When you’re running a server, or any computer that hosts other computers within a small network, it’s important that that computer is performing at its peak and at 100 times better than the other slave computers. A server is like a good leader; the performance of the other computers is depends on the power of the server, much like how employees are driven by their leader’s attitude and capabilities.

In order to increase your server’s performance, here are a couple of software and tools that will help you do just that. Think of them as Milwaukee tools that will help you build, create and repair important things.

1.)    Remove malware, spyware, and other viruses – When a server is infected, the topology of the network would cause the other computers to be infected as well. There are a lot of anti-virus and malware removal/detection tools in the market today, but some primary examples include Microsoft Security Essentials and Microsoft Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool. These are compatible with any Windows OS, from XP to 8. Other notable programs to help protect your server against viruses and malware are Avast! Anti-Virus and MalwareBytes Anti-Malware.

2.)    Defrag your drives – Servers end up storing files from other computers, so as a result, a nearly-full drive would cause performance issues. When possible, defrag your drives at least twice a month or once every two weeks. This will help you segregate your available drive space by removing bad sectors of your drive and optimizing the storage of the existing files. Windows OS will have a default defragging tool, but you can always look up other defragging software like Defragger and Auslogics Disk Defrag.

3.)    Improve your RAM and Video Card – Though these are hardware, they still play crucial roles in increasing the performance of your server or computer. Additional RAM will be able to help you perform operations faster and accommodate other PC’s at the same time. On average, server RAMs are usually at 32GB to 64GB in order to efficiently manage the topology. Video cards are not just for games. By default, the memory consumed by your display is taken from your RAM. Though 512mb to 1GB may seem petty for a 32GB RAM, every megabyte still counts. When you get a separate or dedicated video card, you are able to free up the memory consumed by your default video card. However, the new video cards today have this feature of expanding their memory by taking out some from your RAM, so if you have this kind of video card, avoid turning on the feature.

These three tools and tricks should improve your server’s performance, and improve the performance of your other PCs too.