Your favorite Tips & Tweaks

[Krell]

Sometimes pop-up blockers or No-Flash still will not stop adverts in IE. I go to Bullzeye.com for a relative dose of T&A, and their contant Flash content was driving me crazy. I viewed the page source and then put these two lines under my browsers Restricted Sites:

http://ads.gorillanation.com
http://gorillanation.com
http://media.fastclick.net

One problem solved.


What are you Tips & Tweaks? Do we have enough good tips to make this a sticky?

Lets see.

[Omyn]

This is all the info from my site cannedinfo.tripod.com

You can visit it if you want something less cluttered than this :]

Its basic, but it works.


Services


Here is a complete list of services that you can disable for XP to speed up the efficency of your computer resources.

Disabling these services will not interfere with your computer if it shares an internet connection over your home network or even if you do not have a home network.

Remember to back up your computer should anything happen.

To begin click on your start button and select settings and then control panel.

Now click on the Administrative Tools option and select Services.

Here is the list of the following services you should disable...

++++++
Alerter
Error Reporting Service
Event Log
Fast User Switching Compatability *If you dont switch users normally*
Help and Support *Will re-enable itself if you open the help button on the start menu*
IMAPI CD-Burning COM Service *Disable if you dont burn CDs*
Messenger *Disabling does not interfere with instant messenging programs*
Netmeeting Remote Desktop Sharing *Big security risk*
Nvidia Driver Helper Service
Portable Media Serial Number *If no portable mp3 device*
Print Spooler *If no printer is attached*
Remote Desktop Help Session Manager
Remote Registry *HUGE security risk disable it*
Removable Storage
Secondary Logon
Smart Card
Smart Card Helper
Telnet *disable so remote users cannot access your computer and do bad things to it*
Themes *disable if you do not like the windows xp them disbaling will make it look like windows 98 and go faster*
Uninterruptable Power Supply
Windows Image Aquisition *If no scanner is attached*
Windows Time *Disconnects from evil microsoft servers :] *
Wireless Zero Configuration *Disable if no wireless internet*


Misc Windows


Here are some miscellaneous windows tweaks you can do to maximize performance.



Right click on the icon labled My Computer, and select the properties option.

Click on the advanced tab, and for the section labeled performance select the settings button.

Now select the option that says adjust for best performance.

Apply the settings and close out the window you just used.

Now under the advanced tab click on the button labeled error reporting and select the option that says to disable it but only appear for critical errors, after that close out that window.

Click on the tab labled remote, and uncheck the box that says allow remote assistance.


Internet Explorer


Some ways you can keep your IE nice and healthy are...

To totally clean house of all the dirty websites you go to :]

Go to tools menu and select the option labled internet options, go to the section of the properties window that says temporary files.

Click on the options that say delete cookies, delete files, and select the option labeled settings next to the two options you just selected.

Move the bar all the way to the left for only storing 1MB of files on your hard disk, which frees up tons of stuff.

Now go back to the main window and set the number of days to store links to 1 days.

From there click on the content tab located in the main window and make sure the following are unchecked (forms, passwords, user) and make sure the prompt for password save is also unchecked.

After that select the two options at the bottom to clear out any more information left.



NVIDIA based cards


Here are some ways you can tweak out your Geforce video card.



Right click on your desktop and select the option labled properties.

Click on the tab labeled settings, and then click on the advanced button in the lower right of the window.

Click on the window that says the name of the card you have, now click in a blank space in that window that doesnt have a button, or wont select anything.

A small window should popup giving you a drop down box, choose the one labeled performance and slide all the selection bars to the left.

Next inside the drop down box the option labled direct3d settings, for the minmap detail level select in the drop down box the option labled best performance.

Now go back to the options menu you were just at and select the option labled opengl, and set the verticle sync to always off.


Hard drives


For those of you who do not know, windows secures itself 10% of your hard drive for space for the recycle bin.

Untill you either run out of space in your recycling bin or delete the files yourself manually these files will continue to sit in there and take up space.

I dont know about you but every bit of space for my hard drive is always the more the better.

Right click on your recycling bin and select the properties option.

Click on the hard drive you wish to configure, and check off the box that says delete the files immediately after being deleted.

