUFORCE
--> Click OK.

(If asked, select "Run.) --> Click on NEXT --> Select "I agree" and click on
NEXT --> When it finishes installing, click on "Finish"...

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

Visit this web page:

How do I reset Windows Update components?
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/971058

.... and click on the "Microsoft Fix it" icon. When asked, select "RUN",
both times. Check the "I agree" box and click on "Next". Check the box
for "Run aggressive options (not recommended)" and click "Next". Let
it finish up and follow the prompts until it is done. Close/exit.


Reboot and logon as administrative user.

You should now perform a full CHKDSK on your system drive (C...

How to scan your disks for errors
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315265
* will take time and a reboot

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

Time to clear up some space...

If you are comfortable with the stability of your system, you can delete the
uninstall files for the patches that Windows XP has installed...
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar/spack.htm
( Particularly of interest here - #4 )
( Alternative: http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_hotfix_backup.htm )

You can run Disk Cleanup - built into Windows XP - to erase all but your
latest restore point and cleanup even more "loose files"..

How to use Disk Cleanup
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310312

You can turn off hibernation if it is on and you don't use it..

When you hibernate your computer, Windows saves the contents of the system's
memory to the hiberfil.sys file. As a result, the size of the hiberfil.sys
file will always equal the amount of physical memory in your system. If you
don't use the hibernate feature and want to recapture the space that Windows
uses for the hiberfil.sys file, perform the following steps:

- Start the Control Panel Power Options applet (go to Start, Settings,
Control Panel, and click Power Options).
- Select the Hibernate tab, clear the "Enable hibernation" check box, then
click OK; although you might think otherwise, selecting Never under the
"System hibernates" option on the Power Schemes tab doesn't delete the
hiberfil.sys file.
- Windows will remove the "System hibernates" option from the Power Schemes
tab and delete the hiberfil.sys file.

You can control how much space your System Restore can use...

1. Click Start, right-click My Computer, and then click Properties.
2. Click the System Restore tab.
3. Highlight one of your drives (or C: if you only have one) and click on
the "Settings" button.
4. Change the percentage of disk space you wish to allow.. I suggest moving
the slider until you have just about 1GB (1024MB or close to that...)
5. Click OK.. Then Click OK again.

You can control how much space your Temporary Internet Files can utilize...

Empty your Temporary Internet Files and shrink the size it stores to a
size between 64MB and 128MB..

- Open ONE copy of Internet Explorer.
- Select TOOLS -> Internet Options.
- Under the General tab in the "Temporary Internet Files" section, do the
following:
- Click on "Delete Cookies" (click OK)
- Click on "Settings" and change the "Amount of disk space to use:" to
something between 64MB and 128MB. (It may be MUCH larger right
now.)
- Click OK.
- Click on "Delete Files" and select to "Delete all offline contents"
(the checkbox) and click OK. (If you had a LOT, this could take 2-10
minutes or more.)
- Once it is done, click OK, close Internet Explorer, re-open Internet
Explorer.

You can use an application that scans your system for log files and
temporary files and use that to get rid of those:

Ccleaner (Free!)
http://www.ccleaner.com/

Other ways to free up space..

JDiskReport
http://www.jgoodies.com/freeware/jdiskreport/index.html

SequoiaView
http://www.win.tue.nl/sequoiaview/

Those can help you visually discover where all the space is being used.

In the end - a standard Windows XP installation with all sorts of extras
will not likely be above about 4.5GB to 9GB in size. If you have more space
than that (likely do on a modern machine) and most of it seems to be used -
likely you need to move *your stuff* off and/or find a better way to manage
it.

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

You should now perform a full Defragment on your system drive (C...

How to Defragment your hard drives
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314848
* will take time

Reboot and logon as administrative user.

Visit http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com/ in Internet Explorer and
select to do a CUSTOM scan...

Every time you are about to click on something while at these web pages -
first press and hold down the CTRL key while you click on it. You can
release the CTRL key after clicking each time.

Once the scan is done, select just _ONE_ of the high priority updates
(deselect any others) and install it.

Reboot again.

If it did work - try the web page again - selecting no more than 3-5 at a
time. Rebooting as needed.

The Optional Software updates are generally safe - although I recommend
against the "Windows Search" one and any of the "Office Live" ones or
"Windows Live" ones for now. I would completely avoid the
Optional Hardware updates. Also - I do not see any urgent need to
install Internet Explorer 8 at this time.

