Best way to improve PC's performance?

[scooterscot]

Somehow, I just knew that would be your suggestion

Q: My wife of 12 years has left me, and taken the kids - I feel suicidal and have taken to the bottle.

A: Get a Mac! Love, Scooterscot.

As a Window's user of many years I only every wanted a computer I could use and not to be constantly tinkering with.

That's when I realised Windows is for people who like pulling things apart and exploring new possibilities with different hardware configurations, then, stress when it does not work.

OS X is for people who enjoy working.

[dmini]

Download a utility called c-cleaner. Its freeware, will clean up registry, temp files etc, and DOESNT break the system.
It was recommended to me by another contractor, who said he had never seen it break a system (more than you can say for some of the paid ones). Having run it here, and at work places, I can agree

[vetran]

WHS ccleaner & defraggler.

[MPwannadecentincome]

I was away on a trip and had to use the computer in the lobby to access the internet. It was an Intel Atom processor dual core running Vista, just browsing is sloooowwwwww. Then tried to use facebook, it ground almost to a halt! Even my 5 year old family PC does better than that with IE8!

[cojak]

I was away on a trip and had to use the computer in the lobby to access the internet. It was an Intel Atom processor dual core running Vista, just browsing is sloooowwwwww. Then tried to use facebook, it ground almost to a halt! Even my 5 year old family PC does better than that with IE8!

Intel Atom is designed for wee notebooks working with Linux, XP at the most, surfing and doing the odd office bit.

It's cheap and cheerful (and a bit easier on battery life) - nothing else...

[cojak]

My concern is finding the drivers after I've reinstalled.

Is there a safe driver scanner out there that I can use once I've reinstalled XP?

[Peoplesoft bloke]

As a Window's user of many years I only every wanted a computer I could use and not to be constantly tinkering with.

That's when I realised Windows is for people who like pulling things apart and exploring new possibilities with different hardware configurations, then, stress when it does not work.

OS X is for people who enjoy working.

I agree with that analysis - so I use Windows and Linux

[MPwannadecentincome]

Intel Atom is designed for wee notebooks working with Linux, XP at the most, surfing and doing the odd office bit.

It's cheap and cheerful (and a bit easier on battery life) - nothing else...

Well some idiot has built a desktop server around it and installed Vista - maybe they were trying to discourage people from using it!

Actually in the end what I did was pulled the ethernet cable out and plugged it into my laptop - much better and cheaper than 8 Euros for 1 hours wireless access time.