Cleaning up XP

G · The Voice of Reason Joined: 02 Feb 2002 Karma :

Any currently recommended good 'do it all' programs for speeding up an ageing XP system?

Helping somebody out with a slow XP system. I've upgraded the memory (to 2.5gb from 1gb) and poked around a bit at other stuff, defrag, clean out the startup folder (haven't checked what else is starting up from registry etc yet.)
It does have a fair few things running, but seems to be slower than it 'should'.
Did have active ant-spy-virus-etc running.

MarkJ · World Chat Champion Joined: 11 Apr 2006 Karma :

Have you run the 'msconfig' command in the run box, gone to the Startup tab and disabled anything that doesn't need to be run on startup? That normally speeds things up a bit for me.

Does it have any virus' in the system running anything at full CPU?

panrider_uk · World Chat Champion Joined: 23 Sep 2007 Karma :

Autoruns
Ccleaner
Defraggler
Set any unneeded services to disabled or manual start

Mark
____________________
Current bikes: Honda ST1100 Pan European. Moto Guzzi V85 TT Travel

Misc · World Chat Champion Joined: 15 Aug 2005 Karma :

Format. Will solve the problem. It's a hassle if you can't back up data or have a copy of an OS to use but if they have/can then i find this is the best way.

G · The Voice of Reason Joined: 02 Feb 2002 Karma :

Will be properly going through start up things next time I'm there.
No viruses, didn't check too deeply about what malware protection/detection it had.
CPU was fine when it was at rest.
I did suggest a format, as in my experience this is the only way to get back to 'new' system performance for XP, but that's going to be too much hassle right now.

Misc · World Chat Champion Joined: 15 Aug 2005 Karma :

There was a free software that used all the popular cleaners in one so saved a lot of time & obviously found more crap then just using one.

Sure someone will remember the name of it.

The Artist · Super Spammer Joined: 06 Jan 2008 Karma :

Re install it.

Better than any program. Only takes a couple of hours.

DJH · Trackday Trickster Joined: 09 Jun 2010 Karma :

Tuneup utilities 2010.

everyreasonto · Nitrous Nuisance Joined: 10 Mar 2010 Karma :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5mGAUwMbXg

Thank me later

G · The Voice of Reason Joined: 02 Feb 2002 Karma :

If it was me, I would reinstall - for the record, I have probably installed XP hundreds of times!... well, over 100 at least Smile

- having worked in a 'production' department of an IT service company in the past, I created images for new PCs, documentation on installing it 'our' way etc (including initial testing of XP when we first started to use it in the company - yes a few years ago!), but a bit out of touch with latest such software.
However, the computer's owner doesn't want to, so it's not happening. Don't blame them from a 'newb' point of view with the amount of hassle it can be getting all the settings you've got used to over the years reconfigured.

Phoenix · Twisted Firestarter Joined: 01 Aug 2002 Karma :

To be honest all those programs do exactly what you probably already know to do manually such as checking the 'run' sections in the registry and removing services using msconfig or system admin tools.

Most slowdown is due to anti virus/spyware stuff, different programs have different effects, such as AVG used to work fine on my old AMD XP2000 until version 8 totally stalled it, much like Norton will kill any computer's performance, just don't understand why people use that. A lot of spyware programs cause a lot of slowdown too just by running but some have extra stuff such as background scans and email scanners running by default, all clog it up.

Internet explorer addons also kill the computer while browsing so switching to firefox is the best way to speed that up rather than trying to remove all the junk that gets bolted onto IE.

Another good program I use to check exactly what is running including viruses and unnecessary programs that often wont be found in the normal places to look (registry/run or services) is Security Task Manager. Just use it to identify stuff and then remove it or disable it manually.

G · The Voice of Reason Joined: 02 Feb 2002 Karma :

Yea, I've got annoyed with AVG and made a point of researching the speed of different free anti-virus programs before installing last time I did it.

Unfortunately the computer in question has got quite a lot of silly background tasks, but the obvious ones I could see at least were 'wanted' unfortunately.

Deckx · Nearly there... Joined: 09 Apr 2007 Karma :

i've been using "System Mechanic" for last 5-6 years...excellent program... Just run automatic maintenance wizard and it does the lot..

deleted111 · World Chat Champion Joined: 17 Jun 2010 Karma :

Only scanned the thread so my apologies if it's already been mentioned.

I use TweakNow Powerpack and not had any problems with it, hasn't cost me anything and seems decent enough. Although with the age of this thread, any advice from here is perhaps as useful as a chocolate kettle?

Either way, hth.

Steve.