problems that apply to any personal computer (Mac, PC), any OS (Operating System)

laptops: cpu overuse

multicore laptop processors turn off cores when it is in the interest of keeping power usage down. that means it gets slower.

the only way to get around that is to disable that feature and get a good laptop cooler because your laptop is going to run hot (especially if you are gaming).

laptops:clogged cpu cooler

having the cpu cooler cleaned if it hasn't been cleaned in 2-3 years would be a good idea. they get clogged with dirt and hair (especially pet hair). can of air won't work.

should cost somewhere around $200 maybe, but get an estimate if you need to. go through service department to find authorized service shop in town.

nearly full filesystem.

Got a lot of software installed? or do you have a lot of files? when you open up My Computer and list details for the C: drive, does it show pretty much 50% space left or less? you have a lot of files!

you can defrag all you want, but it's probably not going to make a lot of difference.

if you get down to 15% free, defrag and autodefrag will refuse to work.

when a filesystem is full or half full, files that are accessed are scattered around the filesystem, and that means it has to chase them randomly across the entire disk surface.

HPFS and NTFS, which is usually the default filesystem type installed for Windows and MAC, store the MFT at the center of the disk, and start storing files from the center of the disk toward the outside. CD's and DVD's also store from the inside out. worst case, files to be accessed in sequence are on they are on the outside of the disk, and the next ones are on the inside of the disk - you end up with the disk head sweeping across the entire disk from place to place in order to get to files. that is really slow.

remember what I said about storing from the center out? well the operating system files are stored in the center, and your user files are stored everywhere else. the more files, the longer the access time. the slower the computer.

that's why when you install windows from scratch all over again everything's faster. it might not be necessarily spyware.

not enough RAM.

• 3.1: get 32MB+
• 98: get 128MB+
• 2000:get 512MB+
• xp:get 1GB+ for 32-bit, 2GB+ if you have 64-bit.
• vista:get 4GB if you have 64-bit, 8GB+ if you have 64-bit and you can afford it
• 7: get 2GB+ for 32-bit, 4GB+ for 64-bit if you can afford it.

actually, with Vista, the size of memory doesn't matter beyond about 2GB. but it matters with 7. in vista the rest is used up by the Superfetch service (which you can disable).

Virtual Memory (needs to use fixed instead of system-managed).

Virtual Memory slows down the computer because by definition it swaps chunks of very fast memory to very slow disk.

System-managed does a lot of disk allocation and deallocation and fragmentation with the swap space and tends to be much slower than fixed swap space.

got crashes? programs ending all by themselves? increase Virtual Memory.

This requires disk space. I like to use a fixed 4GB for a 32-bit OS, 24GB for a 64-bit OS if possible.

But realize that having VM slows down the computer. If you can get by with massive amounts of RAM and you need the performance gain, do it. using a fixed VM/swap space speeds up virtual memory.

If you can have 4GB RAM (32-bit OS) or 16/24GB RAM (64-bit OS), essentially maxing out the RAM and turn off VM, do it, but there is a side effect - you will not be able to go into standby after upgrading past 1GB on XP (you can hibernate though using shift-H instead of using S for standby).

On linux VM is referred to as the swap partition(s).

I do not know how you deal with this on the new MacOSX. Macs generally take less memory than their windows counterparts.

Antivirus weekly scans.

this will really bog down your computer. at least on windows systems it is generally very resource intensive and with the possible exception of Vista, hogs the entire machine.

Antivirus updates

this will really bog down your computer. at least on windows systems it is generally very resource intensive and with the possible exception of Vista, hogs the entire machine. But I wouldn't turn off your antivirus updates just because it is making your computer slow.

If You have Mcafee 2010, make sure you get the latest upgrade (updates too) and then make sure you login to your account online and disable any unused machine licenses (with all your computers turned on to be sure which is which). That is a "Feature." in Mcafee 2009 updates practically stopped the whole computer, but they fixed that in 2010 (which you must get through an upgrade, even if you have 2010 - apparently 2010 basically had 2009 on the cd - you can tell you have the new one if you have a red/white shield instead of a silver/red square M).

slow processor.

technology advances. the technology you have will eventually be outmoded, but you can sure maximize its use.

