Advanced WindowsCare Personal 2

Advanced WindowsCare Personal 2 is a quick and easy way to boost your computer system performance. It has all the basic tools you'll need for raising PC speed, and it is exceedingly simple to work with. It even has a one-click fix function in which it analyzes your machine and then corrects any problems it finds.  It works on Windows XP and Vista.

I've found the most useful parts of this program to be:

• the startup manager, which shows you all the programs that run on startup and lets you remove any that you no longer want to start;

• the Registry fixer, which addresses invalid or incorrect entries and values; and

• the system optimizer, which alters the way Windows runs in order to improve performance.

The app has a slew of other tools as well, such as a spyware remover, a junk file cleaner, a privacy sweeper, and some very good tools that show details about your hardware and software configuration.  Word of caution:  as with any other computer maintenance program, be sure that you take a look at the suggestions before you tell the program to proceed.  For example, I didn't want all of the suggested programs removed from my Start menu, so I unchecked the ones I wished to remain.

Best of all, it's fr*ee!  Assess your computer's performance  here.