Useful

**msr** · 17-12-2009, 18:55

Originally Posted by firthy

You could try ubuntu linux os its very good at speeding up older machines. Download it then burn to disc.

There's always one Linux twitty on every forum on the internet isn't there....

**msr** · 17-12-2009, 18:57

Originally Posted by Pronto_Mike_Uniform

Try this:

Device Doctor

In the spirit of scientific investigation I tried this software:

It recommended 3 updates, but seeing as the first one (audio drivers) broke the sound on my system, I declined to try the other 2, which were keyboard and monitor.

Sorry, not going to add this to my toolbox. Vista / Win 7 seem to do the job just fine

MSR

**blue-sophist** · 17-12-2009, 19:01

External Drive = BACKUP. And us it - daily!

How often do I hear about people who have lost EVERYTHING when the main machine goes down.

Laptop = one single piece of kit combining every function. Lose anything and you could lose the lot.

**msr** · 17-12-2009, 19:10

Originally Posted by blue-sophist

External Drive = BACKUP. And us it - daily!

How often do I hear about people who have lost EVERYTHING when the main machine goes down.

Laptop = one single piece of kit combining every function. Lose anything and you could lose the lot.

There are only two types of computer user, those who have lost data and those who are just about to...

**pays.to.win** · 17-12-2009, 19:20

1. CCleaner

2. Smart Defrag

...both free, run them, problem should be solved, good day.

Originally Posted by msr

There are only two types of computer user, those who have lost data and those who are just about to...

There's a third, me, one who has not and will not as he maintains his IT drills like most of his drills in life, good first time.

**blue-sophist** · 17-12-2009, 19:23

Originally Posted by msr

Originally Posted by blue-sophist

External Drive = BACKUP. And us it - daily!
How often do I hear about people who have lost EVERYTHING when the main machine goes down.
Laptop = one single piece of kit combining every function. Lose anything and you could lose the lot.

There are only two types of computer user, those who have lost data and those who are just about to...

Indeed, been there done that on at least 6 occasions [although CD backups helped].
Montigny-la-Palisse has just lost everything including 7 years of Images of War.

Personally, having gone to Mac, the "Time Capsule" thingy [OK, £250] creates complete peace of mind. Everything is backed up every 15 minutes, etc etc.
If the Mac has a problem, get it fixd and then Time Capsure say ... "Would you like to go back to where you were?" ... with everything, data, applications, settings, the lot.

OK, it's expensive - how important is your data, programs and life?
Backup or die!!

Combined with a UPS power supply, I have at last achieved computer tranquility, Grasshopper.

**BarkingSpider** · 17-12-2009, 19:25

Originally Posted by msr

Originally Posted by blue-sophist

External Drive = BACKUP. And us it - daily!

How often do I hear about people who have lost EVERYTHING when the main machine goes down.

Laptop = one single piece of kit combining every function. Lose anything and you could lose the lot.

There are only two types of computer user, those who have lost data and those who are just about to...

Agreed, got a 500Gb USB hard drive and stuffed everything on that then dumped the lot off the laptop. Just loaded up what I needed day to day and plug in the hard drive occasionally. Made a huge difference. Used to go and put the kettle on whilst waiting for it to make up its fooking mind. Just because you have 100Gb of space doesn't mean you should strive to fill it. That 'really fast chip' has more and more to search through each day.
For a good analogy, stick twenty or thirty piles of papers, videos and packs of photos on your desk and add another pile each day. See how long it is before you get pissed off searching through it all.

All the pictures off the camera go straight on to the USB hard drive now. I only look at them a couple of times before storing them away. I'm now considering a second USB hard drive to back the whole thing up every now and then 'just in case'.

**SamWiseGamgee** · 17-12-2009, 19:27

It's also likely to benefit from a RAM upgrade if it's that old - do you know how to tell how much it has at the moment?

**BarkingSpider** · 17-12-2009, 19:32

Originally Posted by SamWiseGamgee

It's also likely to benefit from a RAM upgrade if it's that old - do you know how to tell how much it has at the moment?

I did that too. Got a matched pair online at Mr Memory and plugged them in myself. I went from 500Mb to 2 x 1Gb.
Whoosh! Worked a treat.

**Awoljon** · 17-12-2009, 22:39

Adaware is good and also run spybot search and destroy. You can use both, one might get something the other could 've missed. Run disk cleanup as well. After running any spyware removal tool, also deleting any other files you don't want on the system.
Once you have done all of that then run defrag.
How much RAM do you have in your system and what Windows do you run?