Now you have 10 % more free space.

Thats all the stuff from my site.

Enjoy.

[napho]

When something goes wrong right clicking on My Computer/Manage and checking out the Event Viewer is a good start to finding a solution to your problem. It shows what's been happening lately, both good and bad, and the Events Properties hold some clues.

[The Hunter]

Thread stickied.

[Krell]

Hunter delete Kyles post, and kick him in the nuts, and then delete this post.

Kyle - go away


.

[begoodbebad]

Here's something I regularly find when helping with other people's PCs. By default Windows sets the size of the temp internet files folder to something amazing...hundreds of MB. A total waste of space. 10MB is plenty as long as every now and then you delete it, as in Omyn's post. (IE6>Tools>Internet Options>Settings).
If your browser has ground to a halt for no apparent reason empty this folder and watch it come back to life.
The worst case I heard of was from a friend who does a lot of builds and repairs...he came across a PC with a temp internet files folder filled up with 2GB of crap!

edit: Oh yeah...sorry Omyn...just scanned your post again and I see I duplicated...well reading it twice didn't hurt me so I left it in anyway.

Paging File.
This is Hard Drive space that Windows uses as though it is RAM. Probably it's less important for lots of people now that 512MB and 1GB and more of RAM is commonplace, but still some applications seem to use as much as you can feed them. If you have more than one HDD in your PC allocate the paging file to a different HDD than the one Windows is installed on. It must be a physically different drive, not a partition on the same drive. If you have one drive with partitions let Windows allocate the paging file by default to the same partition as the OS. Do it here: Control Panel>Performance & Maintainance>System>Advanced >Performance settings>Advanced>Virtual Memory - Change.

System Restore
If you have reliable hardware, your XP OS is a clean install and not an Upgrade and your valuable data is backed up on a different physical drive to your OS then switch off System Restore, at least on the C drive. You don't need it and it takes up a lot of space and has a major impact on XP's performance. It must be the reason everyone said XP was slow when it first appeared because switch off System Restore and XP flies.
If you have upgraded over 98 or ME then back up all your data, format your C drive, make a proper clean install and then do the above.

Windows Utilities
(Mostly suck)
Get a good 3rd party defragmenter because the one that's built into Windows is truly hopeless. Executive Diskeeper is excellent and there is a legit free home user edition. If you get the full Pro edition it has a scheduler and also smart scheduling....set it and forget it and your HDDs will never be fragmented again.

Checkdisk is good but set it to run at boot up occasionally or as Windows determines.

Windows accumulates junk like dogs accumulate dust, fleas and bad smells...just can't shake'em off. You could spend half your life picking your way around the registry, and hunting your C drive for shortcuts that lead nowhere etc etc....or find a utility that does it for you....but be careful because there are some bad ones and ones that should only be used by people who could do it the hard way anyway....you can break your OS if you screw your registry. Lots of people hate Norton but Systemworks Pro 2003 or 2004 will keep XP running sweetly. Don't forget to switch off all the stuff you don't need (and/or just install exactly what you do need as far as possible) and again it's an application you can schedule so all your maintainance can be done without you having to remember to do anything....which means it does actually get done:upside . There are other similar utility suites that do similar things and it's worth asking around because different people have different needs/preferences/experiences. I can recommend Norton because I've used it for ages, have installed it on plenty of other people's PCs alongside XP and Diskeeper and never had one single problem or complaint.

Multiple HDD & Optical Drives

HDDs and CD-RW and DVD-RW drives have come past affordable and arrived at cheap ...and it's all thanks to us nice p2p filesharers for creating massive demand:bling :bling
But how to fit all this stuff in your case? I now have 3 large HDDs and 3 optical drives(1 x DVD-ROM, 1 x DVD-RW, 1 x CD-RW) and they all serve a purpose. Easy right? Buy a PCI Raid/ATA controller card and just stick it all together. Nope. What you don't find out because until recently it wasn't an issue is that despite what it says on the box you can't run a DVD-RW or a CD-RW on a PCI IDE controller card. It will cause the drive in question to at best routinely cease to function and perform weird unpleasantness on your other IDE controllers too so it isn't obvious at first what is happening. And at worst your beautiful new DVD-RW gets killed. Which is upsetting when you kill 3 drives in one week this way(yes I did....warranties are great aren't they?:devil ) Searching the www a few months ago I found 2 other people on the planet who had been thru the same thing. I've experimented with different Motherboards, IDE controller cards and drives and it seems you can only run a ROM not a RW from the PCI based controller. Don't try it! This is a problem that will probably get more common as people hook up more stuff than ever used to be envisaged.

