Speed up CD-ROM data transfer

DMA mode

Windows XP sets DMA mode on IDE channels wrong. Most of CD-ROM devices support this, but Windows XP puts them in PIO ( slower ). DMA wont speed device, but it will use less RAM memory, and that way data transfer from CD-ROM to computer will be faster. 
Go to My Computer-Hardware-Device Manager.
Find "IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers" and click «+» (plus) near it. Double click on «Primary IDE channel». Look at «Advance settings» and look at Device 1 settings. It's probably set up to PIO transfer mode. Set to «DMA if available». 
Back to "IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers". Do same for «Secondary IDE channels» now. If it's in PIO mode. 
If this won't help, you can reinstall IDE channels that won't accept DMA mode. And that you can do in following way:
Right click on IDE channel, «uninstall» and OK.
Restart your computer and look if IDE channel excepted DMA mode. 
IN some cases, you can get only MultiWord, but that's better than PIO mode, too.

DLL files and slow computer

Imagine this. You are working in MSWord, close it, that work some in Dreamveawer and Photoshop, close both and than you turn on Winamp to listen some music and start surfing the Internet. All named programs have some DLL files loaded in your RAM until you turn of the computer. And working on computer will be slower and slower. To change that, and to make that DLL files unload after closing particular software, do next:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/Software/Microsoft/ Windows/CurrentVersion/Explorer

Make new STRING Value, name it AlwaysUnloadDll and give value 1 to it. 

Than just restart your Windows.