Streamline Windows 10

With just a little effort, you can make Windows 10 slicker, faster and easier to use. Alex Cox shows you how.

Not all computers fare particularly well in their transition to Windows 10. The promised quick, clean environment and super-fast boot time might not have materialised. Or there might be as much clutter as there was before, if not more. And for the majority who have had a pleasant Windows 10 experience, you could make it even better still.

Here, we’ll speed up and clean up your system at the same time. We’ll disable some of Windows 10’s less-essential features, clear away unwanted clutter, and make sure you’re only running the programs you need at startup. You should end up with a faster boot time and a much more elegant experience. And since most of the things we’re going to do are non-destructive, you’ll be able to switch back the changes at any time if you miss certain features.

1 START MENU

Tidying up your Start menu might take a while, but it’s well worth the effort when it looks this neat

2 SETTINGS

Many of Windows 10’s newer, more vocal features can be disabled by digging through the Settings application.

3 NO ICONS

Hiding your desktop icons means you can keep your mind on what you’re doing and get a less cluttered look.

4 TASK MANAGER

Task Manager is a great way to see which programs are bogging your PC down and, in the Startup tab, stop them running automatically.

5 CCLEANER

Sometimes, special measures are required. CCleaner can do away with certain things Windows would rather you keep.

6 TASKBAR SETTINGS

Gain extra screen space with a smaller taskbar and do away with that ugly search box using its rightclick menu.

5 SEARCH SILENCE

The gigantic search box at the bottom left of the screen isn’t to everyone’s taste, but it’s easy to switch off. Right click an empty area of the taskbar, select ‘Search’, then ‘hidden’ to do away with it. You can also select the ‘Properties’ menu and use it to switch on small taskbar icons for a sleeker look that saves screen space and shrinks the search box down to a single small icon.

7 BANDWIDTH PRACTICE

Head back to the settings screen and go to ‘Update & Security’. From the Windows Update tab, click ‘Advanced options’, then ‘Choose how updates are delivered’. Here, you’ll find a toggle switch for Microsoft’s new peer-to-peer update sharing service, which uses your Internet connection to send updates to other Windows 10 users. Switch it off for a little more Internet speed.

9 ENTER THE CLEANER

Our final bit of housecleaning involves an old favourite third-party program, CCleaner Free, which you can download from www.piriform.com/ccleaner. Not only is it great at scouring away the unwanted stuff lurking beneath Windows 10, you can also use it to do away with those useless apps that Microsoft insist must remain installed.

6 BACKGROUND BOTHER

Now let’s search for a little more performance. While, earlier, we switched off auto-running third-party apps, Microsoft also automatically runs some of its own apps in the background. Click the Start, Settings, Privacy or Background apps to see the list, and use the toggle switches to disable them. This has the benefit of reducing a few of Windows 10’s more pestering pop-ups.

8 HIDING ICONS

If you’re like us, you have a messy desktop cluttered with files and icons. There’s no need to delete them all — you can clean up that desktop to just your wallpaper in a couple of clicks. Right-click an area of empty space, go to the View menu and deselect ‘Show Desktop icons’. When you need to see your stuff again, view it through File Explorer or reverse the process.

10 A FULL CLEAN

In CCleaner’s tools tab, seek out the built-in Windows 10 apps you wish to remove, click them, then click ‘Uninstall’. Be careful, as you can remove semi-essential tools like the Windows Store and it’s very difficult to replace them later on. Finish off by running CCleaner’s ‘Cleaner’ function (select it in the left menu) to wipe away just about everything we haven’t already covered.