Sometimes it seems to take an eternity for programs to load. I stare at an hourglass while listening to the hard disk thrash about, and then the application's window finally appears. There's got to be a way to speed this up.
Before Windows can load an application, it must set aside enough room in your PC's memory. If you have a lot of applications already loaded, you'll probably run out of memory, at which point Windows will use part of your hard disk called virtual memory to make up for the deficiency. Since hard disks are much slower than RAM, this technique (called swapping) slows down your computer considerably. You can temporarily alleviate this problem by closing unneeded programs before opening any new ones, but a better long-term solution is to install more memory
(RAM) in your PC.
Of course, no matter how much memory you have, Windows will still use your hard disk to some extent. To keep your hard disk and thus your system running optimally, run Disk Defragmenter routinely (go to Start --> Run and type dfrg.msc). Also, the more space you set aside for virtual memory, the more efficiently Windows can utilize it. At a bare minimum, make sure you have half a gigabyte (500 MB) of free hard disk space at all times.
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