Are you wondering how to speed up your computer?
Unless your computer is obviously ancient, there's really no need to go out and buy a brand new computer. There's tons of simple maintenance tasks and hardware upgrades that you can do yourself within minutes that can get your system running as fast as possible. Here's how to speed up your computer right now with five of the most powerful methods listed below.
1 - Upgrade the Operating System (32-bit or 64-bit)
It's always best to have the latest operating system edition installed on your computer to ensure you also have the latest security and speed improvements. All operating systems come in either 32-bit or 64-bit system types, and 64-bit system types allow a lot more room to add extra RAM as opposed to 32-bit system types which typically have a maximum RAM limit of 4GB. You may want to keep this in mind if you decide to add extra RAM to your computer later, a 64-bit operating system is the way to go.
2 - Add a Solid State Drive (SSD)
Some computers use a hard disk drive as the default storage device on the computer. Although hard disk drives work fine, solid state drives are much faster and more reliable. This is because solid state drives eliminate file fragmenting, they come without any moving parts such as spinning discs or a read/write head, and are the standard laptop drive size (2.5") fitting into both laptop and desktop computers.
A solid state drive can access and load data much faster because data is stored in one easy to access place as opposed to being stored in fragments with hard disk drives. With a solid state drive you'll never have to worry about defragmenting the hard drive ever again.
3 - Eliminate Unnecessary Startup Services
If you find yourself wondering how to speed up your computer as your system is starting up you may be able to reduce the startup time significantly by simply eliminating many unnecessary startup processes. You can do this by accessing your systems startup folder and removing processes that you don't need to run as soon as your computer starts. Keep in mind eliminating startup processes will not remove them entirely from your computer, but only prevent them from running as your system starts up which can tremendously slow down the startup time.
To quickly eliminate unnecessary startup services using Microsoft Windows, you can use the keyboard short 'Windows key + R' to launch Run, type in 'msconfig' and hit Enter to open the System Configuration Window, and finally select the Startup tab at the top. Uncheck any services in this list that you can safely identify as unnecessary. The more items that you can safely uncheck in this list, the faster your system will startup.
4 - Add Extra RAM (Random Access Memory)
Your system may be able to handle a lot more RAM then what's currently installed. If you're wondering how to speed up your computer because your system can't run lots of programs at once, adding more RAM may be the solution. The more RAM your computer has, the faster your system will run and the more programs you can run at once without any problems. Adding extra RAM to your computer or laptop is incredibly simple even if you've never worked with computer hardware before. No data is ever permanently stored on RAM allowing you to safely upgrade and replace existing RAM without any worries.
Before you can add additional RAM to your computer, you'll need to know exactly how much RAM your system can support. To quickly tell how much RAM your system currently has as well as the maximum RAM limit for your system, you can run the Crucial system scanner at http://www.crucial.com/systemscanner.
5 - Re-install the Operating System
Sometimes completely re-installing the operating system is just what your system needs to regain its top performance. To do this you'll need an installation disk for your operating system. If you're going to completely erase all previous data and files and re-install the operating system, make sure that you first backup any important data before proceeding. If your computer is running slow because you have way to many junk files and too much clutter, it may be a great idea to save any important files and erase everything else by completely re-installing the operating system.

If you'd like to learn more about how to speed up your computer, please checkout The MykeTech Blog where you can download Mike Longo's entire eBook guide on how to speed up your computer for free.