Laptop running slow

These are all the disabled services on my computer and ive had it like this with no problems for several years. Ive also added a few more that i have found while searching for some. Remember that you dont have to disable everything in this list. They are just some of the many services you can disable safely. There are 3 Service modes:

Automatic: Service starts up when the computer turns on.

Manual: Service starts when you make it start up, or when an application needs the service.

Disabled: Service will not start up no matter what tries to use it. Any other service that depends on it will also fail to start.

Before disabling a service, check the dependency tab to see if there are any services that you need in the list. If there are nor services in that list, or a service you plan to stop, you can disable it. If you encounter a problem, re enable the service (it is advisable to disable in small batches, like 5 or 10 at a time).

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Have The Latest Microsoft Updates:

Microsoft periodically releases updates for security issues, driver updates and otherwise critical or useful things. Every month go to microsoft update and download every critical update and driver update there is, and then have a look at the optional software to see if there is anything you might want. This will keep you up to date and helps with speed and security.

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Update Your Drivers:

Drivers are required so that your computer knows what do do with the hardware thats been connected to it. No driver, no working hardware. The most up to date drivers will help in speeding things up (especially video cards) and fix up any bugs in previous versions. Therefore it is advisable to download the newest drivers for optimum performance. This includes the BIOS drivers, as there may be an addition feature included in the update. In rare cases though, you may need to roll back to a previous driver version because there may be a new bug in the newer version.

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Have The Latest Version Of DirectX:

DirectX is a series of files that enhance the way software and hardware communicate with eachother, so it would seem obvious to have the latest version of DirectX on your computer. Windows XP can go up to version 9.0c. Windows Vista goes up to 10 and graphics cards are already starting to become DirectX 10 compatible. DirectX can be downloaded from Microsoft.

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Convert Old Drive Systems To NTFS:

There have been many different types of file systems over the years, and the ones most in use are FAT32 and NTFS. More and more people now have NTFS as it is the best, most secure and fastest file system to use. It is so organized, that it makes defragmenting obsolete.

Before starting the conversion, back up your data. The risk of data loss is minimal but it may happen. Converting a drive to NTFS will not need a format.

Firstly, bring up Run and then type in ‘convert *drive letter*: /fs:ntfs’
This is pretty much saying convert the drive letter (eg. C drive) to the file system (fs) ntfs. Follow the prompts. When the conversion is complete, it should say so. Then all you have to do is quit the command prompt.

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Use ScanDisk:

ScanDisk is a feature built into Windows which is designed to check for errors in your system. These can include lost clusters, bad sectors, and a plethora of invalid dates, names, times and so on. Over time, these will build up and like everything else, slow your system down. The easiest way to fix this is by running the ScanDisk (or CheckDisk/chkdsk) utility by opening up my computer, right clicking and selecting properties on the drive(s) you want, clicking the tools tab, and selecting the ScanDisk utility. Select both boxes and click start. It will ask you to schedule a scan after restarting. Click yes, and the restart your computer. Now during the booting phase, your drive will be scanned. This can take 2 minutes, but it can be more if there is a lot that needs to be fixed.

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Defragment Your Hard Drive:

If you have a file system older than NTFS, you will have to monthly defragment your computer to bring the most used files to the beginning of the hard drive and organize it so that the different clusters of the files are as close as possible to eachother, therefore, taking the strain off the hard drive and increasing its life. The defrag utility is found in System Tools along with the Disk Cleanup utility.

Note that the defragmenter that comes with XP will not defragment everything. The Paging File is the biggest file that will not get defragmented. To defragment the Paging File, use PageDefrag.

Honestly though, just convert to NTFS and get with the times

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Remember that every little bit or performance that you squeeze out of the computer helps. A bit from here and a bit from there will add up and you will notice a difference. Plus it will further prolong your urges to get a new computer or a hardware upgrade.

