22 Easy and Free Steps to Make Windows 7 Faster & Faster

How to make Windows 7 faster? Here are the 22 easy and free steps to make windows 7 faster and faster. I combined these methods from my experience and experiments which worked much better in improving windows 7 performance.  These following steps can be done by any Windows 7 user and not required third party or paid software and extra technical knowledge.

Network is a major factor of deciding a OS speed. Slowness in networking directly affect speed of Windows 7. There for I have added some tweaks to improve windows 7 network performance also.

Continue reading the easy 22 ways to make windows 7 faster.

1)Make Windows 7 Start up faster by removing unwanted programs and services from startup.

To do this type ‘ msconfig‘ in Run or Search box, go to Startup tab and uncheck programs and services not required during start up. The programs and services listed here start with Windows 7 every time so by removing them we can reduce Windows 7 startup time. Do not remove any necessary startup programs.

2)     Disable Aero Experience

If you are not an appearance lover but a performance lover then disable aero experience in windows 7. This method defiantly affects the performance of Windows 7. You can gain some physical memory and display card work load for programs by disabling aero.

Right Click on Desktop, go to Personalize then select any of ‘Basic and High Contrast Themes’.

3)     Increase Virtual Memory ( Paging File)

Windows 7 consumes more memory than Windows XP but lesser than Windows Vista. If you are a heavy computer user who open more programs and windows then you can increase Virtual Memory of Windows 7. Virtual memory works with physical memory ( RAM).  Hard disk space will be used as virtual memory to keep temporary information which very rarely use by programs and OS. By increasing Virtual memory in Windows 7 computer make sure programs and OS work smoothly.

Right Click on My Computer, select Properties. Go to Advanced tab and click on setting button under ‘Performance’.

Go to Advanced tab in next window, press change button under virtual memory.

Here you can see the current virtual memory size. Virtual memory called ‘paging file’ also.

In next screen under custom size enter size you want to allocate for virtual memory (paging file). It depends on your hard disk size and physical memory.  Make sure it’s not less than system recommended size. Normally recommended paging file is 1.5 of physical RAM. In this example recommended size of virtual memory is 4605MB because my windows 7 RAM is 3GB. So, enter 4605MB in Initial size and Maximum Size fields.

Press Set button, you may need to restart computer.

Read more about virtual memory ( Paging File).

4)     Disable Visual Effects

Again if you are not an appearance lover of Windows 7 then disable visual effects. It will reduce the load on RAM and VGA.

In same settings tab under performance (mentioned in step 3), go to Visual effects and set for Adjust best performance.  It will bring all visual effects to very standard level, but to better performance.

5)     Windows 7 Disk Clean up

Remove unwanted and temporary files on your Windows 7 disks. It reduces access time on system and your files to make Windows 7 faster.

Right click on each disk, go to properties and press Disk Cleanup button. In next screen you can select file types to delete and start clean up.

6)     Defragment disks

Defragmentation helps to improve access time for each file by managing  free space and arranging file locations on disks. It’s recommended to run defragmentation tool very frequently especially when you have lot of data. In our case after deleting unwanted files by disk cleanup in previous step run defragmentation now.

Go to Properties of each disk, select defragmentation under tools and start. Defragmentation takes time depends on size of partition and data.

7)     Run Error-Checking on disks

This is another method to improve performance of disk. It will check and correct any system files or physical disk errors on Windows 7 computer.

Select Error-check under tools in each disk with both options selected. If the particular partition is a system, boot or having paging file then error-checking will start in next boot.

8)     Disable Side Bar (Gadgets)

If you don’t use side bar and gadgets in windows 7 then remove them. This helps to gain some resources on RAM, Network and Processor. 

9)     Disable Windows Defender

When you use third party protection software such as Norton, AVG, MacAfee…etc, then disable windows defender. It does almost the same job. So it’s not required to run two similar programs in same time which is a unwanted system load for Windows 7.

