K. Mandla’s posting, “Ten things you can do to keep an old computer useful,” has some great tips on how to maintain the computer so it goes as fast as it can.

My old computer was given to my parents who use it for surfing, reading email and a Word document now and then.  It is six years old, but works great - mind you it was loaded because I did graphics and programming at the time.

One of the tips that I have repeated to others myself is - get rid of the stuff you don’t use.  I reinstall Windows with the bare minimum and add programs that make sense.  K. Mandla goes one step further in mentioning that you should turn off services that are not necessary.