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Registry Tweaks:

Registry tweaking is rather risky if incorrectly done, but can noticeably improve many aspects of your computer. Always create system restore points to be on the safe side. For people who havent done registry editing before heres what you do:

Click start, go to run, and type in regedit. On the side of regedit is a directory tree. In these tweaks, when it says navigate to ‘something/something/something’, it means you start off looking for the folder mentioned on the left and work your way towards the right, with the last one being the folder you need. Now to create a registry key, you right click on the last folder mentioned in your tweak and go to new. Then, depending on what your tweak says, you create the appropriate type of key. It will appear in your main field (ie. not the directory tree). Give it the right name, and enter the right value and there you go. If you are modifying an existing key, all you have to do is double click the key and enter the right value. Be careful as to what type of data it mentions as regedit takes decimal (normal numbers), and hexadecimal numbers, so you have to have the right type selected for that key. Just so you know, the chances of something going wrong are rather slim, seeing as all registry tweaks posted here have been implemented on my computer. Ok, now we can begin:

Regedit 1:

Change your Contiguous File Allocation size:
This setting optimizes the contiguous file allocation size for the file system and can be especially useful for disk intensive applications. Open up your registry and go to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \System \CurrentControlSet \Control \FileSystem
Create a DWORD value named ‘ConfigFileAllocSize’ and set the value to ’200′ (in hex) or 512 (decimal)

Regedit 2:

Increase NTFS Performance:
XP automatically updates the date and time stamp with information about the last time you accessed a file. Not only does it mark the file, but it also updates the directory the file is located in as well as any directories above it. If you have a large hard drive with many subdirectories on it, this updating can slow down your system.

To disable the updating, start the Registry Editor by selecting Run from the Start menu, typing regedit in the Open text box, and clicking OK. When the Registry Editor window opens, navigate through the left pane until you get to

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\ CurrentControlSet\ Control\ Filesystem

In the right pane, look for the value named NtfsDisableLastAccessUpdate. If the value exists, it’s probably set to 0. To change the value, double-click it. You’ll then see the Edit DWORD Value screen. Enter 1 in the Value Data field and click OK.

If the value doesn’t exist, you’ll need to add it. Select New –> DWORD Value from the Edit menu. The new value will appear in the right pane, prompting you for a value name. Type NtfsDisableLastAccessUpdate and press enter. Double click the new value. You’ll then see the Edit DWORD Value screen. Enter 1 in the Value Data field and click OK.

Regedit 3:

Improve Memory Performance:
You need at least 512 megs of RAM for this to be effective. Go to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\ CurrentControlSet\ Control\ Session Manager\ Memory Management
Edit these keys:

DisablePagingExecutive – Double click it and in the decimal put a 1. This allows XP to keep data in memory now instead of paging sections of ram to the hard drive.

LargeSystemCache – Double click it and change the decimal to 1. This allows XP Kernel to Run in memory.

Note: This tweak may cause problems with ATI cards.

Regedit 4:

Disable the 8.3 Naming function:
XP uses two forms of file naming. One form is the one you see on all your files and folders, and the other one is the name MSDOS uses. Do not apply this tweak if you use DOS only software, of if you work in conjunction with Windows operating systems earlier than 95. However, for everyone else heres how to disable it:

Find the key ‘NtfsDisable8dot3NameCreation’ under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ System\ CurrentControlSet\ Control\ FileSystem, and change its value to 1.

Note: if some programs start acting up, simply changing this value back to 0 will solve it.

Regedit 5:

Force XP to unload a programs DLL files after closing it:
DLL’s are files containing data or functions that Windows programs can read when needed by linking to them. Most if not all windows software will include instructions to the operating system as to which DLL’s it will need to access, and XP will cache these files into the memory for faster access.
The problem lies within the time when you close the program in question. These DLL’s are not unloaded, and while they are rather insignificant alone, a few of them could mean that you miss out on an extra 2 frames a second on your games. So, to make sure that XP unloads these files from memory:

Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\ Windows\ CurrentVersion\ Explorer, and create a new key named ‘AlwaysUnloadDLL’, with a value of 1.

