Although after the arrival of this operating system in 2001, another 4 more renewed editions of Windows have been officially launched (Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8 and the current one, Windows 10), there are still many users who prefer to continue using Windows XP . Even in the Public Administration it is surprising to discover that it is one of the reference OS in many public levels.
Whether you use it at home or at work, it is very likely that you have already noticed something in all these years: sometimes, this operating system can end up running extremely slow. And is that if regular maintenance is not performed, over time large files (or excessive, even many of them unnecessary), programs and other problems can slow it down.
Luckily, it’s not entirely necessary to update Windows, especially if you’re still happy with how XP works. And you don’t have to buy a new computer or upgrade the one you already have to solve the problem. On the contrary, just by following a few simple and easy steps you could be able to speed up the operating system, even drastically.
Dramatically Accelerating the Speed of Windows XP
Whenever we are going to make an important change in any version of Windows, remember that it is important to create a restore point , which will allow us to literally go back in case of an incident, since it can restore configurations and programs from a certain date. This way, if things go wrong and Windows crashes, it is possible to restore to that point using safe mode access.
To create the restore point, you just have to open System Restore , which you will find in Control Panel and, finally, in Performance and maintenance .
Once this is done, we can choose to follow a series of basic steps that will help us when cleaning our computer, and fully optimize it. However, keep in mind that the tips that we are going to propose are for advanced users:
- Convert the hard drive to NTFS. Your computer’s hard drive may use FAT16 or FAT32. But if we convert it to NTFS the performance may be slightly better. To do this we must press WinKey + R simultaneously, which will open the Run dialog box. Now we must write ‘CONVERT C: / FS: NTFS’, and after pressing accept, follow the instructions to convert the unit to NTFS.
- Disable GUI boot. Every time we start Windows, it is very likely that at first we will always see the Windows XP logo and the traditional loading bar. Effectively, this is the GUI boot. But, as you can imagine, it is something that is not really very useful, and can affect the loading time of the operating system. To disable it, we must press WinKey + R to reopen the Run dialog box, and type ‘MSCONFIG’. Within the Microsoft Configuration Utility, we must then click on the Startup tab, and mark No GUI startup.
- Speed up browsing in Windows Explorer. You just have to go to My Computer, Tools, Folder Options and click the View tab. Then, disable or uncheck the following options: “Automatically search for network folders and printers”, as well as “Start folders in a separate process”.
- Disable unnecessary services. Windows services are processes that essentially run the operating system. While some are tremendously helpful, others may not be as helpful. Inside the Run dialog box we write ‘services.msc’. Once inside Services, we can click on those services that we want to disable. There are a number of common services that may not be as useful for most inexperienced users, such as: Remote Registry, Secondary Login, Routing and Remote Access, Telnet, Windows Time, Upload Manager, Netmeeting Indexing Service, Messenger, Portable Media Serial Number, and Remote Desktop Sharing, among others.
There are also other useful options, especially less technical ones, consisting of installing different applications that help to clean the computer and reorder the uncontrolled files and programs a bit.
