[.:23 Ways to speed up WinXP without defrag:.] -
.:23 Ways to speed up WinXP without defrag:.
Discuss .:23 Ways to speed up WinXP without defrag:.
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[color=purple]
[b]1.)[/b] To decrease a system's boot time and increase system performance, use the money you save by not buying defragmentation software -- the built-in Windows defragmenter works just fine -- and instead equip the computer with an Ultra-133 or Serial ATA hard drive with 8-MB cache buffer.
[b]2.)[/b] If a PC has less than 512 MB of RAM, add more memory. This is a relatively inexpensive and easy upgrade that can dramatically improve system performance.
[b]3.)[/b] Ensure that Windows XP is utilizing the NTFS file system. If you're not sure, here's how to check: First, double-click the My Computer icon, right-click on the C: Drive, then select Properties. Next, examine the File System type; if it says FAT32, then back-up any important data. Next, click Start, click Run, type CMD, and then click OK. At the prompt, type CONVERT C: /FS:NTFS and press the Enter key. This process may take a while; it's important that the computer be uninterrupted and virus-free. The file system used by the bootable drive will be either FAT32 or NTFS. I highly recommend NTFS for its superior security, reliability, and efficiency with larger disk drives.
[b]4.)[/b] Disable file indexing. The indexing service extracts information from documents and other files on the hard drive and creates a "searchable keyword index." As you can imagine, this process can be quite taxing on any system.
The idea is that the user can search for a word, phrase, or property inside a document, should they have hundreds or thousands of documents and not know the file name of the document they want. Windows XP's built-in search functionality can still perform these kinds of searches without the Indexing service. It just takes longer. The OS has to open each file at the time of the request to help find what the user is looking for.
Most people never need this feature of search. Those who do are typically in a large corporate environment where thousands of documents are located on at least one server. But if you're a typical system builder, most of your clients are small and medium businesses. And if your clients have no need for this search feature, I recommend disabling it.
Here's how: First, double-click the My Computer icon. Next, right-click on the C: Drive, then select Properties. Uncheck "Allow Indexing Service to index this disk for fast file searching." Next, apply changes to "C: subfolders and files," and click OK. If a warning or error message appears (such as "Access is denied"), click the Ignore All button.
[b]5.)[/b] Update the PC's video and motherboard chipset drivers. Also, update and configure the BIOS.
[b]6.)[/b] Empty the Windows Prefetch folder every three months or so. Windows XP can "prefetch" portions of data and applications that are used frequently. This makes processes appear to load faster when called upon by the user. That's fine. But over time, the prefetch folder may become overloaded with references to files and applications no longer in use. When that happens, Windows XP is wasting time, and slowing system performance, by pre-loading them. Nothing critical is in this folder, and the entire contents are safe to delete.
[b]7.)[/b] Once a month, run a disk cleanup. Here's how: Double-click the My Computer icon. Then right-click on the C: drive and select Properties. Click the Disk Cleanup button -- it's just to the right of the Capacity pie graph -- and delete all temporary files.
[b]8.)[/b] In your Device Manager, double-click on the IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers device, and ensure that DMA is enabled for each drive you have connected to the Primary and Secondary controller. Do this by double-clicking on Primary IDE Channel. Then click the Advanced Settings tab. Ensure the Transfer Mode is set to "DMA if available" for both Device 0 and Device 1. Then repeat this process with the Secondary IDE Channel.
[b]9.)[/b] Upgrade the cabling. As hard-drive technology improves, the cabling requirements to achieve these performance boosts have become more stringent. Be sure to use 80-wire Ultra-133 cables on all of your IDE devices with the connectors properly assigned to the matching Master/Slave/Motherboard sockets. A single device must be at the end of the cable; connecting a single drive to the middle connector on a ribbon cable will cause signaling problems. With Ultra DMA hard drives, these signaling problems will prevent the drive from performing at its maximum potential. Also, because these cables inherently support "cable select," the location of each drive on the cable is important. For these reasons, the cable is designed so drive positioning is explicitly clear.
