Computer slowing down

Hey guys, my computer has recently started to slow down a bit and I’m trying to figure out how to speed it back up. I defrag regularly and I’ve gotten rid of most stuff that runs in the background that I don’t need.
Right now my plan was to do a clean install of windows 7 and get rid of most of the bloatware from Toshiba, and it’ll also fix any registry or BIOS errors I might have that I’m not finding. My problem is that I’ve customized my version of windows already and I don’t really wanna have to do that again…(custom button, logon screen, and custom theme, plus a few tweaks).
Any options other that re-installing everything and tweaking it just right again? I’ll prolly end up just sucking it up and going with a new custom version of windows 7…and if so, are there any out there you guys like?
thanks all!
Answer #1
Defrag and delete temp files regularly is a good idea, and you could uninstall any progs you don’t need or use regularly, but If your pc was faster before, then when did it start to slow down ? Or maybe you installed a prog recently which is causing the slow down, but I know for sure increasing your ram will speed your pc performance instantly.
Answer #2
install latest bios drivers
use a low cpu antivir like nod or bitdefender
update win 7
Answer #3
i didn’t uninstall anything important, just some bloatware and a couple progs i don’t ever use. I currently have Norton (only because i’ve already paid for it…i hate norton) microsoft security essentials running for antivirus. Neither seems to take up much ram, the majority is used by windows backgrounds tasks (it looks like). But I’m always above 50% ram usage even if I’m not running anything and my swap usage is usually about the same. When I have firefox open and Jdownloader ram and swap are both at about 70-80%. I’ve also got a 4GB SD card in as readyboost but it doens’t seem to help much.
I’ll try installing latest bios drivers and see if i’m missing any important updates.