You want maximum mileage from your portable laptop. Whatever limitations that are there, you might as well try and maximize the machine by cutting down on the flab and giving the machine and its memory a toned look. There are various ways to crank up the machine so that it runs the distance on the trot and it may not always be achieved just by disk defragmentation or those quick fixes available for a PC. Yet at the same time, a few tweaks here and there can ensure that you can sleep easy about your machine’s speed. Here’s how.

To begin with, even if you are a Firefox fan, we give Google Chrome the thumbs up over this one when it comes to portable laptops. The lighter Chrome can easily chisel off quite a few seconds from your browsing experience by running at a higher speed and occupying less memory space.

But if you were thinking why we haven’t spoken about open source till now while talking about improving the portable computer experience, your need not wait any longer. We racked our brains to come up with Xubuntu, which cannot be defined as a standalone application but rather a power-packed combination of features optimized for the portable laptop. So let’s see what’s on offer here. There’s the Abiword word processor, Evince PDF reader, the GIMP graphics editor, Catfish desktop search, Firefox, internet messenger, a spreadsheet program, text editor, calendar, Thunderbird, IRC, etc. And we cannot round off the discussion on the Linux category without mentioning LXDE (Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment). The LXDE is an innovative desktop system which goes a long way while saving resources on a massive scale. And going by popular reaction and critical acclaim, the LXDE is light years ahead of KDE or GNOME, two extremely popular alternatives that have their own band of dedicated followers swearing by their efficiency.

And just to bolster your package, we suggest the use of PortableApps another set of compatible applications that rev up your machine. The PortableApps is loaded with an antivirus program (ClamWin), an IM device (Gaim) and OpenOffice. And if you are a Sudoku freak, there’s also a Sudoku program to keep your brain ticking away. The application occupies only about 512 MB and lets you add any feature you like. It also brings on board Mozilla applications like FireFox, Sunbird, and Thunderbird, which you may or may not use given how comfortable you are with Google Chrome. But at a nano 512 MB, a few redundant applications are hardly going to give your machine a cardiac arrest.

Finally, if you have always had a headache regarding running the video and audio files on your portable laptop, VLC provides just the right option to ensure smooth running of those files minus the whims and fancies of the flashiness of iTune or WMP. Same sound quality minus the flab goes a long way to keep your portable laptop just ahead of the competition. Cloud computing to save up some of your memory online is also the way forward.