Five services you can disable in Windows to improve performance

There are some features of Windows that don’t get much use, but they still use system resources and sometimes can cause issues with other software. This guide will show you how to disable these five services in Windows that you probably don’t need.


Remove OneDrive

Microsoft’s OneDrive is a handy way to store documents, photos, and other files, but it also consumes a lot of CPU and memory resources. Disabling OneDrive frees up these resources for more important tasks. Follow these steps: 1) In File Explorer, right-click on C:\users\[username]\OneDrive\, 2) Select Properties, 3) Uncheck Allow files on this drive to have contents indexed... 4) Click Apply and then OK.


Disable Cortana

Whether or not you’re a fan of Microsoft’s digital assistant, it consumes system resources. Even if all you do is search with Cortana and never actually talk to her, she will open it whenever your computer starts up and run several processes that tax your system. To get more out of your PC without paying for more memory or hardware, try disabling Cortana and monitoring how many resources it frees up—and then make a decision on whether or not she’s really worth those resources.


Disable Lock Screen

The Lock Screen is one of those features that, while nice-looking, simply doesn’t do much and runs continuously in your system tray. While you could use Task Manager or some other utility to stop and start it on demand, why not just disable it entirely? Right-click an empty area on your desktop and choose Personalize. Click Lock Screen and then click Turn Off Screen. You can now lock your screen by pressing Win + L if you want.


Turn Off Mail

If you’re using Gmail or another IMAP email service, your mail client is only checking for new messages when it has to. If you want it to be more diligent, open up Control Panel, go into Network and Internet > Network and Sharing Center > Change Advanced Sharing Settings > HomeGroup settings. Make sure File and printer sharing is turned off.


Change your Power Options

Windows has a default power-save mode that kicks in after 20 minutes of non-use, but it’s not necessarily saving power. Instead, what happens is your CPU/GPU cycles down and they take longer to respond to commands. This can be problematic if you happen to return shortly after entering sleep mode. One way around that is changing how long it takes for your PC goes into sleep mode; 20 minutes is way too long when most PCs will likely sit idle for hours at a time.

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