Computers today are not luxury, it has become a necessity. Online banking, information powerhouse, social networking, etc makes us even more dependent. Since it’s a machine, its bound to require some maintenance (preventive or otherwise).

Here in this article we have discussed certain high occurring rate problems faced by the user at any point of time and its solution

problems solutions

Over the time my system has slowed down

This problem could be for a variety of reasons. If your system is more than 5+ years old and you have not done any maintenance (such as memory upgrade, Motherboard upgrade etc), then there are high chances of slow speed.

The reason is that in today’s time, technology advances in leaps and bounds. So new software that you bought or downloaded may require high speed or memory to operate optimally.

Installing lots of programs or software in the machine makes it churn like an old horse. Since every program installed takes away some of the system’s resources, its really important to install only those ones, which are essential.

One needs to go to Start – Control Panel – Add remove programs to view what all programs are installed and make a wise choice to remove the one which are not in use as of now. This practice should be done every month or two ideally.

It’s also handy to use certain tools like ‘ Disk Defragmenter’ and ‘Disk Cleanup’ to keep your system healthy. These are Windows inbuilt tools and can be found in Start – All Programs – Accessories – System Tools. Using these tools at regular basis can make difference to the system’s performance considerably

Internet speed is slow or below average

Internet speed actually depends upon a variety of factors like the machine’s configuration, Internet settings, ISP and the site that one is visiting. It also depends upon TOD (Time of day), since at night or early morning fewer users are logged in, hence more speed.

Also typically every now and then, one should delete the temporary files from the system’s hard disk. They are also responsible for systems’ lousy performance sometimes.

For Internet Explorer go to Tools – Internet Options – General – Browsing History and click on delete button. General rule is that if one is getting 75 to 80% of the link speed or connection speed, then that is reasonable enough.

Common Computer Problems and Solutions

System takes long time to start and shutdown

If after switching the system on, you go for a coffee break, then I believe its right time to look at the reason behind slow startup. Again the major reason is too many software or programs installed on the machine.

Most of the software put an initial startup in the Windows for some reason or other. This means every time the machine is turned on all the startup items shall be loaded one by one making it miserably slow process.

The best solution for this quandary is that manually choose which programs you really want to load at the startup. This can be done typing ‘msconfig’ in Start – run dialog box. This will open the System Configuration Utility as shown below

msconfig
Run Window
System Configuration Utility

 As seen in the above window, startup tab has many items mark checked. Imagine all these threads loading one by one at the startup are bound to make the system sluggish.

Browse through the list and uncheck those ones, which are really not required. Once you uncheck the extra ones, press Apply – OK.  System will prompt the user to restart once again as shown below. You may choose to restart now or later on as per wish.

stlt5

System performing weird tasks since some time (or days)

Have you ever noticed that all of a sudden some pop ups start coming up, or folders renamed, start menu items changed or most important the internet is being used while its system is idling (assuming no automatic updates are enabled). Chances are pretty high that the system is infected with virus or malware (adware/spyware).

In this scenario make sure your Antivirus thread is resident when the system is running and the virus definitions are up to date. Also perform full system scan as and when required (probably daily or alternate).

One can use free antivirus available on the net or buy one. As far as free to download are concerned, AVG and Avast are good choice

Preventive maintenance

Make sure to update the OS with respective updates and security patches regularly. Ideally automatic updates are a good choice. Keep the system light and don’t clutter it with too many applications.

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