An upgraded PC can take two to four times as long to start as one
on which Vista has been installed clean. (See Chapter 1 for other reasons
Vista specifically doesn??™t like inheriting a predecessor??™s problems.) Unfortunately,
wiping your hard disk and reinstalling is a whole lot easier said than
done, so here are some other things you can do to reduce Windows??™ boot
time.
Eliminate unnecessary autostart programs
Probably the most common thing that slows down Windows??™ loading time
is all of the programs that are configured to load at boot time. Not only do
they take a while to load, but they commonly eat up processor cycles while
they??™re running, which in turn causes other programs to load more slowly.
There??™s more running on your PC than the handful of icons in the notification
area (tray) suggests, and there are several places where startup programs
are specified in addition to the Startup folder in your Start menu. Check out
???Manage Startup Programs,??? in Chapter 6, for all the places to look.
Make more free disk space
You may not have enough free disk space for your virtual memory (swap
file) to operate comfortably. Windows uses part of your hard disk to store
portions of memory; the more disk space you devote to your swap file, the
easier it will be for Windows to store data there. See ???Optimize Virtual
Memory and Cache Settings,??? later in this chapter, for more information.
The easiest way to create more free disk space is to delete the files on your
hard disk that you no longer need; see ???If in Doubt, Throw It Out,??? also
later in this chapter, for a safe way to do this.
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