[b]10.)[/b] Remove all spyware from the computer. Use free programs such as AdAware by Lavasoft or SpyBot Search & Destroy. Once these programs are installed, be sure to check for and download any updates before starting your search. Anything either program finds can be safely removed. Any free software that requires spyware to run will no longer function once the spyware portion has been removed; if your customer really wants the program even though it contains spyware, simply reinstall it.
[b]11.)[/b] Remove any unnecessary programs and/or items from Windows Startup routine using the MSCONFIG utility. Here's how: First, click Start, click Run, type MSCONFIG, and click OK. Click the StartUp tab, then uncheck any items you don't want to start when Windows starts.
[b]12.)[/b] Remove any unnecessary or unused programs from the Add/Remove Programs section of the Control Panel.
[b]13.)[/b] Turn off any and all unnecessary animations, and disable active desktop. In fact, for optimal performance, turn off all animations. Windows XP offers many different settings in this area. Here's how to do it: First click on the System icon in the Control Panel. Next, click on the Advanced tab. Select the Settings button located under Performance. Feel free to play around with the options offered here, as nothing you can change will alter the reliability of the computer -- only its responsiveness.
[b]14.)[/b] If your customer is an advanced user who is comfortable editing their registry, try some of the performance registry tweaks offered at Tweak XP.
[b]15.)[/b] Visit Microsoft's Windows update site regularly, and download all updates labeled Critical. Download any optional updates at your discretion.
[b]16.)[/b] Update anti-virus software on a weekly, even daily, basis. Make sure they have only one anti-virus software package installed. Mixing anti-virus software is a sure way to spell disaster for performance and reliability.
[b]17.)[/b] Make sure you fewer than 500 type fonts installed on their computer. The more fonts they have, the slower the system will become. While Windows XP handles fonts much more efficiently than did the previous versions of Windows, too many fonts -- that is, anything over 500 -- will noticeably tax the system.
[b]18.)[/b] Do [b]not[/b] partition the hard drive. Windows XP's NTFS file system runs more efficiently on one large partition. The data is no safer on a separate partition, and a reformat is never necessary to reinstall an operating system. The same excuses people offer for using partitions apply to using a folder instead. For example, instead of putting all your data on the D: drive, put it in a folder called "D drive." You'll achieve the same organizational benefits that a separate partition offers, but without the degradation in system performance. Also, your free space won't be limited by the size of the partition; instead, it will be limited by the size of the entire hard drive. This means you won't need to resize any partitions, ever. That task can be time-consuming and also can result in lost data.
[b]19.)[/b] Check the system's RAM to ensure it is operating properly. I recommend using a free program called MemTest86. The download will make a bootable CD or diskette (your choice), which will run 10 extensive tests on the PC's memory automatically after you boot to the disk you created. Allow all tests to run until at least three passes of the 10 tests are completed. If the program encounters any errors, turn off and unplug the computer, remove a stick of memory (assuming you have more than one), and run the test again. Remember, bad memory cannot be repaired, but only replaced.
[b]20.)[/b] If the PC has a CD or DVD recorder, check the drive manufacturer's Web site for updated firmware. In some cases you'll be able to upgrade the recorder to a faster speed. Best of all, it's free.
[b]21.)[/b] Disable unnecessary services. Windows XP loads a lot of services that your customer most likely does not need. To determine which services you can disable for your client, visit the Black Viper site for Windows XP configurations.
[b]22.)[/b] If you're sick of a single Windows Explorer window crashing and then taking the rest of your OS down with it, then follow this tip: open My Computer, click on Tools, then Folder Options. Now click on the View tab. Scroll down to "Launch folder windows in a separate process," and enable this option. You'll have to reboot your machine for this option to take effect.
[b]23.)[/b] At least once a year, open the computer's cases and blow out all the dust and debris. While you're in there, check that all the fans are turning properly. Also inspect the motherboard capacitors for bulging or leaks.
Following any of these suggestions should result in noticeable improvements to the performance and reliability of your customers' computers. If you still want to defrag a disk, remember that the main benefit will be to make your data more retrievable in the event of a crashed drive.
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Posted by:
[color=purple]You may well want to read this article ([url]http://www.globetechnology.com/servlet/ArticleNews/tech/RTGAM/20021223/gts4/Technology/techBN/[/url])
before you do that.
