How To Make WIndows Boot Up Faster

You've been there, done that. You have to do something right now on your PC but the screen is blank, meaning it's turned off. You curse under your breath. You're in for a long wait while Windows messes around and thinks about waking up your PC. If you didn't know better, you'd think it had never done this before.

So how can you make your Windows PC boot up quicker?

It seems like the longer you own your computer, the more time it takes for it to boot up and start running. It's as though no-one at Microsoft thinks you'd ever want to switch your PC off in the first place.

The good news is that there are a few things you can do to speed up the time it takes your computer to boot up.

When it starts, Windows double checks all the programs that run every time you start your PC.Naturally that includes the version of Windows you're running. And all the other things you've asked it to run. Your instant messenger program. Apple's iTunes music program. Anti-virus (this is essential). Maybe a spyware checker. Skype so you can make cheap phone calls. Anything and everything you might need. In case anything's changed since you closed your PC, Windows will go off and check all these programs that run when it starts up.

You can find out what all these programs are. But you need to be a bit cautious - whilst you may not recognize a program by name, that doesn't mean you can safely remove it. Some of the services that run behind the scenes have quite obscure names that don't mean anything to you. But if you remove them, could make your PC unbootable. If you're in any doubt about a start-up program, play safe and leave it be. It's not worth shaving off a few seconds on boot up only to have a PC that refuses to work at all. Unless you're brave, I'd suggest leaving start-up programs to your computer support person.

The next thing to look at is the Windows registry. This is the part of Windows that holds all sorts of information about your computer. Most of it is necessary. But removing or upgrading programs can leave debris in the registry. This causes your PC to slow down. Lots of PC problems have been traced to this old information laying around.

The easiest way to clean the registry is to run a special piece of software called (surprisingly enough) a registry checker. This will scan through the Windows registry, looking for errors, inconsistencies and out of date information. After the scan, you'll get a simple report and the program can be allowed to go off and correct the errors it's found. This is probably the simplest thing you can do to speed up your PC. Personally, I let Error Sweeper run every night to find and fix registry errors.

If you'd like to know more about speeding up your Windows system, click here.