Master Tutorial to Make Windows 7 Super Fast

This is the 3rd tutorial of our “Master Tutorial” series. We have already posted 2 other tutorials for Windows XP and Windows Vista in past and now its turn of Windows 7.

Although Windows 7 is already very fast and reliable but this tutorial will help you in getting the max performance out of your system.

So without wasting any time, here we start our tutorial:

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1. Registry Tweaks:

Following topic contains a few registry tweaks to optimize your system performance and add a few useful extras:

Ultimate Collection of Registry Tweaks to Speed Up Windows 7

You just need to download the ZIP file, extract it and run the file. It’ll ask for confirmation, accept it. Restart your system to take affect.

2. Right-click on Computer icon on Desktop and select Properties (or press WIN + Pause/Break keys). Now click on Advanced system settings link in left side pane (You can open it directly by giving sysdm.cpl command in RUN or start menu search box). Now click on Settings button in Performance section:

Opening_Performance_Settings_in_win.png

It’ll open another window. Disable all unnecessary options in Visual Effects tab, you can leave following options enabled according to your requirements:

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  • Enable Aero Peek (If you want to use Aero Peek feature)
  • Enable desktop composition (If you want to use Windows Aero theme)
  • Enable transparent glass (If you want to use transparency in Windows)
  • Show thumbnails instead of icons (If you want to show thumbnails in Explorer)
  • Show window contents while dragging (If you want windows to show contents while moving them)
  • Smooth edges of screen fonts (If you want to show smooth fonts)
  • Use drop shadows for icon labels on the desktop (If you want to show shadows under desktop icon labels)
  • Use visual styles on windows and buttons (If you want to use Windows Aero or Basic theme)

Disable_Aero_Peek_in_Windows_7.png

PS: Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Office users should also visit following tutorials to make these programs faster by disabling unnecessary animations and transition effects:

[Tip] Disable Smooth Typing Animation and Transitions to Make Microsoft Office Faster

[Tip] Make Mozilla Firefox Faster by Disabling UI Animations

3. Open Windows Explorer and go to “Organize -> Folder and Search Options” and click on “View” tab.

Now disable following options:

  • Display file size information in folder tips
  • Hide extensions for known file types
  • Show encrypted or compressed NTFS files in color
  • Show pop-up description for folder and desktop items

Windows_Folder_Options.png

4. Right-click on Computer icon on Desktop and select Manage (You can also open it directly by giving services.msc command in RUN or start menu search box).

Now go to Services & Applications -> Services. Here you can set a few unnecessary services to Manual, so that these services don’t start automatically with Windows and you can get a faster startup.

Windows_7_Services_List.png

Visit following tutorial to know which services can be set to MANUAL to increase system performance:

[Guide] Which Windows 7 Services are Safe to Disable?

5. Type msconfig in RUN or Start Menu search box and press Enter. Now go to Startup tab and disable unwanted startup entries. You can disable your graphics card’s driver utility, Sound Card utility, etc to speed up the system startup and to increase system performance.

Windows_7_msconfig.png

6. Open Sound applet in Control Panel (or type mmsys.cpl in RUN or Start Menu search box and press Enter). Now go to Sounds tab and select No Sounds from Sound Scheme section. You can keep some of your favorite sounds enabled but make sure to set Exit Windows, Windows Log off, Windows Logon and Start Navigation to (None).

Windows_7_No_Sound.png

Also disable “Play Windows Startup sound” option to disable the sound clip which is played at login screen.

7. Also don’t forget to:

  • Install only necessary software
  • Use the latest device drivers
  • Keep your Windows up-to-date

After following all the above mentioned points, you’ll definitely notice major improvements in your Windows 7 performance.

Also check:

Published in: Windows 7

About the author: Vishal Gupta (also known as VG) has been awarded with Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) award. He holds Masters degree in Computer Applications (MCA). He has written several tech articles for popular newspapers and magazines and has also appeared in tech shows on various TV channels.

Comments

NOTE: Older comments have been removed to reduce database overhead.