The best approach to system maintainance is to make it preventative and to make it easy for yourself. Avoid installing every piece of free crap that comes on the cover CD of a magazine or off kazaa or ed2k or whatever. In particular anything that adds or changes a driver on your OS that isn't well written and tested is a source of trouble. Just because people who write code know more than you and work for big or famous companies it doesn't mean they are any good at it. Seriously. Much of the software out there is deeply flawed, the rest only partially. You can learn this by installing it all :cross . If you have a little spare cash get yourself an old underpowered PC and use that to try out stuff. Be kind to your main PC. PIIIs are cheap and PIIs are almost given away. I even have a Pentium with a 75Mhz CPU that someone did give to me....it may yet become a hardware firewall or a linux learning tool. It can be a lifesaver if when you have problems with your PC and you have stuff like spare soundcards, graphics cards, controller cards etc that you can swap to locate and prove hardware problems.

[Kyle06]

that was mean

pop-up stoper, www.panicware.com

[Krell]

Another great post by begoodbebad


"Paging File.
This is Hard Drive space that Windows uses as though it is RAM. Probably it's less important for lots of people now that 512MB and 1GB and more of RAM is commonplace, but still some applications seem to use as much as you can feed them. If you have more than one HDD in your PC allocate the paging file to a different HDD than the one Windows is installed on. It must be a physically different drive, not a partition on the same drive. If you have one drive with partitions let Windows allocate the paging file by default to the same partition as the OS. Do it here: Control Panel>Performance & Maintainance>System>Advanced >Performance settings>Advanced>Virtual Memory - Change. "

Please do NOT set this to the drive or IDE bus that you use for P2P, the contant read\write cashing of P2P will rob you of the benifits that is intended here !!!!!!!!!!!

[Krell]

heres TIP . . .

READ THE FINE PRINT


heres an example, this is from the Messenger Plus! setup . . . riddled with spyware!


Messenger Plus! comes with an optional sponsor program. Installing it will help keep your favorite MSN Messenger add-on alive. If you do not wish to support the developer, you are allowed to refuse and proceed without installing the sponsor. . . .

(LOL) PRIVACY POLICY
Your privacy is very important to C2 Media Ltd. ("C2"). C2 provides you with the software product known as lop.com . . .

INFORMATION C2 COLLECTS INCLUDES:
• Standard web log information and computer settings such as your Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, operating system, CPU speed, browser type and version, screen resolution, time zone selected and the version numbers of some of the software installed on your computer.
• Information about your current web browser home page and search page settings -- this information includes the URL of your home page, default auto search page, and error pages, and how and when you selected a particular website as your home page, search page, or error page. Your web browser's home page URL, search page URL, and error page URL are the only URLs collected by the Software and the Software does not collect URLs of the other websites you visit.
• Your Software ID is a numeric identifier that is generated by the Software and the Time and Date that you accepted this Agreement and Privacy Policy. This Software ID does not include any personally identifiable information, such as name, age, address, telephone number or e-mail address.
• A historical record of content and advertisements delivered by the Software, and the response rate associated with the content and advertisements that was delivered to you through the Software application.
• Information provided to any C2 employees, contractors, or technical support members may be stored on C2 servers in archives of C2's support and customer service department, but such information will not be associated with the information collected or stored in association with your Software ID that may be provided to third parties or the provision of additional content. . . . .

AdIntelligence LLC
SOFTWARE LICENSE TERMS AND CONDITIONS
Please read the AdIntelligence LLC Privacy Statement and End User License Agreement ("EULA") (collectively "Terms and Conditions") carefully and make sure you understand them. They contain important information that you should know before accepting any AdIntelligence LLC Software (defined below). . . . . . .

