Improving the Speed of your Older Computer

. 4 min read

How old is the computer you’re doing your work on? While computers last longer these days than their older counterparts (this is why you aren’t tracking your business’s expense spreadsheets on an Apple 2E, after all), eventually even the best models will slow down, start to have issues, require more reboots to make it work…so if you don’t want to buy a new system right now, how can you improve the speed and performance of your older computer?

Googling “how to speed up computer” brings up thousands of pages from different tech companies, media outlets, blog writers…everyone has advice for how to get your computer running faster again. However, even with all these information sources, there are a few tips that are relatively universal.

Comparitech’s website has a succint breakdown of the most effective things to try:

- Close system tray programs

- Stop programs that are automatically running on startup

- Update your OS, drivers, and apps

- Delete any unnecessary files

- Find programs that eat up resources

- Adjust your power options

- Uninstall any programs you don’t use

- Turn Windows features on or off

- Run a disk cleanup

- Defragment (aka “defrag”) your hard drive

- Adjust or disable graphics or animations

- Check for malware

- Disable Cortana if it’s enabled

- Upgrade your hardware

Some of these tips only apply if you’re running Windows, but in general, no matter what operating system you’re running, remember to clean off the drive so there aren’t unnecessary programs or files slowing the system down. Turn off features you don’t need (Cortana, animations, etc). Make sure you’re running the most up-to-date version of your operating system and hardware. Don’t use a bunch of programs that take up too much space or too many resources. As long as you make sure to update things every so often, you should be able to keep your computer running longer.