  1. Brilliant tips, I’ve read several of this sort of article and you’ve summed up the best tweaks in one post. Made a noticeable difference to my PC. One thing that might be worth mentioning is that the ‘fastest’ Windows 7 theme is ‘Windows 7 Basic’ – people often believe classic is fastest as it’s the least graphical, but Windows 7 renders Basic and Aero on the GPU, and Classic on CPU – so Basic will be fastest 🙂

  2. can u plz make a simple program that can automatically change all these settings so that windows can be made faster in an instant. waiting for ur reply

  3. ^^ Currently I dont have plans to make such program but I may try in future. Thanks for your suggestion. 🙂

  4. Hi VG Pls advice if I can remove the tweaks reg coz I m facing startup issues even more than before doing the tweaks. And performance has not changed. I am followed the notepad option where i copied the contents and saved file as Tweaks.reg as mention and then run the file. It asked for confirmation but then gave some error. I restarted my PC and found it further slowed down. Pls advice i have an acer aspire with windows 7 Home Basic.Thankyou

  5. I TRIED YOUR SUGESSTIONS, BUT MULTIPLE WINDOWS DON’T OPEN. THAT MEANS WHEN I TRY TO FOLLOW YOUR TIPS THE NEW WINDOW CLOSES ( IN WHICH I AM TRYING TO MAKE THE CHANGES ).HELP.

  6. This is brilliant, it has breathed some much needed new life into my fairly bloated WIndows installation. Many thanks!

  7. I dont know why but this made my pc really freaking slow so Ill slowly but urely return it o its old settings.

    It might be because the pc ran fine on the old settings and i igured this shouldnot hurt.. the worst part i that my cursor wont move nymore because i think the cpu is over loaded by this one pricess (odf the MANY MANY MANY) new processes that came about after these tweaks. it tae up 99 cpu as shown in task manager and uses only 24k ram and is titled System Idle Process its description is Percentage of time the processor idles. Its cpu is always 99! BAD! Alsoo there are around 15 svhost processes..

    No.

  8. my comps an et1331g-03w if yer curious.
    i dont wanta leave on a bad note like that so i think its reversable and prolly wont let u know after i succeed.
    Also i blame myself but tht doez not mean i dont blae others bezides me too k soz peace.

  9. Great article! I’ve known about most of these tweaks but read about them separately through my travels over the internet. I love and appreciate that you have them all in one article. Excellent work! And to all of you commenters out there, this man isn’t your personal tech support person. He has set up an excellent guideline for everybody to follow. But if you don’t understand what these functions do, then use at your own risk. Not everything works on every computer, every time. Give the guy a break! Again, thank you for such a great article!

  10. Great, thanks. I just installed ‘Windows 7 Starter’ on a netbook with feeble specs and it’s running pretty good!

  11. recently my pc is running slow that i can not work my work properly. i google many websites. i find many interesting websites. it is one of them. thank you so much for sharing with us.

  12. VG,

    You may also add few more issue to make it superrr…. fast. Like page size u can safely make it 1066 – 1068.

  13. I did above procces Till 3rd Step after that i did not do after 4th step now my lapy is became Faster but when i Try to Surf Throgh Chrome with wifi Every website is just loding Website Page is not Excecutive properly it reloading like I m useign Low speed Internet at the Same time i use That Wifi Connectin On my mobile its giveing me full 3G speed now Plz Guide me what Cange i do to Surf Properly

    One more i m downloading with that conncetion is givein Proper speed IMD only faceing problem in Surfing in Chrome and Firefox.

  14. ^^ There is nothing in the above tutorial which can cause the issue mentioned by you. It might be a browser specific problem. You can try to clear cache and cookies in your browser.

  15. Hi does this also apply to computers in a network environment? is it safe or will we lose netowkr connection, wsus, antivirus protection etc…. thanks

  16. ^^ It applies to all. Just do not change the services which are used for networking as mentioned in the Services tutorial.

  17. I’ve tried everything but continue to be plagued by slow Chrome. Is there one command prompt or a couple above all others that will speed up Chrome so that it doesn’t take 15 seconds to initially load?

  18. OK, I am having problems with the “Tweak.reg” command. It won’t work. I followed instructions you supplied and keep getting error message. I can’t seem to attach capture of error ,message to this message though! How can I get it to you ?

  19. You forgot the most important one: Power options -> High Performance plan.
    Windows will lock some of your cpu cores and makes your pc significantly slower. Really bad thing on older hardware

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