The performance of my computer over the last year or two has become
particularly poor. I suspect in part this is due to a lot of unused
downloads and software that i have lost track of. I addition internet
connection is also often lost. This brings me to thinking a disk clean
or a system restore to a point when i know general performance was
good, around a year or so ago. As a relative novice i would be
grateful for any comments on what is my best option.

System Restore won't necessarily improve performance. It restores your
system to "working order". Not to "better" working order.

If you're concerned about performance, then the disk clean up, and
defragmenter tools in Windows would be best.

This group has recommended many tools such as CCleaner and defragmenters
(like Diskkeeper). Diskkeeper has more features than the Defrag tool in
Windows.

www.diskkeeper.com (pay-for but 30 day trial version)

www.ccleaner.com (free/donation).


Last time I used CCleaner, I got rid of around 300megs of junk. Then I did
a Defrag, and system performance improved about 90%.


"Barnsey" <steve.p.barnes@hsbc.com> wrote in message
news:1173439068.207061.122730@64g2000cwx.googlegro ups.com...
> The performance of my computer over the last year or two has become
> particularly poor. I suspect in part this is due to a lot of unused
> downloads and software that i have lost track of. I addition internet
> connection is also often lost. This brings me to thinking a disk clean
> or a system restore to a point when i know general performance was
> good, around a year or so ago. As a relative novice i would be
> grateful for any comments on what is my best option.
>

Yeah i would recomend running a disk cleaner program and then defrag your
hard disk, like Andrew says. That should improve things a great deal.

"Andrew Murray" wrote:

> System Restore won't necessarily improve performance. It restores your
> system to "working order". Not to "better" working order.
>
> If you're concerned about performance, then the disk clean up, and
> defragmenter tools in Windows would be best.
>
> This group has recommended many tools such as CCleaner and defragmenters
> (like Diskkeeper). Diskkeeper has more features than the Defrag tool in
> Windows.
>
> www.diskkeeper.com (pay-for but 30 day trial version)
>
> www.ccleaner.com (free/donation).
>
>
> Last time I used CCleaner, I got rid of around 300megs of junk. Then I did
> a Defrag, and system performance improved about 90%.
>
>
> "Barnsey" <steve.p.barnes@hsbc.com> wrote in message
> news:1173439068.207061.122730@64g2000cwx.googlegro ups.com...
> > The performance of my computer over the last year or two has become
> > particularly poor. I suspect in part this is due to a lot of unused
> > downloads and software that i have lost track of. I addition internet
> > connection is also often lost. This brings me to thinking a disk clean
> > or a system restore to a point when i know general performance was
> > good, around a year or so ago. As a relative novice i would be
> > grateful for any comments on what is my best option.
> >
>
>
>

"Barnsey" <steve.p.barnes@hsbc.com> wrote:

>This brings me to thinking a disk clean
>or a system restore to a point when i know general performance was
>good, around a year or so ago. As a relative novice i would be
>grateful for any comments on what is my best option.

You won't be able to restore to a point that long ago unless your
computer came with a "restore disc", which will take things back to
the day you first turned your computer on.

If you use that option, you will lose everything you've done since
that first day.

Be VERY careful about using any "cleaners". If you don't know what
you are doing, they will clean more than you want them to "clean".

I agree with Andrew too, abt Disk Cleanup and Defrag. I normally use the windows Disk Cleanup tool and make it a point to run that everytime i add or delete a lot of files.. esp since i do a lot of photo editing on my system. As for defrag i have Diskeeper doing a cool job on the drives. The performance improvement after these is definitely tangible.

Hi,

System Restore will produce best results when used as soon a possible after
a problem is recognized. Rolling a system back more than a week or two could
cause more problem then it fixes.

Regards,
Bert Kinney MS-MVP Shell/User
http://bertk.mvps.org
Member: http://dts-l.org


Barnsey wrote:
> The performance of my computer over the last year or two has become
> particularly poor. I suspect in part this is due to a lot of unused
> downloads and software that i have lost track of. I addition internet
> connection is also often lost. This brings me to thinking a disk clean
> or a system restore to a point when i know general performance was
> good, around a year or so ago. As a relative novice i would be
> grateful for any comments on what is my best option.