Do you find yourself sitting around for a long time waiting for your PC to boot? It can be pretty annoying dealing with a computer that boots slow. This is especially true if you are constantly on the move and it is your laptop that is booting slow. In this guide, we look at a few ways you can speed up your computer’s boot times.
Cut Back on the Number of Programs/Services that Auto-Start
If you have had your computer for awhile, there is a good chance that you have installed a ton of programs and services that are now auto-starting when Windows starts. One quick way to improve your boot times is to stop these programs and services from automatically starting. I am sure you can find quite a few programs that you just don’t use all the time. You can use MSConfig to disable these programs and services. To access MSConfig, simply click the start button and type “MSconfig” into the search box and click enter. This will bring up the System Configuration Manager. From here, you can disable the programs you don’t need right when Windows starts. You can view a more in depth guide on doing this here.
Uninstall Unneeded Programs
When you were disabling some programs from auto-starting, did you find any that you no longer need at all? Do you know of any other programs that you really just don’t need? If so, uninstalling these unneeded programs may help give your PC an extra boost.
Keep Your PC Malware Free
It is possible that your computer should be starting up fast, but a malware or virus is keeping it from doing so. To make sure this is not an issue, you can keep your virus protection software up to date and scan often. To go one step further, I would recommend checking out malwarebytes and using this tool to scan for malware along with your antivirus of choice.
Add More RAM
If your computer is starting to get a bit dated, or if your PC never had that much RAM to start with, adding memory is a great way to speed up your computer’s overall speed, including its boot times. If you are at all worried about picking out the correct memory, I would recommend using the Crucial Memory Scanner. That way you will get the correct memory for your PC.
Install an SSD
This is a tip that is guaranteed to drastically improve your boot times. I recently added an SSD to my laptop by replacing the DVD drive with and SSD and I am now noticing a huge difference when it comes to how fast the laptop boots. I didn’t measure it exactly, but I would guess that it is starting up 3-4 times faster than before. If you have a desktop, adding an SSD drive is pretty reasonable. Related, here is a list of the top SSDs for the money.