Months pass, and Windows works. Then, out of nowhere, your computer slows down. Files do not open immediately. Programs freeze or close. Your system probably needs some TLC, but what should you do?
You don’t want to throw up your computer, though if it’s slow, doesn’t meet the latest operating system (OS) requirements or is making strange noises, it may be time to say goodbye.
You struggle to pinpoint the exact problem when Windows is screwed. It could be an Internet problem or unknown malware, or – it happens very often – an irrelevant program doing complex background work.
Sometimes it’s an easy fix. You can run software programs that scan your hard drive and flag files and folders for removal, such as Uninstall View, a free app that can help speed up your PC.
Other free tools, like the ones I’ve outlined here, are in every tech pro’s arsenal. It is important that you download these directly from the developers and official websites and not from any third party. This is because you may be installing junk, which can worsen your already unpleasant Windows situation.
1. Free Task Manager and System Monitor for Windows
Microsoft’s free Process Explorer helps you find out whether a program has a particular file or directory open. The program shows you information about which handles and DLLs (in dynamic link libraries, or instructions for other applications) processes have opened or loaded.
The software has two sub-windows; Displays a list of active processes, including the top owner’s accounts. The bottom window is dependent on Process Explorer’s options. Be sure to check DLL Mode, in which you will see DLLs and memory-mapped files that the process has loaded.
2. Identify Wi-Fi Problems With This Free App
Microsoft’s Wi-Fi Analyzer is a free app that uses your PC, laptop, tablet or mobile device to find the best Wi-Fi channel or the best location for your router/access-point. The basic version is completely ad-free. Pro version features include live-tile support, a beeper for signal strength, lock screen rotation, and the ability to change signal strength limits.
3. Find which devices connect to your network
The free app Angry IP Scanner works with Windows, Mac OSX, and Linux. This software provides a fast IP address and port scanner. Use it to find out which devices use your home or business Wi-Fi.
Angry IP scans IP addresses and any ports they have, then will ping them to see if they are “alive”. It can optionally resolve hostnames, determine MAC addresses, and more. It can save these results to CSV, TXT, XML, or IP-port list files. Applications can also be built with the help of plugins to collect information about the scanned IPs.
4. View disk usage statistics and clean your hard drive
Free WinDirStat can run on any version of Windows 95. This application looks at disk usage statistics, and it doubles as a cleanup tool. At startup, WinDirStat reads the entire directory tree.
The directory listing looks a lot like Windows Explorer’s “Tree View”, but it is sorted by file/subtree size, treemap, and extension list, which serves as a legend and shows statistics about file types.
You can also use Treemap, which represents each file as a colored rectangle. The rectangles are arranged so that the directories form a rectangle again, containing all their files and subdirectories. So their area is proportional to the size of the sub-trees. The color of the rectangle indicates the type of file, as shown in the extension list. It helps you easily view the contents and used space of your hard drive.
5. Monitor, Manage and Troubleshoot Windows Operating Systems
If you only find one free tool in this entire list, make it Sysinternals Suite. This free utility bundle is available from Microsoft.
The suite includes the following: autologon, autorun, bluescreen, cacheset, clockrace, debug view, diskmon, diskview, disk usage (du), list dll, logon session, pagedefrag, portmon, procdump, process explorer, process monitor, registry usage ( ru), Sysmon, TCPView, VMMap, VolumeID, WhoIs, WinObj and others.
You could say that the Sysinternals Suite is the catchphrase of Microsoft, which can handle a good 80% of your troubleshooting needs.
6. Deep Clean Your Hard Drive
Over the years, I’ve personally used this program to clean up other people’s machines. Malwarebytes allows you not only to scan the memory, but also to perform an in-depth cleaning of the hard drive, including cookies and the registry.