One of the most annoying things that can happen to the computer, especially those who install and uninstall programs and applications continuously, is a drastic slowdown in the overall system performance. In this post I am going to discuss some very useful and effective tools in a general sense, which you can use regularly to optimize the hard disk and significantly increase the performance of a computer that has become "slow". In fact, the basic tools to improve the performance of a hard disk on a Windows PC are: disk cleaning, uninstalling unused programs, defragmenting the hard disk and optimizing the automatic start menu.
Of all these topics it has already been written, so let's summarize and summarize which programs to use, how to use them and how to actually verify that the computer's performance has improved and the hard disk has been optimized .
To demonstrate that these tools can improve hard disk performance, it is important to take a clear and precise reference point of the current situation.
After reviewing the list of the best benchmark programs to measure computer power, I chose NovaBench, an easy-to-use and understandable software that summarizes the performance measure in a summary and easily comparable score.
Once Novabench has been downloaded and installed, you can then perform a complete rapid test of the general performance of the computer and therefore obtain a global and specific performance score for each hardware component, to be saved and kept aside. The final score combines performance measurements on memory, hard disk, processor, graphics card.
1) First of all then, to optimize the hard disk, you have to perform disk cleaning .
Cleaning the hard disk means deleting all unnecessary, obsolete or temporary files.
For this operation I have already reported several Windows tools, all excellent and usable according to your personal choice.
For example, I have listed programs like Ccleaner and the like with a tab of what I considered the best ones to clean up the disk and delete all unnecessary files.
Two other programs that I have used recently and which I consider excellent are Wise Disk Cleaner (different from Wise Registry Cleaner which deals with registry keys) and Moo0 Disk Cleaner with a nice user-friendly interface.
Using the wizard you will notice how much this software digs to clean up a hard disk.
From the list, you can choose the types of files you want to delete, but leaving the default settings is always the safest way to avoid deleting something important.
Alternatively or in addition, you could also just use Windows Disk Cleanup which only deletes temporary files.
2) To uninstall programs that are no longer used, you must use programs such as Revo Uninstaller that do the complete removal and clean uninstallation of any installed application.
The point is that the standard Windows removal always leaves something, some orphaned files or registry keys with dead references so it is absolutely necessary not to rely on the internal Windows Uninstaller.
3) After having freed the hard disk of useless data a little, it is time to defragment . One of the most common causes of slow PC performance is a hideously fragmented hard drive that lengthens file uploads.
In another article we have already described the best programs to defragment the hard disk .
In this regard, as already mentioned in the article on, I want to say that the Windows defrag utility, the integrated one that can be started by right-clicking on the disk icon in My Computer, is a tool too basic to give an efficiency advantage on the computer.
The most valid program to defragment a hard disk is certainly Defraggler, which however is a paid software.
The best free defragmenter for me is Auslogics Disk Defrag, a free program that has the dual function of defragmenting and optimizing a hard disk .
AusLogic Disk Defrag allows you to automate the defragmentation procedure with an automatic weekly or monthly schedule.
From the menu of the program, very simple, you can do a disk analysis and you can choose whether to defragment and optimize the hard disk.
Alternatively, Smart Defrag is one of the best utilities because it performs a complete defragmentation of the hard disk in an " intelligent " way, ie it moves the most used files so that the computer can access them faster.
Other excellent programs to defragment a hard disk are: Disk Speed Up (Di Glary Soft) and Puran defrag, absolutely reliable with all the functions to plan operations and optimize the disks in the computer.
4) To clean up the automatic start menu and remove programs from the Windows start-up you can refer to the article on how to disable programs that start together with Windows.
Bonus : You can use a single program both to defragment the disk and to clean it from obsolete files by installing Fixbee, free for Windows. During installation, be sure to select Custom installation to avoid installing unwanted software. The program follows a very clear guided procedure that starts from the defragmentation and error checking of the hard disk to end with a cleaning.
Final results
After performing these operations, especially after cleaning and defragmenting the hard disk, an increase in general performance should occur. By running NovaBench again, you should notice an increase in the overall computer power score.
However, these optimization operations are not only a method to bring back a computer that shows slowdowns but also preventive maintenance that should be done at regular intervals if you want to keep the PC always working as when you bought it. What do you think?
