When you add software to your computer, that software usually insists on adding itself to your start menu. What does this mean? It means that, sooner or later, your computer will run slower and slower and/or it will take forever to boot. Here’s a quick way to speed up your computer without deleting any software.

1. Head down to your Start button:

2. Type ‘msconfig’ in the ‘Search programs and files’ slot:

3. In the window that opens, and it might take a while, look for Startup:

4. What you see next is a list of everything that ‘starts up’ when your computer starts. By this we mean software, of course. Windows has many things that run in the background but, for now, we’re only dealing with software that you’re installed. This list is pretty straightforward. If an item is checked, it starts when your computer starts. If it isn’t checked, most of the time it doesn’t start when your computer starts. We say most of the time because some software, malware, adware and things from Apple (usually), start up even when unchecked. We’ll tell you how to get rid of those things a bit farther down. 

5. Even if you don’t uncheck anything, this list gives you an idea of why your computer is slower than it used to be. Things on this list are in chronological order so the original stuff is at the top, the things you have added on later are lower down the line. If you scroll down, you’ll see some things like this, perhaps:

6. Usually, the sketchy stuff is at the bottom. Nothing bad will happen if you uncheck something, so don’t worry about wrecking your computer. Unchecking something only means that you’ll have to wait for a bit before you can use the software. Want to run Spotify? Well, you’ll just have to look for the shortcut on your desktop and double click it, it won’t be on your taskbar after you uncheck it here.

7. Down on the lower right of your taskbar, you’ll see a row of icons. Those icons are the programs that are running right now on your computer. Yes, they are running but you probably aren’t using them. Some programs, Skype is one, have an icon on the right of your taskbar and another on the left. The icons on the left side usually are the ones you are actually using, as opposed to ones that are just running in the background, waiting for you to click on them. After you uncheck some of the items in the list, there should be fewer icons down on the right of your taskbar.

8. OK, so now you know why your computer is running slowly. If you can’t stop something from starting by unchecking it in msconfig, go to the program and find its preferences. Somewhere in the preferences is a menu where you can choose to uncheck ‘start when Windows starts’. Quicktime, Adobe Reader and some other third party software (as opposed to Microsoft software), want to run all the time, just in case you decide to use them. This eats up your resources and slows your computer down. Now you know how to stop them from starting!

9. Finally, remember those icons on the lower right? Sometimes you can right click them to get to the preferences menu. Here’s an example:

This is a handy way to tell Open Live! Central 3 that we don’t it to start when Windows starts. We also chose to uncheck the second part, too. You’ll have to make your own decisions on all of this but you can use msconfig to control what starts and what doesn’t, most of the time. Next time, we’ll tell you how to use it for something else. Stay tuned!