The only way to fix this is with either a processor upgrade (may not be that easy to do - can you still get the proc?) or a motherboard upgrade (usually necessitates upgrading the video card, power supply, memory, case, and motherboard) - costs at least $600 if you haven't upgraded in a long time. You might as well buy a new $600 quad-core computer for the price of the parts. but remember, buying a new windows 7 computer requires buying all new peripherals too.

so maybe living with it until the machine is absolutely useless is good. then recycle it. replace the power supply after 3 years. Computers last a long time. My mother's windows 98 machine is still running.

software bloat.

Programs like Norton Antivirus get relatively huge and slow like a lumbering giant. Norton Internet Security is a good package to have, but Norton 360 includes a lot of things you don't necessarily need or use. Mcafee Total Security is better.

More software installed=somewhat slower computer.

the registry tends to get larger and larger even though programs get uninstalled (they don't uninstall completely). Norton and Mcafee are one of those that leave things behind, though they are good programs to have.

spyware

this is pretty much the last thing to check.

Unless you are an expert with hijackthis, I suggest you try using a standard antivirus+antispyware package and do the most sensitive scan that you can.

real spyware usually gets installed on your computer and you don't want it there. Some spyware can be removed with their own installer/uninstaller whish is really convenient. it takes some registry research to find the unwise/uninstaller or installshield uninstaller string usually. with some, you run the installer program with the /u parameter from the command line (best from start|run with double quotes on the executeable path so the directories get removed).

I digress.

Spyware generally reports back over the internet to a server somewhere or downloads ads from a server somewhere and uses up precious internet bandwidth (speed). This is generally not something you want, because it can expose you to network attack by hackers (this is one of the reasons why a nice session with your firewall software or router and tcpview from microsoft would be good).

some spyware may do damage to your computer (the term "spyware" has morphed to include this definition), such as rootkits.

Even though Vista is supposed to be near-impervious to viruses and such, you will notice that it comes with Windows Defender. it still needs anti-spyware software. I do not recommend Windows Defender, because from the last time I heard, it could be disabled from a malicious web page.

I suggest you get an Internet Security package (antivirus+antispyware+firewall) like Mcafee Total Security, Norton 360 Premier.

have a laptop and not using a laptop cooler

this can shorten your laptop's lifespan. get a fan-based one for your laptop NOW $20-$70.

get one with a high-numbered CFM. see here for laptop coolers.

defrag the drive

if you defrag an SSD it will reduce its lifespan, probably significantly! defragging is for hard drives ONLY.

computers slow down because the disk blocks that make up each file can get scattered across the disk instead of being sequential like they should be optimally. This occurs because files (temporary and other) get deleted and created, and the method used by the Operating System to allocate and deallocate disk space can leave "holes" in files or can be forced to scatter them because a sequential block may not be available.

nothing's perfect down here, folks.

files optimally should be contiguous, meaning they should be not broken up [all over the place]. The OS fragments files because of the algorithm it uses for finding a new free block (which isn't always the next sector, track, and cylinder over). the next one may be way over somewehere else on the disk at a given time. so it gets fragmented.

to fix this (as best as possible, close all your programs, even the ones in your system tray/notification area, and:

open up my computer, right click on the drive and pick properties, tools, defragmentation. analyze, then defrag. give it the whole night.

try a reputable registry cleaner

If you are in the habit of adding and removing programs, or getting spyware on your computer, you will need this.

a registry cleaner such as PC Tools Registry Mechanic and do a registry defrag. doing a clean might not hurt either.

If you do the clean first, its results will get included in the registry defrag/compact. but don't let it scan on startup because it's slow and you don't want that.

clean your CPU cooler and the inside of your computer every 6 months to 1 year.

