Computer help forum: Why do all Window systems slow down over time?

Hi! you mention watching out for started programs using MSCONFIG's Startup tab... can you explain this please? How do you you get to this and then possibly remove programs from this area? I'm running Windows 7 Home.

Thanks!

Experts will tell you not to us this utility except for troubleshooting, and to use the services section in Administrative tools to end unnecessary start-up entries.

Click Start >>>>and in the Start search bar type MSCONFIG, and in the results you will see the applet and can double click it or simply hit enter and it will start if you are logged in as Administrator. In XP you will have to type it into the "Run" box accessed from your start menu.

When the MSCONFIG dialog box pops up your focus should be on the tab that says "Startup". You can look down this list at anything you suspect you can do without automatically starting every time you boot up your computer. Fortunately you can't hurt your computer doing this, in fact you can click the [Disable all] button and do what is called a clean boot. This is a good way to install security software that is sensitive to interfering processes. However that would be a slow way to check performance.

Do not un-check anti-virus or anti malware as that would more than likely turn off your real time protection and leave you vulnerable to invading malware. I don't recommend messing with any other tabs on that box, unless you are a professional or experienced in this.

There are plenty of lists of suggestions online in search engines that could tell you the better way of doing this using the services applet in Administrative Tools. If you followed them carefully you could speed things up significantly. These same forums will give you other suggestions in configuring your Graphical User Inferface(GUI) to speed up operating performance as well.

For my clients who are newbies and don't like fiddling with such things; I recommend downloading and installing StartUpLite by Maleware-Bytes Anti-Malware(MBAM). That one shuts down services and processes that you should never have to use. That way you don't have to figure out why something you are trying to do won't work, and you forgot which service was attendant to such operations.

MSCONFIG will pester you after you reboot and finish configuring it; to ask you if you want to revert back to the original configuration. You can check a box to tell it not to do this anymore, but really - I only use this for one or two pesky startups myself, and anything more serious I will simply uninstall the offending program, or use the Administrative tools to change the behavior to manual startup. This is the way you are suppose to do it in the first place - but I've never hurt a PC by violating this tenant.

You did not spend a lot of time on the services section of system configuration. As I have a large number of items manufactured by Microsoft listed, some running-some not, please confirm which are totally necessary to operate my unit safely. Also, there are a number of other manufactures in the mix.

Secondly; I am informed by my grandson that I have too many items on my desktop and task bar causing a slow down with my system. I am running Windows 7 Professional.
4 Gb RAM
Intel Core 2Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40 GHz
64bit
3.4 Windows EI because of I did not order the unit with 3D Gaming Graphics

I may be a little impatient.

With regard to the services section in msconfig, if I were to enable all, there are items which would be disabled after a reboot.
The question regarding the task bar and desk top clutter remains unanswered.

casadia

Quote (by: JCitizen)
Experts will tell you not to us this utility except for troubleshooting, and to use the services section in Administrative tools to end unnecessary start-up entries.

The only problem with the comment above is; NOT ALL Startup Programs run as a Service! Yes it is best to use the Services configuration to "Disable" a service if need be. But, sadly more Startup programs are in the Startup Group (easy enough removal) & usually more are in the Registry in the Run listings under "Current User" or "Local Machine", and for the regular User, please, only use MSConfig to make changes to these. Editing the Registry can really cause problems if you do not know what you are doing! As always, if you do not know what you are doing (in any & all cases), please, make sure you back up your system prior to any major changes... Macrium Reflect has a free version for home users that will allow you to create an entire image backup of your system & can be restored from a bootable recovery cd/dvd (which you have to create yourself, after installing Reflect).

Folders like 'WinSxS' and 'users', go on swollen by themslves as time pass on. But one fails to know how to reduce reduce this phenomenon. The windows user has no choice to delete some of these. When the swelling process reaches a certain limit, all on a sudden the whole C drive gets a red color on explorer, and the system stalls. This is in spite of the limited number of applications. My habit is , following a clean virgin installation of windows and all those necessary applicatoins and after the first big bout of windows update, I do an image backup. When thing becomes very unfavorable I just restore the image backup, and do a defragmentation and disk cleanup using CCleaner and such softwares. This will suffice for a month or so.
OS: win 8 64 on a 120 GB Corsair SSD
Hard disk: a second 500 GB WD, and a 3rd Corsair 60 GB SSD on which other apps are installed
Motherboard: ASUS F1 A 75-V Pro
Processor: AMD A-8 3870 APU
RAM: Corsair 8 GB