Regedit 6:

Stop the Master File Table from getting fragmented:
If you have an NTFS file system (most people), especially if there are a lot of files on the partition or drive, then the MFT will get fragmented. This is one of the few places where NTFS fragmentation is of any real problem. To stop the MFT from getting fragmented, simply navigate to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ System\ CurrentControlSet\ Control\ Filesystem

Change or create the DWORD key ‘NtfsMftZoneReservation’ to a value of 2.

Regedit 7:

Disable User Tracking:
Certain applications track your activities for the purpose of customizing some features like the user assist function, which is located when you press start and displays your recently clicked shortcuts. Therefore, disabling user tracking will no longer allow you to see these features. however, you may still work around the start menu problem by pinning your most used shortcuts to the list, and it works just as well. Make sure you set the user assist number of entries to 0, or you will have a gap in the list. To disable:

Navigate to:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\ Microsoft\ Windows\ CurrentVersion\ Policies\ Explorer

Create or modify the DWORD key ‘NoInstrumentation’, and set the value to 1

Regedit 8:

Change Your Prefetch Settings:
Not surprising, but the useful prefetch function is not as simple as on or off. There are many levels to prefetching which determine how many system resources actually go to prefetching application data. Depending on the number of boot processes you have on the computer, you can get performance boosts using settings up to 9. Firstly though, find the registry key EnablePrefetcher in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\ CurrentControlSet\ Control\ Session Manager\ Memory Management\ PrefetchParameters. This setting therefore affects loading times of your most frequently launched applications. However, the optimal setting would be around 5, but there is insufficient proof that higher settings result in faster. The default setting of this key is 3.

Regedit 9:

Disable LastKnownGood Configuration Creation:
This setting allows you to disable the creation of the LastKnownGood configuration, which stores a copy of the configuration after each successful boot-up, therefore skipping the process and loading the computer faster. To do this, navigate to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\ Windows NT\ CurrentVersion\ Winlogon and change the key ReportBootOk to 0.

Regedit 10:

Kill Crashed Applications Faster:
Part 1: This registry tweak allows Windows to find and kill a crashed application faster. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Control Panel\ Desktop and add or edit the string HungAppTimeout to a Value of your choice between 1000-5000 for optimum results. Default setting is 5000 milliseconds.
Part 2: This tweak allows Windows to automatically kill the crashed or hung application without you having to wait. In the same path as part 1, find or create the key AutoEndTasks and set the value to 1.
Part 3: This tweak allows you to still auto close the application is it has crashed, but allows the application some time to ’fix’ itself, for instance, when loading. Again, found in the same directory, find or create the value called WaitToKillAppTimeout, and enter a value in milliseconds.

Regedit 11:

Network Intelligently:
If you are using a CPU intensive program which requires the internet, then this will help a lot. For anything else, you may still get some boost out of this. This tweak basically frees the processor from networking related tasks. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SYSTEM\ CurrentControlSet\ Services\ Tcpip\ Parameters and add or edit String = DisableTaskOffload to a Value of 1.

Regedit 12:

Disable The Thumbnail Cache:
The thumbnail cache is there for the purpose of storing those little graphics showing what a photo is, what a movie contains, or what photos and/or videos a folder contains so that they can be loaded and therefore viwed faster. However, this has nothing to do with loading the actual file, just as a preview. This cache actually takes up space on the computer and is especially evident on computers with many graphics or videos. Turning this feature off will save you space. It will still allow you to see the previews, but it will need to load them every time. There is not much of a point to it, so you might as well disable it. Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\ Microsoft\ Windows\ CurrentVersion\ Explorer\ Advanced and add or edit the DWORD value DisableThumbnailCache to a Value of 1.