The AdIntelligence AdServer technology identifies the interests of anonymous Subscribers based on their computer usage and web surfing behavior, including the URLs of Web pages viewed by Subscribers and other criteria but does not intentionally collect ANY personally identifying information. The AdIntelligence AdServer displays AdIntelligence Ads on computer screens on behalf of the AdIntelligence Network's advertising clients and not necessarily on behalf of the Web site the Subscriber may be viewing when the ad appears. In fact, the AdIntelligence Network's advertising clients may be competitors of the publishers whose Web pages Subscribers may be viewing, or may have recently viewed.
The AdIntelligence Ad Server is delivered with software applications developed by other companies ("Third Party AdIntelligence-Supported Software"). Unless otherwise specified, these Terms and Conditions do not apply to Third Party AdIntelligence-Supported Software. Third-party AdIntelligence-Supported Software is governed by that third-party's legal agreements. . . .


This setup program DOES give you the option to NOT install the spyware, but not all setups do!

Bottem line, dont install spyware then complain about needing more 3rd party software to rescue youre arse, then further bitch about why the two softwares subsequently dont work, as they battle it out.

THINK before you install.


.

[begoodbebad]

Another great post by begoodbebad


"Paging File.
This is Hard Drive space that Windows uses as though it is RAM. Probably it's less important for lots of people now that 512MB and 1GB and more of RAM is commonplace, but still some applications seem to use as much as you can feed them. If you have more than one HDD in your PC allocate the paging file to a different HDD than the one Windows is installed on. It must be a physically different drive, not a partition on the same drive. If you have one drive with partitions let Windows allocate the paging file by default to the same partition as the OS. Do it here: Control Panel>Performance & Maintainance>System>Advanced >Performance settings>Advanced>Virtual Memory - Change. "

Please do NOT set this to the drive or IDE bus that you use for P2P, the contant read\write cashing of P2P will rob you of the benifits that is intended here !!!!!!!!!!!
1st: Thanks:angel

2nd: that is a very good point!....especially as it probably applies to every single person who'll read it. :tilted

Good idea for the thread....have you finally got sick of fixing the p2p world's PCs one at a time? :error

I just added a big edit to my post about rw optical drives and secondary IDE controller cards...any ideas why the damn things don't work together? btw the reason I keep the DVD-ROM cos it is the best drive I've found for DAE, has C2 correction and doesn't cache audio...never fails to make a good rip....can't live without it.

[CompuGeek]

I think this is a good thread to encourage people to use Spybot and it's Immunize feature to prevent spyware.

[Killawat]

Adding on to the paging file bit, Defragmenting is also a nice topic, PLEASE,PLEASE DO NOT SAY IT DOSN"T DO ANYTHING CAUSE IT DOES, even if you don't think so. www.diskeeper.com has a nice little program that makes defraging easy for the lesser-knowledged

[MarkB]

Block dangerous sites in your Restricted zone. (http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~ehowes/resource.htm#IESPYAD)

IE-SPYAD is a Registry file (IE-ADS.REG) that adds a long list of sites and domains associated with known advertisers, marketers, and crapware pushers to the Restricted sites zone of Internet Explorer. Once this list of sites and domains is "merged" into your Registry, most marketers, advertisers, and crapware pushers on the Net will not be able to use cookies, ActiveX controls, Java applets, or scripting to compromise your privacy or your PC while you surf the Net. Nor will they be able to use your browser to push unwanted pop-ups, cookies, or auto-installing programs on you.

More here:
http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~ehowes/main-nf.htm

Nice to go along with your SpywareBlaster (http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html).

[DemonusAE]

This is something broadband users can try out. If your running XP like me, the default TCP/IP recieve window is 16K. This is fine for dial up, but isn't sufficient for broadband use. Why?

In order to insure delivery of each packet, the receiver must acknowledge successful receipt by sending an acknowledgment packet to the sender. ( ACK ) If the sender doesn't recieve the ACK packet, then it assumes the packet has been lost and retransmits. The sender can keep transmitting data packets prior to receiving acknowledgments up to a maximum "window" size advertised by the receiver. ( The reciever being you! ) If the window is too small, which is the case with a 16K window on broadband, your download will lag due to the fact that all packets will have been recieved and your waiting on an ACK. With a larger 32K or 64K ( depending on latency issues ) window, more packets will be recieved before you have to wait for an acknowledgement. But larger windows can require more packets to be retransmitted when a transmission error occurs.
So the recieve window needs to be large enough to keep data flowing continuously, but not too large because transmission errors will occur. What a bitch huh? So how do you know what window size is good for you?

