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    Make Your PC Stable and Fast: What Microsoft Forgot to Tell You
    Make Your PC Stable and Fast: What Microsoft Forgot to Tell You
    Make Your PC Stable and Fast: What Microsoft Forgot to Tell You
    Ebook146 pages1 hour

    Make Your PC Stable and Fast: What Microsoft Forgot to Tell You

    By Charles Spender

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    About this ebook

    The amount of technical support information for Microsoft Windows is overwhelming. For most PC users, it is difficult to separate good information from bad and to devise any concrete maintenance plan that they can use regularly. This booklet provides a summary of key points that can serve as a maintenance and troubleshooting plan for your PC. The instructions will also help to speed up your computer. The ebook is organized as several small chapters (who needs another massive book about Windows?); each chapter provides key information on a topic, and a link or links to more detailed information that has been tested by this author and is available for free on the Internet.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherCharles Spender
    Release dateOct 2, 2015
    ISBN9781311942241
    Make Your PC Stable and Fast: What Microsoft Forgot to Tell You

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    Make Your PC Stable and Fast - Charles Spender

    Table of Contents

    Introduction

    The most useful tool: System File Check

    The second level of Windows repair

    The third level of Windows repair

    The fourth level of Windows repair

    Second most useful tool: drivers from a PC manufacturer

    Investigate blue screen events

    Investigate freeze events

    Your antivirus missed this: adware

    Prepare for a disaster

    Methods for encryption of data

    Backing up your data

    Both the source folder and backup folder are not encrypted

    Both the source folder and backup folder are encrypted with BestCrypt or BitLocker (not EFS)

    The source folder is EFS-encrypted and backup folder is either not encrypted or encrypted with BitLocker or BestCrypt

    Both the source and backup are encrypted 7-Zip archives

    How to create a System recovery drive

    Install a solid-state drive

    Useful tweaks

    Gray background in program windows

    Uninterrupted sleep/standby

    Final thoughts

    APPENDIX I: Reliable detection and elimination of errors on a hard drive

    APPENDIX II: If Windows 10 fails to get upgraded or if you want to stop upgrades

    APPENDIX III: Clean reinstallation of Windows

    MAKE YOUR PC STABLE AND FAST:

    What Microsoft Forgot to Tell You

    Charles Spender

    Distributed by Smashwords

    January 10, 2024; ISBN: 9781311942241

    Copyright © 2015 Charles Spender

    Introduction

    BOOK AT A GLANCE: This manual recommends avoiding all kinds of software for optimization or tweaking of Windows or cleaning of the Windows registry because these tools will make your Windows more unstable and buggier. People who write this kind of software believe that they know more about Windows than Microsoft does. To optimize and repair your Windows installation, you need to use Windows own tools in Windows Command Prompt: CHKDSK, SFC, and DISM. Besides, you need to install the latest hardware drivers from the website of a PC manufacturer. Only these four methods can make your PC stabler and more reliable. Besides, minimizing the number of simultaneously plugged-in peripheral devices will make Windows stabler too. To diagnose hardware problems, use Windows Troubleshooter. To make your computer faster, you need to upgrade your hardware, no software will help you in this regard. To prepare for a catastrophic failure, create a system recovery drive and use Windows Restore and AOMEI Backupper Standard (freeware). As soon as you achieve a stable configuration of Microsoft Windows and Office, disable all updates (because many of them are buggy), while maintaining system security with a good antivirus. Wait at least 1 year before installing a newly released version of Windows and 6 months before installing a new version of Microsoft Office. With all the problems of Windows, it is still more convenient than Macintosh. Use encryption software to protect your sensitive information and be sure to change privacy settings in Windows, Office, and your web browser.

    The amount of technical support information for Microsoft Windows is overwhelming. For most PC users, it is difficult to separate good information from bad and to devise any concrete troubleshooting plan that they can use regularly. This booklet provides a summary of key points that can serve as a maintenance and troubleshooting plan for your PC. The ebook is organized as several small chapters (who needs another massive book about Windows?); each chapter provides key information on a topic, and a link or links to more detailed information that has been tested by this author and is available for free on the Internet.

    If your PC crashes every few days (freezes or displays a blue screen of death) or if you are experiencing other computer problems, this booklet can serve as an easy checklist for troubleshooting. Even if you are not currently experiencing serious technical problems with your computer, this booklet will help to speed up your PC, to take full advantage of all Windows features, and to prevent disasters that can put your computer out of commission for several days and wipe out your precious data.

    This ebook is designed for users of Windows 7, Windows 8.1, Windows 10, and Windows 11. Unless stated otherwise, when Windows 10 is mentioned in this book, I mean Windows 10 and 11. Before we begin, change your Windows settings such that all file extensions are always visible. Go to the Control Panel (in Windows 10, 11: Start button → All apps → Windows System; in Windows 8.1: Start button → Settings → [at the bottom] Control Panel). Then double-click Folder Options (Windows XP/Vista/7/8) or File Explorer Options (Windows 10, 11), select the View tab, and uncheck the options Hide extensions for known file types and Hide protected operating system files. You will need to see the extensions of certain files while following instructions in this ebook. I recommend pinning the Control Panel to your task bar (because we will use it often):

    color image 051

    To accomplish this task, click the Start button, type Control Panel then right-click the Control Panel shortcut and select Pin to taskbar. Also take a note of the bit of your Windows (whether it's a 32-bit or 64-bit operating system). Go to the Control Panel → System and look at the section System type:

    color image 013

    The size of your random-access memory (RAM) is also listed there. When following instructions in this ebook, you will notice that some software applications can be installed as either a 32-bit or 64-bit version. You need to select the version that matches the bit of your Windows (note that 32-bit programs are sometimes labeled X86 instead of 32-bit). To successfully follow instructions in this ebook, you will have to be logged into a Windows user account of the Administrator type.

    If you want to print out any portion of this ebook on paper, you can do it in Calibre e-book viewer. After installing Calibre on your PC, go to Start → Programs (or All apps) → Calibre e-book management, and select E-book viewer. In the upper left-hand corner of the program window, you will find the button Open e-book. After you open the ebook file (.azw, .mobi, or .epub), look at the lower left-hand corner of the Calibre e-book viewer window, and you will find the Print button (or an arrow that expands the view to show this button).

    Windows 10 and 11 users can read about Windows Update settings below. Finally, it would be worthwhile to spend 15 to 30 minutes learning about the basics of your version of Windows. See one of the following summaries of Windows features (out of the horse's mouth):

    Windows 11:

    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/windows-11

    Windows 10:

    http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/getstarted-whatsnew-cortana

    Windows 8.1:

    http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/previous-support#1TC=windows-8

    Windows 7:

    http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/previous-support#1TC=windows-7

    Windows 10, 11 users: First of all, I recommend Windows 10 and 11 if you want to have the latest and most advanced hardware. Just as any newly released version of Windows, I do not recommend the latest versions of Windows because some time needs to pass before Microsoft fixes most of the bugs (at least 6 months, better wait for a year).

    The latest major updates of Windows 10 and 11 (Microsoft calls them upgrades) take a major effort to install (see Appendix

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