Regedit 13:

Defragment specific files and folder with Shell:
I wont explain what shell is, but basically, this allows you the option to select whatever files and folders you want to defragment, directly from explorer, without having to have Defrag.exe do the entire disk. This is especially useful if you want to quickly bring, say, a game folder, to the beginning of the drive for faster performance with the specific selection. To do this, navigate to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\ Drive\ Shell and create a new string value called Defrag. Once created, select this value (single click), and then right click it and choose another string value (Edit –> New –> String Value). Name it command. Double click the standard value and type in the value Defrag.exe%1. Exit the registry editor, and right click on something you wish to defragment. You will see a new option called Defrag. Select this to defragment your selection. If you do not see the option, double check and make sure you have added this correctly, and restart.

Note: This tweak has yet to be tested. I will report back with results soon.

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BIOS Tweaks:

BIOS tweaks are related to the settings that are located within the BIOS. There are some powerful settings in here which can destroy your hardware if you set values to insane amounts. As always, never touch any settings that you are unfamiliar with. Now getting into the BIOS is very easy. Right after you start up your computer, somewhere on the screen (it varies with different manufacturers), there will be some text saying press *button* to enter BIOS/CMOS. This *button* can vary, but generally it would be either Esc, Del, or F2. Sometimes it may be necessary to repeatedly press the button to get into the BIOS. Once you are in, you will see low graphics menus (note that there may also be a password. If you arent sure what the password is, read on to find out how to solve this). The BIOS will have a legend showing what different keys do. Always save before exiting unless you havent changed any settings, or want to undo something to which you dont remember the original value for.

Now everyone makes mistakes, and if you save something which renders your system inoperable, there is a simple solution to your problems (this applies for the password problem as well). If you open up your computer, look for a metal disk. This is actually one of those flat batteries you see in car remote controls etc. You can try one of two things; Remove the battery and disconnect the power cable to your computer, or look for the ‘Clear CMOS’ Jumper. A jumper is a small piece of plastic about 1/4 of the size of your thumb nail and it connects two pieces of metal together (sticking up from the motherboard) to create a circuit, and therefore, represent an on/off value. Make sure the computer is off before going either one of these, and make sure you touch the case metal to remove any static electricity that may be in you. If you start up your computer now, it should notify you that the default settings have been restored, and therefore your computer can be used again.

BIOS Tweak 1:

Disable Unneeded Ports Or In-Built Motherboard Features:
In this age of computing, everything comes loaded with features, many of which we dont even use. Think of disabling unneeded services, and then think of the hardware part of it. Unnecessary resources are being used for your serial ports (they look like the VGA ports, but they are the ‘male’ versions), which few of us use, then your parallel ports (think of those large printer ports that have the red/pink/maroon colour), and then any other additional feature which you may come across while looking through the BIOS. To disable your unneeded components, look through your BIOS for ‘Integrated Peripherals’, or something similar. If you dont need a port or function, and you dont intend on using it anytime in the future, then it is safe to disable it. Keep in mind though, if you use a printer connected to the parallel port (printers using the LPT1/2/3 ports), do not disable it or your printer wont work.

BIOS Tweak 2:

Alter Memory Latency Settings:
In a nutshell, latency settings change how long it takes for your RAM to send and receive data. So therefore, setting lower latency times for your memory will therefore improve your performance. Just like overclocking, there is a limit to what you can do before you cause instability (it can of course be reset if you do something wrong).
To change these settings, look for the ‘advanced chipsets’ menu (some BIOS’s may support the alteration of these settings). From here, you simply lower the settings. It is inadvisable to go from slow to fast in one go, but no harm comes from doing so. Find the settings that are stable for you (ie. if you can run your computer normally with no lag or freezing) and give your computer a test run with a game or similar high end application.

BIOS Tweak 3:

Overclocking your system:
The popular overclocking function works by making certain hardware, like RAM, GPU and CPU, go faster by moving more data at faster speeds. This ultimately leads to having to also increase the voltage flowing through these components, and therefore increasing the amount of heat created. Before proceeding, check in your BIOS under something that may be called PC Health, or similar, for your temperatures, with emphasis on CPU temperature. It is inadvisable to overclock if your CPU idles (isnt doing anything) at 65 degrees C or over. CPU’s can withstand up to around 90 degrees before they get destroyed or damaged by heat. Also keep in mind that without proper cooling, a CPU at such high temperatures will also wear out faster and therefore lose several years off its lifespan.

