Is your Windows 7 getting sluggish on Startup?

Mine was, because I like to load it up with all sorts of programs that will automatically start during the initial Startup sequence - and therein lies the problem, as they say.

So here's what to do about that, step by step:-

(1) Click "Start" on your desktop, and in the little "Search" window just above that Start button, type in the word Troubleshoot.

(2) From the list which appears, choose and click on "Review your computer's status and resolve issues."

(3) In the next window which appears, assuming you don't see any specific problems reported by Action Center, click on the selection shown in the lower left of the window, titled Troubleshooting.

(4) In that next window, under "System and Security", at the bottom of the list, choose and click on "Check for performance issues".

(5) A Performance window appears with an option to adjust settings to help improve overall speed and performance. Click on "Next" near its lower right corner.

(6) A search begins for issues, and if nothing specific is found, then you will be told that it is set up to automatically run programs at Startup which may slow down that procedure. It will offer to start the System Configuration utility, and you should choose "Next" to get it started.

(7) When the System Configuration utility window opens, you will see under its "Startup" tab a list of items each with a checkbox before it, and any items in the list which are already checked will be automatically started during your computer's initial starting-up routine. You can prevent those from being started automatically at Startup by simply removing that little check mark from the box, by clicking on it. NOTE: Those not checked on the list will still be started as required by your Windows Operating System, during normal computer use, so you don't need a whole bunch of them on this list. These are often added to this list automatically by their installation programs when first installed, so you should periodically check this list to remove (uncheck) the ones you don't need every time the computer is started.

(8) After you've trimmed down that list of checked items preferably to only those required for your system's security, then you can complete the process by clicking on "Apply" and "OK" and then do a system reboot to get these new changes recognized by the system. It should boot faster now.

Additional cleaning:

Other tricks for 'de-gunking' your pet PC running Windows 7 are to make shortcuts to your Prefetch, and (Username) Temp and Windows Temp folders, and regularly dump everything dumpable in those folders. Your anti-virus will likely have a folder in Windows Temp that you will not easily be able to delete, and you don't want to use MoveOnBoot or some other unlocker program on it, because that folder contains your latest set of database samples for the anti-virus, so when you come to that one, choose to 'skip' that, and leave it in there. And don't fret about dumping whatever is in the Prefetch folder, because that is automatically regenerated every reboot. So why dump it at all? Because - it will eventually collect a lot of junk that will be once-only type of files used to assist downloads or suchlike, and which may or may not be empty folders, and which you will never use again, but are taking up space and bytes. So out-out-out with them!

Your computer will thank you, and show it by giving you better performance, because it isn't hunting through junk while it ought to be responding to your latest requests.