PC optimizing is not a very difficult task. Still, many of us continue work on a slow computer without realizing that you can speed up your Windows Vista computer in just 3 easy steps. Surprised? Well, don’t be. The three top causes of system slowdowns are:

• Registry problems
• Virus and spyware problems
• Hard disk problems

These problems unnecessarily clutter your system, feed on system resources and CPU and drastically bring down the performance of your system. Therefore, to speed up your PC, you need to get rid of these problems to free CPU usage and system resources utilized by them.

The 3-step Vista speed up process involves:

1. Clean the registry: Registry problems occur due to the accumulation of unwanted information, such as obsolete, invalid, and corrupt entries.  Some of the common causes of this unwanted data are: frequent program addition and removal, incorrect removal of programs, system crashes, faulty programs and device drivers, and malware infections. To prevent these problems, it is important that you regularly scan your registry for this unwanted information and remove it. The best, easiest, and most efficient way to perform registry maintenance is by using a reliable and efficient registry cleaner tool. A good registry cleaner tool helps in several ways. Some of the benefits are listed below:
   • Enables automatic scan and repair of the registry files.
   • Helps fix several computer errors caused by invalid registry entries.
   • Uses advanced and smart algorithms to perform a deep registry scan and weed out any malicious and embedded spyware data in the registry.
   • Helps compress and consolidate the registry by defragging it.
   • Fixes and speeds up the registry, thereby enhancing the speed of your computer.
2. Clean malware: A sudden and dramatic slowdown of your Vista computer may indicate some type of malware infection pertaining to virus, Trojans, spyware or adware. These programs infiltrate your PC and start infecting your program files and eating up system resources. In more severe cases, malware infections can even cause physical damage to your computer. You need two separate tools to prevent malware problems—antivirus and antispyware. You must ensure that these tools are updated and run regularly to ensure that your system stays free from any malware data. Most of the time, antivirus and antispyware tools have the following features that you must enable to ensure round-the-clock protection of your PC:
   • Live or Automatic Update: Enable this feature to ensure that your anti-malware tools are always updated with the latest virus and spyware definitions.
   • Real-time protection: Enable this to ensure that you can prevent malware infiltration in real time.
   • Scan scheduler: Schedule your scans to run periodically to ensure that your system is free from any type of malware data.
3. Clean the hard disk: You can indirectly reduce the load from the hard disk by cleaning up the registry and weeding out malware data from it. In addition to this, you can use the Disk Cleanup and Disk Defragmenter tools to perform additional hard disk maintenance. Disk Cleanup helps you remove unwanted information such as outdated program setup files, Temporary Internet Explorer files, and cookies from the system. You can also use this tool to empty the Recycle Bin, remove unwanted software programs and system components and delete old system restore points. After the cleanup is complete, use the Disk Defragmenter tool to make data stored on the hard disk contiguous and optimize the hard disk. In Windows Vista, you can schedule regular Disk defrags to ensure that your data stays contiguous at all times.