Before continuing, some background information on overclocking; The way the speed of a CPU is calculated is from the information of the FSB speed, multiplied by the CPU multiplier (hence its name). For example, if your FSB is 200 Mhz, and the CPU multiplier is 10, then your CPU speed becomes 2000 Mhz, or 2 Ghz. The FSB is the path on the motherboard which is used to move information between the CPU and RAM. The speed of this would typically run at the speed of the RAM, but newer chipsets are capable of making the RAM run faster than the FSB. Overclocking the FSB is one of the best ways to increase the performance of your computer, as most information passes through this area.

To overclock your FSB, first find the settings for your memory and/or FSB. This should be located in a menu named ‘Frequency/Voltage Control’, or similar. Remember to always increase in increments when it comes to overclocking, then remember the number (best to use paper for this), save and restart. Repeat this process until you cant boot into XP. This is when your computer becomes unstable (its just a name, its not as bad as it sounds). Once youve found the unstable setting, go back into the BIOS and change the setting to the highest setting that worked (this is where that paper comes in handy). You will most likely need to reset the BIOS to get back into it.

The CPU multiplier can make larger differences with smaller changes, than the FSB, but it isnt that simple, as you are only altering the speed within the CPU, and therefore you do not get a performance increase throughout the entire system. Sometimes it may actually be necessary to decrease the multiplier to increase your performance via the FSB to achieve a faster FSB while still maintaining stability. To change your CPU multiplier, find the multiplier settings, which should be in the same menu as the FSB settings. Again, always go one step at a time. It is recommended to do this in unison with your FSB settings.

Now for the part which can be potentially fatal to your computer. The voltage of the CPU and RAM. Once you have reached the maximum stable limit of frequency alteration, you may now consider increasing the voltage to increase the stability of overclocked hardware. This is the single most important area in which a beginner must step-up one at a time, or risk buring out hardware. This should also be possible to modify through the same menu. Then, once youve changed the voltage, step up a frequency or multiplier and observe the results.

Thats it! Now also note that you may want to consider getting better cooling due to the increased heat made. Its not a nice feeling to be in the middle of something, then get a busted CPU…and a lighter wallet. So its recommended to invest 30 to 50 dollars in cooling, rather than paying 200 up to 1500 dollars (depending on your CPU) for a new CPU.

BIOS Tweak 4:

Disable floppy drive seek
The floppy drive seek option sets whether your PC will attempt to detect the floppy drive(s) during boot up. Whether it finds one or not, there is no point to it, as control of hardware devices including drives are handed over from the BIOS to Windows.
By disabling the ‘floppy drive seek’ option in the ‘advanced BIOS features’ menu, you can save a few seconds while booting, and since there is no point to it, you might as well disable it anyway.

BIOS Tweak 5:

Free up hard disk access resources by disabling S.M.A.R.T:
S.M.A.R.T is a monitoring tool on your hard drive which monitors hard disk performance and activity, and notifies you if there is a potential hardware failure, among other things. Its basically a tool in diagnosing problems. If you dont want these extra resources going to S.M.A.R.T, then you can go into the BIOS and disable it. It is found in the Advanced BIOS Features menu.

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Other Tips and Tricks:

Trick 1:

Isolate Paging File:
The paging file is pretty much extra memory placed on the hard drive and is generally 1.5x the size of your computers RAM. It is slower than the RAM because the hard drive has moving parts but if you have enough memory, it shouldnt really be needed. If you have more than one hard drive, you can speed up access of the paging file by isolating the paging file in another hard drive (that does not contain the currently running operating system). To do this, it is best to have a partition made that is a bit bigger than your paging file. Once that is out of the way, right click on My Computer and click properties. Go advanced and click on performance settings. While you are here, select or deselect some visual options as these use up resources. Once done, go to the advanced tab and click change under virtual memory. Here you can change the size of the paging file and which drive/partition it can be located on. Once adjusted, click set and restart the computer.

