You must have missed the lack of guides and tutorials on the site, right? Yes, I was committed to this guide to bring you a full tutorial on Windows XP.
Several tutorials with this theme are found on the internet, but I went a little deeper, in addition to the basic tips to optimize your Windows XP, today I'm going to teach some tricks that I've learned in these seven years working with this system. 😉
For you, who are already complaining about the slowness of your computer, this tutorial will be very useful.

Starting from Zero (Some tips to improve your PC's performance);

–Whenever you install a program, avoid marking the option "Start With Windows", as this makes it much more time-consuming to complete system startup. Programs like messenger, have by default start next to Windows, but this can be changed in the program settings themselves. To learn how to disable some boot items click here and read the tutorial here on the site;

–Try to organize your files as much as possible, always leaving enough free space for the computer to work smoothly. When formatting your computer, try creating two partitions, one for the system, and one for your files. If you do not perform this type of work, ask your support technician to do so, as well as reducing file fragmentation, this will be very useful when formatting again, because only the system partition will be formatted;

–Keep your Windows up to date because only then do you get free of internet pests that slow your PC down;

– Avoid using drivers Windows generics for your Video Card, HD, Sound, Network type Hardware items etc. Always use the drivers of the equipment manufacturer;

–I suggest you schedule a date in the month, so you can perform Backup of important files in CD or DVD, to remove them from the computer. I know it's more trouble to have to take that CD every time you have to use the file, but security is everything.

– Avoid also calling your nephew who "understands everything in computer" to maintain your PC. Always call an authorized professional for this kind of service. Or do it yourself, between you and your nephew, trust you! =]

– Always use light programs, both to play your songs and to watch your videos among others. Always look for lighter programs, ask in the forums which is best suited for your computer type.

Well, now that you're a little educated, let's untangle Windows.

1. Faster Navigation (Disable some sounds);
Yes, it is possible to increase the navigation performance of the system by deactivating some Windows sounds, such as the sound of "Start Navigation", which is nothing more than that click you hear every time you open a folder or click on a link on the internet explorer. Or the sounds of effect when maximizing and minimizing windows.
To disable some sounds go to the Control Panel and open the "Sounds and Audio Devices";
Click on the sounds tab and turn off the following sounds:

- It's okay.| Start Windows;
- It's okay.| Windows Logon;
- It's okay.| Maximize;
- It's okay.| Minimise;
- It's okay.| Restore Above;
- It's okay.| Restore Below;
- It's okay.| Quit Windows;
- It's okay.| Menu Command;
- It's okay.| Printing completed;
- It's okay.| Start Navigation;
- It's okay.| Finish Navigation;

To disable these sounds, just click on the sound, and right below select none. =]

1.2 Faster Navigation (Pastas);
To increase browsing speed, use the classic Windows folders, for this, open any folder, and click Tools -> Folder Options.

In the window that opened, click "Use Windows Classic Folders".

Then click "Apply" and "OK".

2. Organizing Start Menu
Keep your start menu organized, avoid clogging it from programs. Create folders to separate them. For example, if you have CorelDraw, Paint.NET and IrfanView installed, create a folder named "Graphs and Image" with the program shortcuts. So opening the start menu will be much faster.

3. Log Tips
Registration is basically the center of Windows, it is stored the system settings. Here I'll teach you some tips that increase Windows performance, but I promise I'll write a full article about registration with more tips.

3.1 Start Quicker Menu
The first tip is already a classic, almost everyone already knows, with it you will make your Windows menus faster (including Start Menu).

Go to Start -> Run and type "regedit"; (no quotes)
In the dialog that opened, click the folder arrow HKEY CURRENT USER in the left corner of the window;
Then click the Control Panel arrow;
Then click the Desktop folder;
On the right side of the screen, look for MenuShowDelay, double click on the item, and modify the value from 400 to 0.

Okay, your menus are already faster.
To spare you from this service, I created a file for registration. Just download and run, it will question if you want to add the information to the record, click yes and ready, your menu will already be fast.
To Download File click here.