 

[David C. Holley]

I actually was looking around for help myself and ran across this article
which discussed the impact that 'prefetching' can have on start up.

http://www.intelliadmin.com/index.php/2006/09/why-windows-takes-so-long-to-start-up/

 

[Pegasus [MVP]]

I've seen this prefetch item before and I think it's a great pity that its
author failed to publish some benchmark tests that his modifications to the
prefetch feature had. It would have lent his claim a lot more credibility.

I actually was looking around for help myself and ran across this article
which discussed the impact that 'prefetching' can have on start up.

http://www.intelliadmin.com/index.php/2006/09/why-windows-takes-so-long-to-start-up/

I've seen this prefetch item before and I think it's a great pity that its
author failed to publish some benchmark tests to show the benefits that his
modifications to the prefetch feature generated. It would have lent his
claim a lot more credibility.

 

[David C. Holley]

It dropped 2 minutes from the login to the point where I could work with the
laptop. Mine had never been cleared out and had stuff in there from the past
15 months. Obviously if you only open the same apps, it wouldn't make that
much of a difference. Tests would have been interesting though as my Office
apps start up without any noticable difference as the article suggests.

 

[John John - MVP]

I have a great deal of respect for the folks at IntelliAdmin.com and I
think that they have very good utilities and advice on their site.
Unfortunately it seems that they too do not quite understand how
prefetch works. Prefetch only helps applications and startup item that
are absolutely necessary to the startup process or the applications that
*you* decide to start automatically when the computer starts up.
Prefetch loads nothing into memory unless you already have the items in
one of the startup locations, if the item is set to start automatically
when the computer is booted then prefetch improves the load time of the
application. If the applications aren't set to start when the computer
boots then nothing is loaded into memory, but when you do start the
application here too prefetch will help the application load faster, but
it will only do so when you actually launch the application.

John

 

[David C. Holley]

I have a great deal of respect for the folks at IntelliAdmin.com and I
think that they have very good utilities and advice on their site.
Unfortunately it seems that they too do not quite understand how prefetch
works. Prefetch only helps applications and startup item that are
absolutely necessary to the startup process or the applications that *you*
decide to start automatically when the computer starts up. Prefetch loads
nothing into memory unless you already have the items in one of the startup
locations, if the item is set to start automatically when the computer is
booted then prefetch improves the load time of the application. If the
applications aren't set to start when the computer boots then nothing is
loaded into memory, but when you do start the application here too prefetch
will help the application load faster, but it will only do so when you
actually launch the application.

How does prefetch help the app to load faster upon application launch if the
app isn't set to automatically launch at startup?

 

[R. McCarty]

Prefetch works by strategically placing drivers and apps on the fastest
section of a drive ( defrag ). This lowers the head movement to read &
load the code. The .PF modules are used in the Idle tasks process to
create or update the Layout.Ini file in the C:\Windows\Prefetch folder.

 

[David C. Holley]

So then when I cleaned out my PreFetch yesterday, I should have also done a
defrag as some of the files shown as 'immovable' might now be movable?

 

[David C. Holley]

(I'm assuming that MS designed PreFetch in such a way that Defrag wouldn't
move the files thus ensuring that the files are as close as possible to each
other and that without that contingency Defrag could inadvertently move a
file.)

 

[R. McCarty]

If you removed 100% of prefetch you may have deleted the Layout.Ini
file. You have to be careful, as it will not always be re-created thus
loosing
the Prefetch benefit.

You can force a Prefetch process by invoking the following command:
rundll32.exe advapi32.dll,ProcessIdleTasks
from the Run command box.

After completion you should check \Windows\Prefetch and ensure there
is a Layout.Ini file present. ( Explorer must be configured to show System
and Hidden files to appear in Explorer view ).

 

[John John - MVP]

How does prefetch help the app to load faster upon application launch if the
app isn't set to automatically launch at startup?

Along with what R. McCarty has said, prefetch also monitors for 'page
faults' when you launch your applications. Prefetch keeps track of
these page faults and when you start the application the pages are
'prefetched' by the cache manager, thus minimizing page faults.

A page fault simply means that the data required by the application is
not in its working set, the working set is the memory space that the
application is using. A 'soft' page fault means that the data wasn't in
the application's working set but that it was loaded elsewhere in
memory, soft page faults do not cause much of a performance hit,
reading/moving data from one memory location to another is very fast. A
'hard' page fault means that the data was nowhere in the memory and that
it had to be read from the hard disk, this is very slow, the hard disk
is the slowest component in the performance chain. By keeping track of
these hard faults the cache manager can automatically load the data that
caused the page fault into memory when the application is launched, it
doesn't wait for a hard page fault trigger to load the data.

Read more under the Prefetch section here:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-ca/magazine/cc302206.aspx

John