Ok computer wiz, see if you can help on this one!!!?

Question

My computer is fine for what I use it for, but runs a little slow. I have a DELL with Windows xp home. Pentium 4 cpu 2.4 GHz. 2.39 GHz 384 MB of ram. BCM v.92 56k Voice modem. The capactiy on my hard drive is 37.24 GB. I have 28.4 GB of free space. I use dial up. Is there anything I could do to make it run a LITTLE faster? Also, when I do a disc clean up, I can never seen to delete compressed files. What are they, how can they be deleted or adjusted to not have co many. I think I have 38,000 or more. Thanks. If you need more details, feel free to email me.

Answer 1

More ram,not using dial up,faster hard drive like a raptor...Bigger hard drive would also help....

Answer 2

The slowest part of any computer is the hard drive, especially in slower OEM computers from Dell and Compaq and the like. If you want a real nice performance boost, replace the old 40 gigabyte 5400 rpm 2 meg cache hard drive with a modern, fast 16 meg cache 7200 rpm hard drive. Things will be notably faster for not much money (160gb with 16mb buffer can be had for around $65 at newegg.com). I'd also stick more ram in it, a gig of ram is standard nowadays. Other than that, learn how to tweak windows for performance (things like turning off disk indesking and system restore provide huge performance returns). There are dozens of websites that can help you tweak windows to it's maximum potential. So there you have it.
Fast hard drive.
More ram.
Tweak windows.

Answer 3

im thinking like all the there res there are so many but would like to say a little more ram and installing new hard drive at least have 2 sticks of 512 this will help you out a lot as thoses compresed files they are all the files stored on your hard drive but a defrag might be inorder this will increase some speed but not much as defraging only orgnizes the files on your pc's hard drive physicaly but it will make disk acess a little better or you could index your drive this will help some in searching for files but with out at least a new hard drive it wont get much from doing nothing your ram seems fine

Answer 4

The stuff you can't clean up might be stored away in System Restore files. Deleting them will get you some disk space back, but you run the risk of losing anything important that's backed up. Then, when you run a disc clean up, it should work better. Plus, you should delete any cookies on your hard drive and maybe even your web browsing history. Then, you should run any programs you have to remove spyware, adware and viruses, before you defragment your hard drive.

Answer 5

You need a larger hard drive and more RAM. Compressed files take awhile to delete. Maybe you could delete them while you sleep.

Answer 6

According to your description,there are some regsitry errors in your PC to cause "Computer slow".You need to clean you PC.
Every time you install and uninstall software on your computer and surfing online you create junk in the registry.You need to scan and clean your PC with registry cleaner to make your pc faste.Good Regisry Cleaner will improve your PC and Internet performance dramatically.It even can speed up your PC by 300% or more!
There are some comparison and review of
TOP 5 registry cleaners.
http://www.registry-Cleaners.info

You can download and scan your PC for free.

Answer 7

OK first and for most what you need to do is go to start, run, and type in msconfig click OK go to start up and uncheck every thing there exit without restarting, then go back to run type in regedit click OK when the box pulls up open the files in this order HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop single click on desktop after that to the right another box will open find menushowdelay right click on it then choose modify in the value box that will open change the value from 400 to 0 exit out now changes will not take affect until you restart your PC
after you have restarted a small box will appear telling you about the selective start up just check the box stating that you don't want to hear about it again now you should have noticed the speed of the menu opening alot faster

then click start again go to control panel set your computer to category view choose printers and hardware after that opens chose mouse select pointer options move arrow over to fast this increases the speed of the mouse

then click start again go to control panel set your computer to category view choose performance and maintenance select adjust for visual affects uncheck all boxes the check 3 and only 3. the box that says shadows under menus, 2 use common tasks in folder , and 3 use drop shadows for icon labels windows may change but all the extra affects that slow down your PC are gone

next to put you PC back to the pretty state all you need to do is change the them back to what you had it go back to control panel and select tools the folder options then under general where you see tasks be sure show common tasks in folder is selected

If you have more than on hard drive in your PC you can then click start again go to control panel set your computer to category view choose performance and maintenance select adjust for visual affects choose the tab at the top that says advance go down to virtual memory click change if you have more that one drive C:, D:, E: and so on will appear all you have to do is just single click on C: select the box on that says no paging file the click set you must select d: or any other available drive and select system managed size or a one or 2 gig of space (1024 MB to 2048 MB or as you see fit) click set then OK and restart you PC

Then after the computer has been restarted all you need to do is defragment it and you should be done this will give you the max speed with out spending a lot of money

If you want it faster than that i recommend running a raid 5 system which i what i have in my computer the speed is off the charts also all i run is 256 FOR MEMORY AND I WILL PUT THE SPEED OF MY PC UP AGAINST ANYONE PLUS I'M USING ONLY A 1.5 GHZ P4 PROCESSOR 1 GIG OF MEMORY IS NOT NECESSARY for part and services

Here is a great website for all your computer needs they have everything at dealer cost most of the time and if you join their yahoo group they will be able to keep you posted on up and coming deal and they have well trained techs that will give you plenty of how-to advice.

http://www.theelectronciswarehouse.com

Answer 8

get some page files goin on that hard drive or get a new hard drive and use that one for some page files if you dont have money for ram... registry cleaners, disk defrag and disk cleanup tend to do a bit for me. if you want really good performance re-install your os.

Answer 9

You could try overclocking the cpu or add more ram. The prescott cores tend to overclock well.

Answer 10

Install your Motherboard software. It's usually online.