You can disable Windows defender in control panel.

10) Disable UAC

UAC (User Access Control) is a window pop ups for administration tasks and requires action.UAC in Windows 7 does not irritate you as Windows Vista, but still you can work faster if you disable UAC.

Read more about UAC in Windows and how to disable it.

11) Make Window 7 shutdown faster

You can make windows 7 shutdown faster by editing one registry key.  Read more here about editing registry key and make windows 7 shutdown faster. I consider this step also to make windows 7 faster.

Setting it to a lower 4 digit value, (say 5000) will make your PC shutdown faster, but you could end up losing data.

12) Disable Autotuning in Windows 7 Network

This option helps lot in Windows 7 network. If you face slowness in windows 7 network then you must do this.

13) Remove RDC to improve Windows 7 Network

Remove RDC additional network feature to improve data transfer speed over windows 7 network. 

14) Remove IPv6

Remove IPv6 from Windows 7 network adapter settings if it’s not required.  If you are not using IPv6 in internal or external networks then remove IPv6 to improve Windows 7 network performance.

15) Compatibility of drivers and programs

Before install any drives or programs make sure it’s compatible with Windows 7. It should be officially supported for Windows 7. Installing non compatible drivers and programs on Windows 7 may cause problem with system performance and crash your system.

16) Disable Indexing (Windows Search) in Windows 7.

Indexing in Windows 7 made for improve speed of Windows search. When you search a file or folder on windows search, if it’s already indexed by indexing service then results will appear immediately from indexed cache.

When you use third party indexing search programs such as Ava Finder, Google Desktop then disable windows 7 indexing service. This method avoids two programs to index your whole data and slow down disk performance.

You can find out indexing options in Control Panel -> Indexing Options -> Modify button.

Also windows search service can be disabled in Computer Services.  Go to Computer Management, Services and look for ‘Windows Search’. Set Disable to startup type and Click Apply.

17) Sync Centre Synchronization

If any network shares set to sync with your windows 7 and while it’s happening in background it affects your system very much.  During this time network and disk activity will be very high and you can’t make it out. Two options are available to avoid this issue.

a)      Remove the sync partnership.

b)      Let synchronization complete fully without any errors.

Sync Center is located in Control panel.

18) Remove Unwanted Programs

Some time we install programs for testing purpose or for one time use only. You can uninstall these type of old and unwanted programs from windows 7 computer. Even though you are not using these programs but some services and system files of these programs load in Windows 7 all the time. By completely uninstalling these unwanted programs on your computer help to improve system performance.  Programs can be uninstalled from control panel.

19) Speed up Menu Show delay time in Windows 7

Editing a registry key speeds up menu show time in Windows 7.  I suggest trying manual registry editing (2^nd) method available here. So next time menus will appear more quickly than earlier and improve windows 7 performance.

20) Change the power plan to maximum performance.

This method mostly suitable for laptops. If you don’t run on battery most of the time then change the power plan to maximum performance.  This can be done in desktop computer also. To do it, go to control panel, power options and select ‘ High Performance ‘ plan and press OK.

21) Virus check with Microsoft Security Essential

Make sure your windows 7 computer is virus free. Viruses make any computers slow by giving additional work to processors, memory and disks. You can run virus check and clean viruses by free antivirus software ‘Microsoft Security Essential’ from Microsoft. Download Microsoft Security Essential here and run a scan.

22) Malicious software check and Removal

Check your Windows 7 computer for infection by specific, prevalent malicious software (including Blaster, Sasser, and Mydoom) and remove the infection if it is found.

Download the free latest malicious removal software for Windows 7 from Microsoft and scan now.  By removing malicious software you can improve windows 7 speed.

The above 22 free and easy tips make windows 7 faster and faster. I combined above steps which really worked in my experience and experiments.  You can find similar articles to make windows 7 faster if I miss anything in above list.