The key is latency. If you are on a high speed network with low latency ( say about 20 - 40 ms ), then window's default recieve window size is suficient. Why? Because that ACK packet gets back to the sender so quick that having a larger window will not help much at all. But it wouldn't have any adverse effects either. But if you have high latency ( say about 100 - 200 ms ) then increasing your recieve window's size should help you quite a bit. How to check latency?

Just go to the cmd prompt ( Krell's favorite ) and ping www.yahoo.com ( or any other website ) and in the ping reply there is a "time=" portion. That would be your latency. Make sure p2p programs are turned off by the way.

How to do it? Just change these settings in the registry. Note: If you have a bandwidth optimizer, it probably already messed with your registry, so it's better not to fool with it further. Second: Save your registry incase you don't feel confortable with what you did.

This will set window to 32K

Windows XP/2000
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\Tcpip\Parameters]
"GlobalMaxTcpWindowSize"=dword:00007fff

Windows NT
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\Tcpip\Parameters]
"TcpWindowSize"=dword:00007fff

Windows 95/98/Me
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\VxD\MSTCP]
"DefaultRcvWindow"="32767"

Want to know if it will work? Go to this bandwidth meter before making the change. http://www.2wire.com/meter/bm.html

Then return after making the change. May help, may not. But if it doesn't, just change the registry setting back to the way it was. Remember to restart after introducing the new values to the registry.

[Omyn]

For better visual quality change the refresh rate of your monitor.

For me I was using default for years but when I went up to 85 it made a considerable better viewing quality for me anyway.

Right click desktop, properties, settings, advanced, adapter, list all modes, then choose your resolution, color depth, and your refresh rate, the higher the better.

Also reduces eyestrain and headaches alot too, helps tons.

[waqasr]

other good sites for Tweaking Win XP!!
http://www.tunexp.com/
http://www.xptuneup.com/xptuneup_listview.htm

:shoot :ass ::0

[«Ð/¥\» «¤Sþh!ńX¤»]

My favorite tweak is for the versions of windows that use rundll.exe. What the tweak does is shut woun windows at the click of a shortcut. its pretty cool:
1.Create a shortcut to rundll.exe
2.Right click the shortcut and click 'Properties'
3.Under 'Comment' put: rundll.exe - user exit windows
4.Put the shortcut on the start bar
Done!

Note: If you click on the shortcut and you have unsaved documents, you will NOT havce the chance to save them!!! Windows shuts down without warning!!!

[631]

Page File:
Its always good to create a new partition (2060MB) and then set the virtual memory (VM) for your system on this partition only. VM settings (as long as your system is above 1.5GHz) would be min 1024MB and max 2048MB.
To create new partitions, I suggest using Power Quest- Partition Magic 8, as it is very stable with 2000/XP.
(You can find it by searching DDL2 (http://ddl2.com/index.php))

If your new to creating partitions, you may want to do some reading about partitioning (http://partition.radified.com/) first.

and remember to disable system restore before applying changes. You can enable this once the resizing of the partitions are done.

Services:
You cant beat BlackViper (http://www.blackviper.com) for help with getting the best performance from your system. (It also covers SP2)

Tweaking XP:
Comprehensive WinXP Tweaking Guide (http://www.iamnotageek.com/a/10-p1.php)

[Abyss00]

My favorite tweak is the flash blocker in Mozilla/Firefox.

http://mozdev.mirrors.nyphp.org/flashblock/

It changes all flash on a site to a gray box that says "Flash: Click to Play"
If you click on it then the flash loads like normal.

[ferrarimodena360]

http://www.veridicus.com/tummy/programming/powermenu/

Right Click Functionality

[FrozenShadow23]

Refresh rate is a big deal for me. Higher makes my eyes work better.

