Fixes for Windows 10 Performance issues

[Raven.]

If everyone was like me, everyone upgraded to Windows 10 the moment it came out. Or, some people may have waited for a few months and then upgraded. And you would had noticed that sometimes performance issues pop up. Over the last few months I have worked with computers that were very quick when running with Windows 8 or Windows 7, and then slow to an absolute crawl after upgrading to Windows 10.

So here are some things that I've found that have helped considerably. Overtime, I may add more to this list.

1. Update to the 1511 build.

The 1511 update came out a month ago. Several people have referred to the 1511 update as "Windows 10 SP 1." Whether this is accurate or not, one thing is for sure, the 1511 update does fix things. 

2. Update all drivers.

A bad driver, or an incorrect driver, will cause several issues with your computer. After a Windows upgrade, your computer will more than likely still be running driver meant for an older version of Windows. The first order of business after an OS upgrade should always be to run updates and to update drivers. Some drivers can be obtained through Windows update.

Others, such as graphics drivers, will need to be downloaded from nVidia's, AMD's, or Intel's website as opposed to Windows update (Microsoft graphics drivers are garbage). After installing your graphics driver, refer to this site here in order to block Windows update from installing Microsoft graphics drivers.

3. Run CHKDSK

Many IT professionals will tell you that it's always better to perform a clean installation of Windows as opposed to an upgrade installation. One of the many reasons for this is that a clean installation creates a new partition that is clean and healthy. After upgrading to Windows 10, it can help to CHKDSK to perform much needed maintenance on the partition for your Windows installation. I've personally seen this fix some performance issues with Windows 10 after an upgrade.

Basically, right click on your start button, and then click on "Command Prompt (Admin)." Then type "chkdsk /spotfix /sdcleanup /offlinescanandfix" without the quotation marks. After running the command, type "shutdown -r -t 0" to restart your computer from the command prompt. 

4. Defrag your hard drive (does not apply to SSD owners)

If your computer has an SSD as its operating system drive, skip this step; SSD's are random access and do not suffer performance penalties due to disk fragmentation. However, if you are running an older magnetic hard drive, like I am, it's an extremely good idea to defrag your hard drive. You could use the built in Windows defrag utility, or you can get Defraggler or another third party defrag utility.