Increase notebook performance on Windows 10

2022-11-07

Laptop manufacturers improve each new model by improving specifications and features. However, performance is not always enough, especially if not limited to office applications and simple programs. Constant "freezes" not only take up the user's time but also make him visibly nervous. One way to solve the problem is to improve the performance of your notebook and to speed up its work. There are several ways to do this.

Cleaning the autoload list

Of all the available ways to increase laptop performance, the easiest one is to clean the autoloads. The Windows 10 OS downloads updates of many programs on its own, starts various processes after you turn on your device. Such downloads slow down the laptop, with most of them being absolutely useless to the user. To deactivate the automatic loading we proceed as follows:

1. Open the "Start" menu and click the "Run" tab.
2. In the line that appears, type the text "msconfig" (without quotation marks) and hit "Enter".
3. In the window that appears, select the "Auto Loads" item, carefully read the list of programs and uncheck those that you do not use.
4. Click "Apply" and reboot the system.

Detailed instructions to clean the startup

Disabling the background services

Windows 10 offers different visual effects for the desktop which make your work more comfortable. However, there is one disadvantage of these effects - they consume the CPU and RAM resources of the video adapter, causing the device to slow down. To increase the performance of your notebook you may perform the following actions:

1. Go to the "Start" menu and click "Run".
2. In the line that appears type the text "services.msc" (without the quotes).
3. List the list of background programs and a short description of them.
4. Select the programs that you do not use, click on their names and select the "Disable" option.

This is a rather simple way to increase the performance of your notebook without additional services or manipulations by offloading the CPU and reducing the RAM consumption. The background programs can be recovered later by selecting the optimal combination of applications to operate the device efficiently.

Drive defragmentation

The hard disk drive accumulates a large number of fragmented /files that are constantly being accessed by the system and slow the device down. In order to speed up your notebook we recommend defragmenting your hard disk. Here is what it looks like step by step:

1. Go to the "Start" menu.
2. Go to "Programs", then to "Standard", next to "Utilities".
3. Look for "Disk defragmentation" and launch the application.

There is another way to improve your notebook through defragmentation. For this you can use third party programs. The most popular are CCleaner (downloadable at //www.ccleaner.com/ru-ru/ccleaner/download) and Defraggler (downloadable at //defraggler.ru.uptodown.com/windows). Both clean interfaces are user friendly and can be operated easily.

Best HDD Defragmentation Software

Pump File Defragmentation

Pump file defragmentation can significantly optimize the performance of your operating system. There is however a small detail which cannot be ignored. Thus, /files which are currently being used by the system fall outside the scope of defragmentation. This also concerns the swap file, which also has a significant impact on the computer performance. Therefore it is advisable to disable it before defragmenting, which we shall do.

1. In the context menu of My Computer, select Properties; (Win+Pause Break). Open the "Advanced" tab, click on "Settings" (under "Performance");
2. In the "Advanced" tab click on "Change";
3. In the "Virtual Memory" window the size of swap file is indicated in front of the system disk name. Highlight the swap partition and select at the bottom the "Without swap file" radio button;
4. Apply changes by clicking on the "Set" button.

Replacing Notebook Elements

If the Windows 10 operating system is too slow, you may improve the performance of your notebook by more radical methods. This means replacing one or more elements of the device:

• HDisk Drive. You may replace it with a storage device such as an SSD on your laptop. This reduces start-up times and accelerates the boot-up process of the operating system. This results in increased performance for the notebook.
• Repair memory. As a rule, manufacturers install small amounts of RAM on laptops to reduce the cost of the device. Users may install a faster module.
• Cooling system. During the active work the device heats up, which in turn slows down its work. Increasing notebook performance is possible by installing a cooling fan.

In addition a fan can be installed to cool the front panel.

Fast Windows shutdown

The operating system can be forced to shut down faster. There is one "useful" registry setting, which is responsible for the shutdown time of the services. The point is, when shutting down Windows, the system gives the shutdown command to the services, and by default the shutdown interval is 2000, which is equivalent to 20 seconds. It is possible to reduce the time to, for example, one second and thereby reduce the time it takes for the processes to shut down correctly. Of course, this does not mean that the operating system would become unstable and so on. - we have tested it by experience. Therefore we again will resort to registry edit.

1. Start the registry editor;

2. Open the [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SYSTEM/CurrentControlSet/Control];

3. Double-click the WaitToKillServiceTimeout key. In the "Value" field replace "2000" with "100" (or any digit you like);

4. Reboot the system.

How to improve the performance of your graphical environment?

Choose the most appealing/less demanding theme from the "System Performance" dialog. Trite as it may seem, this is the easiest way to speed up your operating system. Put "Classic Theme" and your problems will be ...slightly less than they were.

1. Change the design theme. To do this select the option Personalize from the context menu on the desktop, then in the window that appears go to "Theme" and in the dropdown menu select "Classic".

2. Deselect unnecessary effects. Start - Control Panel - System and Maintenance - Counters and Performance Tools - Visual Effects Settings. Select "Provide best performance" and apply your settings.

