Give
Windows a
sprin
clean
Help! My
laptop
keeps
chu
in
to a halt
Stuff, when I first bought my
Windows 10 laptop it was glorious.
Mainly because I never had to use
Windows 8 ever again, but also
because it was so easy and slick
to use. Time makes fools of all of
us, though, and this slow machine is
showing me up as a right old chump.
How do I strap a rocket on it?
GADGET DOCTOR
THE EXPERT Rob Leedham Editor
READER IN NEED William Davies
Just wants to watch some Netflix●Do the defrag classic
Also known as your dad’s favourite cleaning implement,
Windows’ Disk Defragmenter re-orders the files on a
hard drive so that they’re not all scattered across different
locations. It’s one of the best and easiest ways to speed
up a computer without costing you money. But you should
steer well clear if your laptop has an SSD (see right), as the
rules are very different for that kind of storage.●Control your startup programs
Like a puppy without potty training, Windows will happily
stink up your laptop with a splattering of programs as
soon you’ve turned on your computer unless you tell it
otherwise. To make sure Spotify opens straight up but
Skype stays put, head to Task Manager > Startup > Disable.
You’ll immediately notice a difference in speed.●Scan for viruses
Look, we’re sure all the content on your laptop is totally legal
and the most titillating website you visit on the regular is
Google Sheets. In the unlikely scenario that isn’t the case,
you’ll want to regularly scan your PC for viruses. Avira Free
Antivirus is the one to grab and won’t cost you a penny,
while Kaspersky Anti-Virus is a decent paid-for option.1