3.2 Time to Start and Off
This tip, it's not as well known as the first, but it's also very useful. With it you shorten the time to start and shut down your computer. Which means when you turn your computer on and off, it'll be faster.

The tip is a little complex, so I'll save you the services, and I'll make available two files that do the job for you.

File to Connect Computer | File to Shut Off Computer

Well, as the record keeps settings, sometimes it doesn't delete others, thus leaving the record "dirty". Why does that happen? Throughout your computer usage, you install and uninstall many programs, and the settings of these programs are also saved in the registry. Only when it's time to uninstall, most programs don't remove their settings, so their record gets dirty and heavy. Of course, the higher the number of settings, the slower the computer will become, so don't go installing programs you won't use.
An easy way to clear your registration is by using some programs available on the internet, they are free programs that have a great effect on your computer.
There are several record shredders, but here I will only mention two that I recommend and use, which are the MV RegClean 5.0 and EasyCleaner.

4. Deactivating perfumeries and visual
Of the many new features of Windows XP, it brought a new and pleasant look, but a little too much for old machines. If you don't have that much memory on your computer, turn off the visual freshness, your computer will get a lot faster.
For this, right click on "My Computer" and click on "Properties".
In the window that opened, click "advanced";
And then in Settings;

In the Window that opened, click "Adjust to Get Better Performance";
Then click "Apply" and "OK";

After that, your Windows will already be with the Classic Windows 2000 Visual, and much faster.

5. Recycle Bin
If you have little disk space, I recommend you reduce the size of the trash can. For this right-click the trash can and choose the properties option. In the window you opened, reduce the space of the bin by clicking and dragging the measuring cursor;

Then click "Apply" and "OK".

6. Desktop
Avoid cluttering your shortcut desktop because they point to your original program, which in turn has its own icon, which is inside the program, which needs to create temporary files to show it, and in that you have already lost many megas of memory. I suggest you create a folder on the desktop for your icons.

7. Defrag Boot
Windows has a very interesting feature, which is boot defragmenter. Usually Windows defragments boot files every 3 days. But I trust myself, so when you think you need it, go to Start -> Run and type "defrag C: -b" without quotes.

7.1 Faster Boot
Browse the folder "C:WindowsPrefetch" and delete all its contents.

8. System Search Time
Windows by default, has a search time for the system, so it searches all the systems installed on the computer and displays a list for you to choose which one to use. If you only use Windows XP, slow down this time, go to Control Panel -> System -> Select Advanced -> Initialization and recovery -> choose Settings and uncheck "Time to display operating systems" option.

9. Memory
After using some programs, Windows by default leaves some Dlls loaded into memory, making the computer a little slower. You can disable this.

– Go to Start
– Click run, type gpedit.msc and press the OK button.
– To the left, inside Computer Setup, click the arrow next to Templates Administrati.
– Wait to load: this may take a few seconds.
– Click the arrow next to System.
– Click the folder User profiles.
– To the right will appear a list of items. Double-click the item Maximum number of attempts to download and update user profile.
– Change the selected field to Activated and the Max field to 0.
– Click OK and close gpedit.

10. Deactivating indexing
The indexing service serves to speed up your computer file searches. I particularly never use Windows search. If you also do not use, disable, you will get a good amount of free memory.
To disable indexing, right-click on your HD icon (C:) and choose properties. In the dialog you opened, uncheck "Index Disk to Speed File Search."
Click "Apply" and "OK". If you have more than one HD or installed partition repeat on the other disks.

11. Decrease Temporary File Space
Decrease the cache size of your browser. Usually browsers, reserve a cache space, so they save temporary files from systems you always access, these temporary files, they do it so they can expedite the opening of the site, the next time you visit it.

In Internet Explorer, click Tools, then click Internet Options. In the first General tab, in the Internet Files box Temporary click settings, in the window that opened, in the Disk Space bar to use, leave it at 25MB.

