CompTIA A+® Certification All-In-One For Dummies®, 2nd Edition

Chapter 3. Optimizing the Windows Environment

Exam Objectives

• Optimizing operating systems by modifying virtual memory settings

• Using utilities to monitor and identify optimization areas

• Optimizing hard drives and temporary files

• Improve performance by turning off OS features

• Managing services and startup of applications to optimize system performance

Few things in life are perfect, and if you put them on a scale from perfect to lousy, most things fall somewhere in the middle. Computers play a part in my life, and I can safely say that they are not perfect, especially when dealing with speed and performance. I regularly work with other people's computers and find the responsiveness of many computers far less — very far less — than perfect. Over time, if left to its own devices, your computer will slow down, sliding down the scale from the perfect end to the lousy end. When I comment on the slow response of a computer that just completed a 15-minute boot and logon, I am often surprised, or absolutely floored, when the owner says that it is acceptable. Although some people find "acceptable" to be, well, acceptable, as the saying goes, "good enough" is never good enough. As a CompTIA A+ Certified Professional, you should be able to identify areas that might cause a slow down — and then resolve those issues.

In this chapter, you look at the major problems responsible for many slowdowns — and how to avoid them.