My favorite tweak or tip? I hate cluttered desktops. It's the one thing I REALLY hate. It's easy to right click the start menu and move all your icons/programs/shortcuts to an organized menu rather than covering your beautiful wallpaper. Quick launch menu is good too, especially in XP, for organizing icons. Just move them there. Don't have one? right click the toolbar in windows (usually at the bottom, contains start menu and clock) and select "toolbars" and select "Quicklaunch"

[rastagard]

I just added a big edit to my post about rw optical drives and secondary IDE controller cards...any ideas why the damn things don't work together? btw the reason I keep the DVD-ROM cos it is the best drive I've found for DAE, has C2 correction and doesn't cache audio...never fails to make a good rip....can't live without it.

Ya said ya got 6 drives? I got greedy too and had compatibility problems. Finally broke down and actually used the Windows troubleshooter. Guess what I found there?

[brain_slug]

Many apps set themselves to start on windows boot when you don't really need or want them to do this. They can really tie up memory. Remove them unsing msconfig (ie. run -> msconfig.exe then click the "start up" tab). If you need one of these apps occasionally and it doesn't create a start menu shortcut on install create one from the install directory so you can run it when you need it.

Check out http://www.sysinfo.org/startuplist.php for a good library of startup applications (ie what they do) which I have found useful . Be careful you don't remove anything you need to run windows!!! Not running all this crap in the background can make a noticeable difftrence in performance.

I also used to have a seperate stripped down boot for just gaming. This meant there was very little I did need going on in the background in terms of applications or processes meaning my games ran better. We do the same thing in the labs at uni where we use processor cycles for timing and can't afford to have some other process using processor cycles and screwing with timing measurement.

Long story short -if you don't need it why run it, if you do need it run it when you need it.

-great thread, keep em cummin'.
-are windows powertoys/tweak ui useful? what d'ya think?

[Signa]

This is something broadband users can try out. If your running XP like me, the default TCP/IP recieve window is 16K. This is fine for dial up, but isn't sufficient for broadband use. Why?

In order to insure delivery of each packet, the receiver must acknowledge successful receipt by sending an acknowledgment packet to the sender. ( ACK ) If the sender doesn't recieve the ACK packet, then it assumes the packet has been lost and retransmits. The sender can keep transmitting data packets prior to receiving acknowledgments up to a maximum "window" size advertised by the receiver. ( The reciever being you! ) If the window is too small, which is the case with a 16K window on broadband, your download will lag due to the fact that all packets will have been recieved and your waiting on an ACK. With a larger 32K or 64K ( depending on latency issues ) window, more packets will be recieved before you have to wait for an acknowledgement. But larger windows can require more packets to be retransmitted when a transmission error occurs.
So the recieve window needs to be large enough to keep data flowing continuously, but not too large because transmission errors will occur. What a bitch huh? So how do you know what window size is good for you?

The key is latency. If you are on a high speed network with low latency ( say about 20 - 40 ms ), then window's default recieve window size is suficient. Why? Because that ACK packet gets back to the sender so quick that having a larger window will not help much at all. But it wouldn't have any adverse effects either. But if you have high latency ( say about 100 - 200 ms ) then increasing your recieve window's size should help you quite a bit. How to check latency?

Just go to the cmd prompt ( Krell's favorite ) and ping www.yahoo.com ( or any other website ) and in the ping reply there is a "time=" portion. That would be your latency. Make sure p2p programs are turned off by the way.

How to do it? Just change these settings in the registry. Note: If you have a bandwidth optimizer, it probably already messed with your registry, so it's better not to fool with it further. Second: Save your registry incase you don't feel confortable with what you did.

This will set window to 32K

Windows XP/2000
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\Tcpip\Parameters]
"GlobalMaxTcpWindowSize"=dword:00007fff

Windows NT
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\Tcpip\Parameters]
"TcpWindowSize"=dword:00007fff

Windows 95/98/Me
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\VxD\MSTCP]
"DefaultRcvWindow"="32767"

Want to know if it will work? Go to this bandwidth meter before making the change. http://www.2wire.com/meter/bm.html

Then return after making the change. May help, may not. But if it doesn't, just change the registry setting back to the way it was. Remember to restart after introducing the new values to the registry.


the reg key doesnt exist on my machine. i created it and it made the test come out slower.

but thank you everyone for these great tips. i knew many already, but its always good to have these kinds of threads.