Computer shutdown acceleration

When the system shuts down, it gives all processes a shutdown command. This period may take different values, on which the shutdown rate of the computer depends. Actually you can find and reduce this parameter in the Registry.

1. Open Registry Editor (Regedit).
2. Create a String key called HungAppTimeout (branch [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop]) and set its value to e.g. 1000.
3. Reboot the computer to apply these settings.

Disabling the automatic update

No, the rather useless traffic "eating" function has not disappeared from the Windows arsenal, and hardly ever will. Unless you take action and manually disable Update manually - via Registry or msconfig dialog. We will consider a combined variant.

Only to disable the "Automatic Update" service notifications from the system tray,

1. open the Registry Editor (Win+R - Regedit or the same command from the search line).
2. Discover the [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Security Center] node and create the "UpdatesDisableNotify"
3. Key dword set to "1".

If you do not use the Windows Update over Network, just disable it. To do this:

1. Go to the msconfig (Win + R, type "msconfig" ).
2. Hopen the "Services" tab and uncheck the "Windows Update Center" entry.
3. Lock all windows and do not accept the reboot request.

Lowering the booting time of applications

Windows provides a possibility to launch programs quickly thanks to a special function called Prefetch. The idea behind this technology is to increase the loading time of the operating system and to make applications perform faster. Surprisingly, this optimization method is really applicable to many applications. To change the launch parameters we should specify the necessary parameters in the properties of the program shortcut. This can be done like this:

1. Right-click on the application shortcut and select "Properties" from the menu.

2. Open the "Shortcut" tab.

Set the cursor in the "Object" cell and at the end, add the following: "/prefetch:1", without quotes. This parameter must be separated from the rest of the text by a space.

Advanced graphics card performance

It is not uncommon that Windows "forgets" to set the optimal parameters for some hardware and leaves it at the minimum. Video card wasn't an exception. Yes, for normal operation basic settings are quite enough. But when it comes to resource-intensive applications, such as rendering in 3d Studio Max, visualization in Winamp, game applications, etc., computer performance drops dramatically. The reason may be the switched off AGP video card acceleration. Enabling it is possible and even necessary, as it is well-documented hardware settings. The DirectX Diagnostic Utility, and not only the DirectX Diagnostic Utility, can help you.

1 Open the "DirectX Diagnostic Utility" (Start -> Run -> "dxdiag").

In this settings window select the "Display" tab.

Find the section "DirectX Features" and activate all options by clicking on "Enable".

This refers to the settings "DirectDraw acceleration", "Direct3D acceleration", "AGP Texture acceleration". If you have initially set "Off" buttons everywhere you should not change anything.

3 Another address you should check your settings is the monitor properties. From the Desktop bring up the context menu, select "Properties".

Open the tab "Options" and click on "Advanced".

In the section "Diagnostics" you should adjust the full hardware acceleration (slider to maximum).

4. Reboot the computer in order to apply the settings.

If nothing helps, please make sure you have installed drivers for your video card. You can find them on the CD-ROM that came with your hardware. Better yet, download the latest drivers from the manufacturer's website.

Disabling the boot screen

Aesthetes will not like this tweak, overclockers and optimizers will. It is possible to disable the boot screen image and it will speed up Windows booting a bit. What to do?

1 Open "System Configuration" dialogue (Start -> Run -> "msconfig").

2. Select the "Boot.ini" tab and check the /NOGUIBOOT checkbox.

3. Reboot the computer.

Be aware that once you have disabled the boot screen you might not see messages from the disk scan process. Therefore it is useful to occasionally turn on the screen, especially in "emergency" situations.

Icon Displaying slower icons in Windows

Icon Displaying icons on the Desktop and in the Explorer menu can be explained by this. Every time you open folders through "My Computer" item which is on the Desktop, the system tries to find network folders and printers. You can disable this definitely unnecessary action like this:

1. Open File Explorer (Start -> My Computer).

2. From the top menu bar, select Tools -> Folder Properties. Under the "View" tab, uncheck the box next to "Automatically search for network folders and printers".

Laptop optimization programs

To speed up Windows 10 on your laptop, you can use additional programs and applications. The most popular and convenient programs are considered:

• AeroTweak is a free program that does not require installation and does not impose additional services on the user. It can be downloaded at //www.softportal.com/software-18651-aerotweak.html. Aside from performance, it also allows you to configure the security and interface of your device.
• PCMedic is a payable but very useful application, which can be downloaded at //soft.softodrom.ru/ap/PCMedik-p3038. Its main feature is the complete automation of the process. It's enough to run the application, select the operating system, processor and optimization type.
• Auslogics Boost Speed is another paid but very powerful program that you can download at //www.auslogics.com/ru/software/boost-speed/after-download/. The program optimizes the processes on your laptop, does defragmentation, cleans the system of unnecessary /files.

So, you can speed up your laptop on Windows 10 operating system in different ways. For best results we recommend to start with simple methods, complementing them with special programs.