In Firefox, type about:config in the address bar and press enter. In the page you opened, in the Find Name field, enter a browser. cache.disk. capacity and squeeze enter. Double-click the remaining item and change the value to "25000".

In Opera, enter the Tools menu, then Preferences... There click on the advanced tab, and on the left bar click History. On the right side, the value to be changed is "disk cache". Switch to 25MB

12. Disable Hibernation
Hibernation is a useful service for those who need to always be using the computer. But it consumes a very large feature of the computer, besides memory, it occupies disk space. So if you don't use it, or you don't even know what it is, I recommend you turn it off. For this, go to Control Panel, Power Options, go to the Hibernar tab, and uncheck "Enable Hibernation". Click "Apply" and "OK".

13. Deactivating Services
When booting, Windows loads a list of services to be used during the use of your computer. But some of these services are almost useless to a common user. So let's deactivate them, so we'll win many megas of free memory.
Go to Start -> Run and type services. msc;
In the window you opened, you look for the items I will list below, double-click, and choose "Deactivated".
The items you can safely disable are:

–Messenger
–Telnet
–Task Scheduler
–Warnings
–Help and Support (Unless you don't feel safe about this)
– Storage Area
–Netmeting desktop remote sharing
–Remote Record
–Spooler (If you don't have a printer. Saves about 4MB memory)
–Discovery service UPnP
–Initerupta Power System

By deactivating these services, you have already saved many memory megas that can be used for other tasks. This process is completely Reversible so you don't have to worry about anything. For a deeper explanation on Windows services, take a little walk on our Forum.

14. Virtual Memory
Avoid using a very large virtual memory, in addition to losing disk space, you end up losing too in your PC performance. Also avoid using virtual memory on the partition where the system is installed, as at a time of instability, you will compromise all the performance of your computer. Never let the system set for you the amount of virtual memory, always set with a fixed number, which is almost twice as much memory found on the computer.

Example: If you have 256MB of memory, leave the virtual memory in 512MB as shown in the figure below.

To open the virtual memory configuration, right click on My Computer and click Properties. In the window that opened, click the Advanced tab, and then the first settings button;

Na janela que abriu agora, clique na aba Avançado, e depois em alterar.
Na janela que abriu, clique na opção Tamanho Personalizado e digite o tamanho desejado. Não exagere pois você pode comprometer o desempenho do computador. Depois clique em “definir” e “OK”.
Esta dica vale para quem não tem muita memória instalada no computador, quem tiver mais de 1GB instalado nem se preocupe em fazer esta etapa.;)
Uma dica: Não utilzia programas para liberar espaço na memória, eles liberam espaço, jogando todos os processos para a memória virtual, que é muito mais lenta do que a memória física, deixando assim o computador extremamente lento.

Bom, com essas dicas você já vai deixar o Windows XP “tinindo”, mas mesmo assim, vou listar o nome de alguns programas que serão úteis para aumentar ainda mais o desempenho e a manutenção do seu Windows. Eles são:

WinXP Manager
Tuneup Utilities
EasyCleaner
CCleaner

Claro que não é para sair instalando todos, destes que eu citei, recomendo o TuneUP Utilities por ser uma poderosa ferramenta que faz toda a manutençao do seu sistema, desde a limpeza do registro, até a desfragmentação da memória.;)

Pronto
Este texto foi baseado em dicas encontradas na internet, todas as dicas foram testadas e funcionam perfeitamente. Se você ainda não está satisfeito com estas dicas, dá uma passadinha no Winajuda.com, lá esles tem um tutorial bem completo sobre o assunto.

Então é isso pessoal, por enquanto é só, ao longo do mês vou editar este artigo novamente adicionando novas dicas, se você tiver alguma, deixe nos comentários ou acesse o nosso fórum. Vamos criar o Guia mais completo sobre optimização. Conto com a ajuda de vocês.

Abraço Forte e Até a Próxima;)