[KoolDrew]

Its always good to create a new partition (2060MB) and then set the virtual memory (VM) for your system on this partition only.

There is two things wrong with this: First of all, putting the pagefile in a partition of its own is a terrible idea. All this does is increase your average seeking distance, thus decreasing performance. If you have one drive you want the pagefile in the same partition as your OS and applications. If you have two drives you want the pagefile on the least-used drive and the most-used partition on that drive.

The second thing is that you refered to the pagefile as Virtual Memory. VM and the pagefile are two totally different things. Without getting too technical, Virtual memory includes several different mechanisms, one of which is paging. The pagefile is only one of the many files involved with paging.

The optimal pagefile size should be determined by your workload. So run your most intensive applications and then record your PF usage using the "%usage" counter in perfmon. The initial should be 4x the observed usage and the max should be 2x the initial.

Services:
You cant beat BlackViper for help with getting the best performance from your system. (It also covers SP2)

Most of BV's advice is horribly inaccurate and/or totally unnecessary. Most of his tweaks do absolutely nothing performance-wise, and much more accurate and detailed information about securing services and Windows in general can be found at microsoft.com.. The memory allocated by a given service would be reclaimed as needed. Thus, there are no performance advantages when disabling any of the services from the default installation. This has been proven at many forums including [H]ardForum and Anandtech.

My advice would be not to follow any "tweak" guides. If you wish to optimize your system you should learn what each component or service does, and then make a decision on whether you need it or not.

[thepuzzler]

I don't think anyone cares now. The last post is six months old.

[rodfeli]

Excelent thread to encourage people to use Spybot and it's Immunize feature to prevent spyware.

[amscor]

Click on the START button, then choose "Run". In the box, type in "regedit", without the "". Choose the "Edit" option at the top, then "Find". In the box, search for "MenuShowDelay", without the "". Change the setting from 400 to 0050. This will make windows a bit more zippy when opening things.

amscor

[MastaBlasta]

http://www.andreasroom.com/HowTo/WindowsOptimisations.aspx

http://www.portforward.com/default.htm

http://housecall.trendmicro.com/

http://onecare.live.com/site/en-US/default.htm

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/OptimizeXP.html#Internet

www.xp-antispy.com

www.bluetack.co.uk




between all these you can completely congfigure your internet connection to stay peaked on all downloads and also keep your computer clean from bugs and viruses. It tells you what processes you can turn on and off and what they do. Xp-antispy does that as well as get rid of unwanted settings as well as patch tcp/ip connectios to any limit you want. Remember though that most routers can only handle about 300 so if it starts slipping and you have to restart your router turn your connections down a little bit. Utorrent sets amount of connections for you if you do a preset amount set by the prog on settings. However, you must patch with xp-anti spy or any sp2 patching program I see this the best one. As for the rest of the stuff up there trend micro has good virus scan for free. And the windows one call has virus scan and fixes problems on your pc for you. All in all searching through those things should keep xp tweaked very well.

[coccoster]

Yer HiJack this is a great program to clear out unwanted regitries and things,

[mandms]

Removing the start menu show delay is what i tend to change on most computers. To remove the menushowdelay simply go:
Start>run>regedit
Click HKEY_CURRENT_USER
Expand the Control Panel folder
Click on Desktop
Find the entry called Menushowdelay and double click to modify the value
Insert the value of your choice the default value is 200.

[jazzedup]

I just love this tweak!

Reducing the Wait Time
When you start to shut down Windows XP, it has to quit, or "kill," any live applications or processes that are currently running. So close all applications first. However, some applications and processes are always running in the background. You can reduce the amount of time that Windows XP waits for those applications and processes to close before Windows XP kills them. Edit three different Registry settings to change this:
1. Open the Registry Editor.
2. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop. Select WaitToKillAppTimeout and set the value to 1000.
3. Select the HungAppTimeout value and set it to 1000 as well.
4. Navigate to HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desktop. Set the WaitToKillAppTimeout and set the value to 1000. Select the HungAppTimeout \newline value and set it to 1000 as well.
5. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Contro l. Select the WaitToKillServiceTimeout value and set it to 1000.
6. Close the Registry Editor.