Your best off using autoruns by sysinternals to find autorun programs becuase it will give you a comprehensive list off all startup programs inside of the registry including codecs and services

Many persons are unhappy in using msconfig. Possibly too many cautions about modifying elements within msconfig have created this nervousness. So I recommend using REVO (which you can download from CNET). As well as being the best (in my opinion) program uninstaller, it also offers (under Tools) a safe and simple alternative to msconfig entitled "Autorun Manager" which allows you to enable or disable applications on Windows startup. Right clicking on any application in the listing will offer a google search to help you decide whether to enable or disable the application from Windows startup. Should you decide to disable an application and encounter problems, it's very easy to return and simply enable the application (which remains in the startup listing.
I strongly support wpgwpg's comments about defraggiing on a regular basis but doubt whether chkdsk will speed up your PC (although it will perform important repairs if necessary).
I prefer to recover the original OS every year. It's as though you've just purchased a new PC. Of couse, whether you recover from a separate partition on your hard drive or your backup DVD's, you will need to recover all subsequent Windows updates, re-customise your installed programmes and personal data et al, but you do benefit from regaining a fast efficient system.

Hope this also helps.

I often look at things from a quite obtuse angle. So when I read this question I first ask if you know for sure it is the OS that is slow or is it the mechanical part, ie the computer itself.

I remember when cordless drills & other such things came out & the batteries had a memory. They had to be run right down then recharged to full or they learned to expire at half full/half empty.

Is it possible that the working components of a computer can also learn the same thing?

So that even after the OS has been cleaned up & lightened up, the darned thing still runs slow?

Hi,
I have stopped installing upgrades because more often than not they cause problems. The software mafia will of course invent new stuff that you do not need and people start for instance sending you docx documents.
In that case I always send a standard message: "Your attachement will not open. We only accept messages in WORD. There is also one diabolic way used often: you install a free utitlity. I works ok. You get pestered by a message "there is a new free version." The new version turns out to have less useful features than the old one. To be back where you were you have to buy the "pro version". I am a businessman and as such am not anti business, but the software business is the most rotten business there is, except maybe the fund managers who claim they know how to handle your money. If they did, they would not need your 2.5.% commision, they would get rich applying their fantastic knowledge.

Kaarlo von Freymann Helsinki Finland

I have stopped doing windows updates. In fact, I "rolled back" the last set of updates I did. My previous computers always got worse after I updated windows and there was no other explanation, really. I rarely get new software, and I run anti-virus softwares often. This time, my computer doesn't seem to have slowed down at all, in well over a year. I'm not sure if Microsoft does it on purpose, as you postulate, to make it so people will buy the latest version, or if it's just an artifact. But I'm not having the problem, anymore.

People will say, "OMG! you HAVE to update! Something terrible might happen if you don't!" I'm not buying it, anymore. Something terrible happens WHEN I update, and not without doing it. My computer does slow down, from time to time, but I usually just restart Firefox or Windows and it's fine.

As for Adobe, I sure with they would get their act together. What would make them think it's OK to make us update 2 to 3 times a week?

This is my first-hand experience with my Sony Vaio laptop(which was very fast when purchased about 5 years ago). It got very sluggish. Standard stuff like defragging and anti-virus checks didn't help. I tried a free registry cleaner program. It "said" that I had hundreds of registry errors. I cleaned up the registry with that program. That led to a temporary speed-up. I decided to re-install Windows as a last resort.

Re-installing the operating system was a total nightmare. I found out the hard way that there are right and wrong ways to back up your computer. I think I worked on this for weeks!

Bottom line... Happy ending. A couple of important changes were: moving to Microsoft Security Essentials antivirus and using CCleaner. I used to use Avast or Avira free antivirus. I blew out 5 years of dust from the fan. It was running like a torch! I was selective about reinstalling all of my software. For example: I had an old version of Photoshop that kept having issues, so I dumped it. Also, when I downloaded new software versions, I was sure to delete the setup files. There was even more to it...but that was a good start.

One of the really big benefits to a 64 bit processor and Vista/W7/W8 is that they can address more than 4 GB of physical memory; that is XP Pro's biggest failing...too little memory is accessible under that OS.