Speed up a Windows 7 PC's performance

The Performance Troubleshooter is included with all versions of Windows 7. To launch it, click Start, then Control Panel followed by the ‘Find and fix problems’ link under the System and Security heading (if you can’t see these headings and links, use the View by dropdown menu to switch Control Panel to Category view. Now click the ‘Check for performance issues’ link below the second System and Security heading.

If allowed, Performance Troubleshooter will run automatically, applying whatever fixes it thinks appropriate. Complete novices may prefer this approach, in which case click Next and follow the prompts. However, we’d recommend retaining control by clicking the Advanced link and then clicking to remove the tick from the ‘Apply repairs automatically’ box. Now click Next.

The Performance Troubleshooter will now spend a few moments analysing the PC for issues that could be affecting performance. As stated, Performance Troubleshooter’s main thrust is applications that launch themselves at the same time as Windows but it also examines other areas, such as the power plan (because PC performance can be reduced when running on battery power, for example) and whether there are multiple anti-virus applications running. The results are presented as a summary list, like this. Click the ‘View detailed information’ link for a forensic breakdown or click to remove ticks from any area you’d rather Performance Troubleshooter left alone. Here, for instance, Performance Troubleshooter has detected that another user account is logged on and several applications are launched with Windows. We’ve removed the tick from the ‘Prevent unnecessary startup programs ... (all users)’ option, because we want to focus only on problems with this user account. However, we’ve kept the tick next to ‘Log off other users from the computer’. Make your selections and click Next.

What happens next depends on the selections made in Step 3. On our test PC, for example, we asked Performance Troubleshooter to weed out programs that launch at the same time as Windows and log off other user accounts. Performance Troubleshooter presents a list of applications that launch at the same time as Windows: click to place ticks alongside any that can be safely disabled then click Next.

Now tick those user accounts that should be automatically logged off. Note that this action may result in unsaved data and documents being lost. So, use with caution and, sensibly, seek the permission of the owners of the affected user accounts. There’s only one other user logged on to our test computer, so only one box is displayed here. Make your selections and click Next.

Performance Troubleshooter now goes about its business and presents a summary of its actions, indicating whether or not the issues have been fixed. Note that in our screenshot the ‘Several programs are running at startup’ entry is listed as ‘Not fixed’. This is a little misleading, because Performance Troubleshooter did in fact prevent the solitary program we selected from launching in the future. However, because other programs remain able to launch with Windows, Performance Troubleshooter considers that this issue may need addressing on another occasion. To see what else Windows 7 has to offer by way of performance-improvement tools, click the ‘Explore additional options link’. Otherwise, click ‘Close the troubleshooter’ and then restart the PC.