Despite the fact that Windows 8 was designed with the latest technology in mind, it works smoothly on low-performance computers. The hardware requirements for Windows 8 are marginally higher than those for Windows Vista, which was released almost six years ago.
Instructions
Step 1
If your computer has a hard drive, the first step is to replace the built-in defragmentation utility in Windows 8 (do not defragment the SSD). Windows 8's built-in defragmentation utility is generally okay, but there are more efficient free solutions available. Defraggler is a good replacement for the built-in defragmentation tools. Since the analysis procedure is better implemented here and file fragmentation is eliminated more efficiently, drives processed by Defraggler should theoretically demonstrate higher performance. In practice, the differences may be minimal, but on older hardware, even small improvements play an important role. It is also recommended to download and install Defraggler immediately after installing the OS. Free up unused space with Disk Cleanup, update your operating system, and run Defraggler. After that, most of the OS files will occupy contiguous sectors on the disk and are located in areas that provide maximum performance.
Step 2
There is another tool for system optimization. The CCleaner utility not only extends the capabilities of the built-in Windows Disk Cleanup tool, which removes unnecessary files and frees up disk space, but also optimizes the operating system boot procedure. After installing Windows on a blank disk, removing unnecessary items is not so important, but when updating the OS, all the garbage accumulated in the old system successfully migrates to the Windows 8 environment, and you need to get rid of it somehow.
Step 3
First, install Windows 8 on a freshly formatted disk, and then install the updated OS and all drivers found on the Microsoft Update website. Check the websites of the manufacturers of the main components (graphics card, monitor, etc.) and install the most recent drivers. Then download and install the CCleaner utility. If you have a standard hard drive, download and install the Defraggler software. Run the built-in Windows Disk Cleaner and CCleaner tool. Defragment your hard drive with Defraggler. If you have a solid state drive, you can skip this step.
Step 4
Configuring Windows 8 Settings
Enter the Advanced System Settings menu where you can change the virtual memory and visual effects settings. To access the Advanced System Settings menu in Windows 8, switch to Desktop mode, click the Libraries shortcut in the taskbar, and then right-click Computer. In the context menu that appears on the screen, select the Properties item - a window of the System Control Panel item will open. In the left part of the window, select the Advanced System Settings item - the System Properties panel will appear on the screen. Go to the Advanced tab and click the Settings button in the Performance section to open the Performance Options panel. Go to the Visual Effects tab, set the switch to Adjust for best performance, and click the Apply button. If you want to keep some visual effects, check the corresponding boxes. In general, it is recommended to disable effects to improve PC performance.
In the Performance Options panel, go to the Advanced tab at the top of the screen and click the Change button under Virtual Memory.
To determine the size of the paging file in Windows 8, set the radio button in the center of the Virtual Memory panel to the Custom Size position and specify the recommended page size in megabytes in the Initial Size and Maximum Size fields. Click the Set button, then OK and OK again to close the Performance Options window. Click OK in the System Properties window and restart your computer if necessary, but in practice this is usually done without.
Step 5
Disabling unnecessary items
In order to further optimize Windows performance on old hardware, it is recommended to disable all unnecessary programs and services included in the system boot procedure, unused hardware and non-essential tiles.
To do this, on the Start screen, right-click on any tile and select disable it from the menu. By default, in Windows 8, the Sports, Travel, Finance, News, Mail, Bing, and Weather tiles are active. If you can do without any of them, disable the corresponding items. This saves Windows from having to regularly perform data selection and update procedures.
There are not too many hardware components in your computer that you can disable, but when you disable them, Windows loads faster, and because the component driver does not initialize, there is more free memory on the system. Hardware can be disabled in two ways: using the BIOS or Device Manager. Disabling via BIOS is preferable because in this case the hardware component is not even recognized by Windows and its driver is not loaded. Different computers do this differently, but, as a rule, immediately after turning on the machine, you need to press the or key. The BIOS interface will appear on the screen. Then you need to go to the Integrated Peripherals section, where the unused component is disabled. To disable hardware components through Device Manager, switch to Desktop mode, click the Libraries shortcut in the taskbar, and then right-click Computer. In the context menu, select Properties and in the System pane, click Device Manager. In the Device Manager window, click the arrow next to the device group to expand the list. Right-click the required element and select Disable from the context menu. In our system, we disabled the cabled network controller and the Bluetooth controller, leaving only Wi-Fi. Many computers have serial ports (RS-232). They can usually be turned off as well.
Step 6
Disable annoying UAC notifications
To change the level of control, open the Charms bar by moving your mouse to the upper-right or lower-right corner of the screen and click the Search icon. In the Search panel, select the Settings item and type UAC in the search bar. In the left pane, select Change User Account Control settings to open the UAC Settings window. Move the slider down one space. Now Windows 8 will not dim the screen and will be limited only to issuing notifications about attempts by applications to make changes to the system. Moving the slider down one more space will turn off notifications altogether. It is not recommended to do this, since with such settings all security risks are borne entirely by you.
