I copied files from my pc hard drive to an external one. Should I now erase the files on the pc hard drive?

Question

Hoping that it will make my pc run faster?

Answer 1

If it's just songs and videos and that kind of thing, the go right ahead. if it's programs howver, don't since they might not work afterwards. Before you delete the files try these things to speed up your computer and free up space and memory for free:

Go to the Start Menu> Run

Type in "appwiz.cpl"

Uninstall whatever you don't need.

Next, go to Start> Run and type in "msconfig".

Go to the Startup Tab and uncheck everything you don't want to startup. If you want, you can uncheck everything, and your anti-virus will still restart itself when you log on.

Now go to My Computer> Hard Drive> Documents and Settings> [USER NAME]> Local Settings> and delete everything inside the Temp Folder. (This is a hidden folder so you will need to have "show hidden files and folders" checked in Folder Options) All the files in this folder are just temporary files that your Internet stored for certain websites.

Next, you should install CCleaner; it will get rid of alot of temporary files on your computer. It also has a registry repair system, which is easily the best free one available on the Internet:

http://www.ccleaner.com/download

Another option is to try defragmenting your computer.

Go to the Start Menu and go to All Programs

Go to Accessories and System Tools.

Choose Disk Defragmenter and when it loads click defragment.

Next, go to Device Manger (Start> RightClick My Computer> Properties> Hardware Tab> Device Manager) and expand all listings. Now rightclick and update all drivers.

Another thing I would say is to compress your files if you already haven't.

Open My Computer and right click on your hard drive

Check the Compress Drive button and let it do its thing.

Finally, make sure your Hard Drive doesn't have any bad sectors. Go to My Computer> Right Click Hard Drive> Properties> Tools Tab> Check Now> Check both boxes and Start. It will ask you to reboot, so reboot. This will clear out any bad sectors on your Hard Drive.

These are short-term solutions however. The easiest way is to just upgrade the RAM on your system, but at least the ways above are free.

Good Luck =]

Answer 2

If you're trying to improve performance by addressing the amount of space being taken up on your hard drive, also consider where the files are stored. Over time, as files are deleted and created, they become fragmented resulting in a file being stored in pieces across your hard drive.  Also resulting in your Windows (I assume you're using Windows) page file being spread across these multiple areas on your drive.

Now that you've copied the files to an external drive, go ahead and delete them (otherwise, what's the point?).  Once you've deleted them, empty your Recycle Bin.  Until you do, you really haven't deleted anything.

After the files have been deleted and the Recycle Bin has been emptied freeing up the space those files were taking up to be used again, you'll want to defragment your drive to put everything back together in non-fragmented files.  

- With My Computer open, right click your C: drive.

- Click on Properties

- Click on Tools

- Click on Defragment Now

- Click on Analyze to see how frag'd your drive is

- Click on Defragment to run the utility.

Deleting old files and defraging is one of the simplest (and free) ways to improve performance.  When the files are fragmented, it takes more time for your hard drive to access the data because the heads have to transit more.  Once everything is defragmented, the heads don't need to move as much resulting in somewhat faster performance.

Answer 3

It's highly unlikely that it will make it run faster, but it will create more HDD space on your internal drive.

Answer 4

I would keep the Files on the hard drive just on the safe side.