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bad blocks

there are only a certain number of blocks the hard disk can mark as bad before it totally gives up.

bad blocks will definitely slow down your computer WAY DOWN. bad blocks on the disk can be caused by 3 things I can think of:

• sector is marginal, therefore hard disk marks it as bad.
• soft errors are made often by hard disk vibrations, often caused by out-of-balance, noisy cd/dvd media that vibrates the whole machine. yeah, and it vibrates the hard disk, and the heads too, causing soft errors on the disk, which can be fixed only by a format (windows) maybe GRC can fix stuff like this really well. fills up your bad sector list to the full really fast. just request a new cd from the manufacturer because it's defective, and immediately take the cd out of the drive.
• hard errors, often caused by age or physical drops.

one solution to turn marginal sectors back into good data and get your data back is GRC's SpinRite 6. but users of it say that it doesn't always work. when it works, it works well.

another less then savory solution is to run chkdsk /f /r. but it works. [windows-logo-flag-key]-R chkdsk /f /r [Enter] y [Enter] then reboot.

registry cruft

installing and uninstalling programs leaves a lot of leftover junk in the registry. before you use a registry cleaner (which I DON'T recommend, they are not good at determining what is safe to remove, but if you must, then use Registry Mechanic), and you are an expert, you should:

WARNING: doing these steps wrong (regarding the rd command and the for /r command) or skipping a step can lead to a blank or corrupted OS! you should already have some basic knowledge about the cmd shell!

1. uninstall the application you want to get rid of
2. restart the computer
3. use a cmd.exe shell (start, [run, ] type in cmd, Enter) and cd into the c:\program files\appname to see if the files still exist. your Program Files directory will be different if you are on a 64-bit system.
4. do a dir /s/b/a-d, this will show any files (but not directories).
5. make absolutely sure the directory you are in (shown in your cmd-shell prompt) is the correct directory before you do the next operation, because there is no undo, you can only reinstall the app. At this point, if you choose the system directory you can wipe out your system, or if you forget to cd down from c:\program files into your appname, you can wipe out all your programs. You have to *think* about what you are doing and have a clear head and concentration when doing this.
6. do a for /r %x in (*.exe *.ocx *.dll) do c:\windows\system32\regsvr32.exe /u "%x" or you can do simply for /r %x in (*.exe *.ocx *.dll) do regsvr32.exe /u "%x" (if you are sure your system is spyware free) to uninstall any leftover .dll, .ocx, or .exe files left over after the uninstallation.
7. there will be a lot of OK messageboxes saying that either there was no entry point found or that it was successfully unregistered.
8. check the registry key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run using regedit for any entries which may start any apps in that directory and delete those entries.
9. do control-alt-delete and look for any of the EXEs named in the list you saw and do an end-task on those.
10. in the cmd shell, do rd * /s /q
11. in the cmd shell, di dir - the only things you should see are . and .. in the listing, which you can ignore.
12. If you still have files left over, you need to seriously go after this program, because it still have some background DLL or control or something tied into a browser, or windows explorer, or something else, and it's going to take some real effort to extricate it from the system. obviously their uninstaller didn't do a good job. some of yahoo's stuff is like that.
13. restart the computer.
14. try starting the cmd shell again and cd'ing into the app's directory in c:\program files\appname and see if you can remove the files again using rd * /s /q and then do a dir to see if it was removed. this time, the app is more likely to have not started on startup like last time, and if it is not running, the files are not locked, and if the files are not locked, you can delete them.

people-entropy: getting "used to the new speed"

After about 2 weeks of using the computer, it seems to be slower than when you first used it. and the more you use it, the slower it gets. Even though you have

• cleaned off unused apps
• cleaned up disk space
• defragged
• maxed out or increased your RAM (memory)

partly this can be caused by file usage, and partly this can be caused bya person getting used to the new speed.

problems that apply to windows pc's

XP auto-defrag

this process kicks in without a trace and without warning and starts defragging your drive. It does it when it needs to. Still, you will need to periodically defrag your drive.

Your drive will not defrag if you don't have 15% free space (I learned this the hard way - I had to migrate/upgrade to a larger disk. there are programs for this). Once this process kicks in, your system availability takes a dive - it really slows down because any disk activity causes the whole computer to slow down - this is due to the way XP was written. Vista and Windows 7 do not have this problem. I can't remember, but I don't think 98's defrag is not automatic and you must do it (and scandskw) in safe mode or from the command-line in ms-dos-only mode or from your boot disk/disc. 3.1 does not have defrag because it is based on DOS and DOS doesn't have defrag (except freedos, and it doesn't run windows 3.1 yet).