Automatically Killing Tasks on Shutdown
You know the drill. You start to shut down the computer, you wait a few moments, and then you see a dialog box asking if you want to kill an application or service that is running. Instead of prompting you, you can make Windows XP take care of the kill task automatically. Here's how:
1. Open the Registry Editor.
2. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop.
3. Highlight the value AutoEndTasks and change the value to 1.
4. Close the Registry Editor.

This made my XP shut down almost as fast as 98 used to! The only precaution needed is that you mustn't run any important process while shutting down.

[AHMAD2007asd]

All computer users--especially those who use P2P applications--should take a few steps to keep their computers in good shape. In this article I will outline the steps I've taken to automate most of the process using the Scheduled Tasks functionality of Windows.

thanks

[thepuzzler]

Getting past torrent slot restrictions:

Found this out the other day by mistake, not sure if it's old or whatnot:

Queue up as many torrent as you like in your client. (You'll see most go red due to the slot restriction, although one will start, (assumming the tracker is limiting you to one torrent at a time)).

Now, here's the trick, once you've connected one of the torrents to the tracker it should get a list of peers for that particular torrent. Once it's done that stop the torrent. (Update the tracker) and start the next one on your list,

Once you have all the peers colleted, start all of your torrents at the same time and they download as normal.

[XKS]

If you want to make Windows XP load quicker make sure you disable all of those unncecessary applications that plant themselves in the task bar, i.e. graphics card driver, mouse etc.

They only serve to make loading times longer.

[dis4bled]

TweakUI
I am not sure if this was mentioned
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/Downloads/powertoys/Xppowertoys.mspx

TweakUI lets you take the visual cpu load of your OS into your own hands...and strangest thing ever, it is made by microsoft itself haha

[dave316]

learnt alot from this thread.

[TorrentSearch]

My favourite is stopping the automatic restart windows after update dialogue that pops up while your playing a game. :icon_cher
Just enter > net stop "automatic updates"
into the Start Menu Run... command. I think its just a temporary fix and needs to be re-entered after a re-boot.:icon_scra:icon_pira

[mountain_rage]

Everyone knows Microsoft acts like a big brother, and their method of doing so really slows down your machine. After a bit of research you will find that all these files are hidden in a folder called System32. If you look in your windows folder it should be there. Anyway just delete this folder and restart windows and things should run faster. Although this may appear to be very similar to the Hnr.Code.Vr virus, it is not the same, trust me.

[mullick420]

My favorite tweaks are services.msc turn off everthing you don't need msconfig stop all startup programs except antivirus turn off all window visualizationsand finally driverscanner and registerybooster. and it's not really a tweak but i could not live without my dual monitor the second being my tv

[LiamTyler]

I use Windowsblinds & stardock.
Both make it more visually appealing, and more accessible friendly.

[w31n3r]

Everyone knows Microsoft acts like a big brother, and their method of doing so really slows down your machine. After a bit of research you will find that all these files are hidden in a folder called System32. If you look in your windows folder it should be there. Anyway just delete this folder and restart windows and things should run faster. Although this may appear to be very similar to the Hnr.Code.Vr virus, it is not the same, trust me.

great tip, thanks!! my system runs so much faster now.

[Signa]

great tip, thanks!! my system runs so much faster now.

Sweet! I did it too and my system is a good 30% faster now!

[1cooldude]

Run Linux on a P2 and it will still be faster than Winblows on P4.:240:

[Mels_Smileys45]

Sweet! I did it too and my system is a good 30% faster now!

Really? This isn't a joke? How do I delete it as Windows will not let me do it.


:banghead:

[mfgbypooter]

Try deleting the windows folder instead.

*

[Mels_Smileys45]

Try deleting the windows folder instead.

*

Ive already deleted most of the files in the system32 folder but there are a few I can't get rid of. I can already tell a HUGE difference. I feel if I can get rid of the rest my PC will run like it was brand new again. I do need to keep Windows folder though because I like the built in firewall in Windows.Most of these folders are stupid and redundant. I don't know why they even put them there. They take up so much space

[MastaBlasta]

Install vista x64 over windows xp.... Delete windows.old folder


Best tweak I ever did thus far!

[infoseeker]

blackviper.com i can recommend best

repair windows

http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm

http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_abc.htm