Trick 2:

Adjust graphics and detail:
Graphics are major users or resources so it would benefit you to optimize it. The first thing to adjust is the resolution and colour depth. right click on an empty space on your desktop and click properties. Go to the settings tab. You will see a slider. Move it to the left to decrease resolution, making the computer go faster and making things appear larger. Move it to the left to do the opposite. Find a happy medium between speed and detail. Next, go to the drop down list. the higher the bit depth, the more colours can be used, but again, will decrease performance. Find that balance again. Next thing to do is to adjust the refresh rate of the monitor. The refresh rate is the speed at which the monitor will change its pixels to show new images. This is especially important if you want extremely smooth movement of graphics on the screen. Do not incorrectly set this as some monitors can get damaged from incorrect settings. Unless you are a gaming freak, someone who does video editing or similar, or just has a lot of performance to burn, this setting can be set at 60 hertz. Note that setting it to 60 hertz may increase eye strain, so if you do get affected by that, then increase the refresh rate to 75. Now, another thing that can slow down a computer is its wallpaper. When people get wallpapers they usually set it to stretch so it fits the graphic to the exact resolution the monitor is at. Tiled setting is just as bad. If you select Center it will use less resources trying to render it each time it is displayed. Use small files that fit to your computers dimensions as much as possible, try to use a compressed file format such as .gif or .jpeg, and dont even think about using uncompressed formats like .png. Even .bmp degrades performance more than other compressed types.

Another thing to try is to go to the system properties (windows key + pause/break), clicking on the advanced tab, opening up the performance settings, and adjusting the graphics for best performance. Windows XP has all these nice animations and effects like sliding or fading menus, shadows and so on. Some of these are rather stupid and take up too many resources, so you can disable one or two…or several, but you dont have to disable all of them unless you are squeezing performance out of your computer. Happy medium….

Trick 3:

Speed Up Folder Access:
This one is a no-brainer. If you have ever tried to open up a folder with a lot of files in it, or a fair few amount of .AVI files in it, you will know why this one is a good one to do. Ok so firstly, you go to the control panel and go into the Folder Options. under the View tab you will see some check boxes. Uncheck the following:

Automatically Search for network folders and printers
Do not cache thumbnails
Launch windows in separate process

Thats all. Now if you dont have a network, you dont need the first one as it will just use up those precious resources. As for the second one, the thumbnails are those big boxes with a graphic in it which will also show a preview of a graphic if the icon leads to a graphic file. The cache is like the temporary internet files folder. It just helps speed things up. However, too many things in the cache will slow it down. The worst part of this is that your computer will go really show if you have a folder full of .AVI files. .AVI files are uncompressed video files and they take up a hell of a lot of space. Lastly, launching each window in a separate process will lead to slightly faster folder exploring and better reliability. For example, if explorer crashes, you should still have your other windows because they were seperate from explorer.exe.

Trick 4:

Make sure your computer is using DMA:
DMA, or Direct Memory Access should always be on as this will help make your computer transfer data more efficiently. To check whether you are using DMA or not (and to enable it):

Press Windows Key+ Pause/Break to bring up the system properties.
Under the Hardware tab, click Device Manager.
Expand the IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers.
Double click Primary IDE Channel.
Under the Advanced Settings tab, open the drop down menu next to transfer mode and choose DMA if available. If you see a device 0 and device 1 there, do it for both.
Repeat steps 3 to 5 if you have another Primary IDE Channel in the device manager.
Restart the computer.

