Do Speed Boosters Really Work? We put the latest notebook performance optimizers to the test to find out if they speed up--or just throw a wrench in--your system.
Let's get real about mobility. For all the gains in performance and storage we've seen on laptops in recent years, notebooks are just as sensitive now to clutter as they were before dual-core processors existed. Fragmented hard drives, choked system registries, and unnecessary memory resident programs will bog down even the most powerful machines very quickly. Therefore, optimization should be part of any notebook owner's maintenance routine.
To find out whether the latest tools can really speed up your notebook, we took them for a test drive on an eight-month-old Vista system, one that was cluttered with all kinds of test software and that had seen aggressive Internet use. It turns out there's one all-in-one suite that should be comprehensive enough for everyone to use, but a few specialized programs definitely belong in your virtual utility belt as well.
Hands-on video with Apple's groundbreaking tablet.
Let's get real about mobility. For all the gains in performance and storage we've seen on laptops in recent years, notebooks are just as sensitive now to clutter as they were before dual-core processors existed. Fragmented hard drives, choked system registries, and unnecessary memory resident programs will bog down even the most powerful machines very quickly. Therefore, optimization should be part of any notebook owner's maintenance routine.