Trick 5:

Set CPU priority for processes:
This is done whenever you may need that extra power for a certain program. Press Ctrl+Alt+Del and bring up the process manager. Look for the process name of the program you want to change priority to. Right click on it and where set priority is, select the CPU priority. Realtime is the fastest but it will suck CPU power up from every other process, so therefore it isnt recommended. anything under that is fine. For something like Word or similar, use the Idle priority as it is only text and it is easy to process.

Trick 6:

Reduce the number of icons on your Desktop, System Tray and Quick Launch Bar:
This will help a lot when you exit high resource using programs. Its very simple, have as little amount of icons as you can. I recommend that you make a main folder on your desktop and place everything you access frequently in there. It acts like a second Start menu to help avoid congesting it. You can easily get your icons down to 2 or 3 on your desktop and just have the show desktop icon on your quick launch bar. Your System Tray on the other hand, is a bit more tricky as when you exit the programs, they will come back again after a restart. To stop this, you either disable the show icon in the System Tray, or disable it in the startup entries.

Trick 7:

Clean out your prefetch folder from time to time:
The prefetch function is a technique in XP which is like a cache. Its there to speed up access to the files in there. However. after a while, this folder will become congested with files that have rarely been used and all that clutter will decrease performance. Now to clean it up, go to your system drive (the one with the operating system, which is most likely C):/Windows/prefetch, and delete all files that havent been used in a while. This will vary from person to person. If you use high end software then you may want to remove all files older than a week, whereas others may want to remove ones older than a month. Either way, you will notice an increase in performance. Do not, however, delete these files too often as you will decrease performance instead.

Trick 8:

Decrease application loading time:
If youve read the previous trick, you should already know what prefetching is. Now to prefetch programs; Find or make a shortcut to the program you want to prefetch. Rick click on the shortcut and select properties. In the text field called Target, add to the end of the path ” /prefetch:1″ (there is a space before the slash…and no quotes). Click ok and there you go.

Trick 9:

Start up the computer faster with less fonts:
When the computer starts up, it loads many things. Among them are the fonts the computer uses for different styles of text. The more fonts you have, the longer it takes to load. So simply, remove unnecessary fonts like wingdings etc from your fonts folder found in the control panel.

Trick 10:

Adjust cache parameters:
We all know what the cache is by now, so lets look at it in detail. Aside from the min and max cache size, we can also adjust a few other things. Chunk size, as the name suggests, determines the size of each bit of info in the cache. if you use high end software, its best to change the size to around 2 megs (2048 KB). Lower this setting if you mainly use low end software. 2 other setting you can change are the name and directory cache. The Name and Directory cache work in conjunction with eachother and control how much memory is set aside for caching the filenames and directories that are used by programs, which can speed up subsequent accesses.
Now to my knowledge, there is no simple way to change all these at once. However, there is a program about 200 KB made by AnalogX called CacheBooster. Unfortunately, I cannot link the site because neoseeker blocks the first part of the websites name, so if you do a google search for CacheBooster, you will find the file.

Trick 11:

Use RAM Conservatively:
When we have multiple programs, or use programs that eat through our memory, the ram isnt used in a smart way, to put it simply. The best thing to do is to make sure that the computer uses every last bit of RAM before it starts to page data to the hard drive. To do this, go to run, and type in msconfig. Click on the SYSTEM.ini tab. click the plus next to [386enh]. Click New and type in ‘ConservativeSwapfileUsage=1′. Click apply and ok, then restart the computer.

Trick 12:

Disable Performance Counters:
Just like Windows 2000, XP comes with performance counters that most of us would never even use, let alone be aware of. These performance counters pretty much monitor your computer and record data for someone to read. If you own the computer youre sitting at, and dont read it, disable it. To do this:

Download the Extensible Performance Counter List, install it, and open up ‘exctrlst.exe’ in the area you installed the program. Once you have it open, select one counter, and uncheck the box at the bottom labeled ‘Performance Counters Enabled’. Do this for every counter in the list. Once youre finished, close the program, and you should see no information when you try to open up the performance logs under administrative tools in the control panel.

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This message was edited by hiigaran on Apr 15 2009.