Do you [b]really[/b] want to - i mean if it's running fine [i]as is[/i] then i wouldn't worry too much about it.
I believe point #18 is mainly aimed at [i]lower-spec[/i] Pc's[/color]
Posted by: ekĘsine
i don't agree with [b]18.) Do not partition the hard drive[/b]. i think any computer around 4GB or over should have at least 2 partitions. you can accidentally format a drive as easily as you can delete a drive.
also i do this so i can store user data and a ghost image of the operating system volume on the second partition. this way i can make a bootable CD and put ghost2k3 and autoexec.bat on it. when they pop in that bootable CD it would start a DOS menu asking if they want to restore there OS.
if they select yes it would execute a ghost2k3 commandline switch that would automatically start restoring the OS partition. this is equal to any restore CD and works the same way.
this is something you could do when fixing a computer. i would tell them to store all data to the second partition. all your client needs to know is to boot with the CD when their operating system needs restoring. i suggested ghost2k3 because it supports NTFS.
Posted by: kboy
Nice List Placebo!!!
Posted by: LoTeX
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Placebo [/i]
[B][color=purple]
[b]21.)[/b] Disable unnecessary services. Windows XP loads a lot of services that your customer most likely does not need. To determine which services you can disable for your client, visit the Black Viper site for Windows XP configurations.
[/color] [/B][/QUOTE]
I just did this recently myself and boy oh boy it really did decrease windows startup time, the "desktop phase" is now way faster.
Posted by: kboy
When I originally Disabled some Services I took out My Home Network also so be careful!;)
Posted by: Demalii
I agree with 18, when a hard drive is at 50% capacity it will indeed slow down, especially on a smaller hard drive, if you partition it into 2 say on a 10G hard drive, and fill up your C drive with Winxp, windows office, and a paint program and a little music, you've already filled up 2.5G, now the second hard drive is for games, you install 3 games if you're lucky and you drive will be running twice as slow than if it weren't partitioned... nice list Placebo
Posted by: Shannon
I disagree with #18 as well. I think it's much safer to have a seperate partition for the OS. I have to physical drives, and one is partitioned(generously, I might add) for the OS. And with all that can happen, I can reinstall the OS on a clean and reformated drive without touching the rest of my data. I've done it several times, and always been thankful that my drives are partitioned.
who really has a 10 gig hard drive anymore, anyway?
otherwise, nice list!
Posted by: LoTeX
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Shannon [/i]
[B]
who really has a 10 gig hard drive anymore, anyway?
[/B][/QUOTE]
i don't. but i do have a 20 gig one. (which has 2 partitions 50/50)
Posted by: Eric5000
Nice! Thanks guy for all the tips! Man! I didn't even think my hard drives would be on indexing! But they were- the other tips were great too! Go England!
-Eric
Ps- Who here in America doesn't envy your guy's accents???
Posted by: TheMajor
Use seperate partitions for OS/Soft and other data (MP3, movs, docs) Its easy to format this way.
Multiple partitions do not neccesarely decrease performance. You can manually increase the partitions cluster size to increase performance with Partition Magic. (only useful for FAT/FAT32) Be aware of slack space though.
Also:
You can defragment really quick if you move all data from one partition to another and back.
Posted by: TheMajor
You can also increase the cluster size using the MSDOS "/z" switch: "format /Z:8" (8KiloByte clusters) for example. Make sure you know what you are doing though. You will loose all data on your harddrive and some programs won't work.
Posted by: traviswrx
Is applying "disable Indexing" suppost to take a long time? Its been applying attributes for a while.
Posted by: ApM
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Eric5000 [/i]
[B]Nice! Thanks guy for all the tips! Man! I didn't even think my hard drives would be on indexing! But they were- the other tips were great too! Go England!
-Eric
Ps- Who here in America doesn't envy your guy's accents??? [/B][/QUOTE]
What are you talking about? :).
You guy's should know this already, you are a TF Member! :)
Posted by: kboy
This thread still going on??:)
Posted by: TMT
Partitioning a hard drive is vital if its possible for you to do. Although, in saying this, it can only be done in experience, for the fact that you need to predict how much space you're going to need for your OS and programs, etc. The larger the drive appears to be, the more fragmented files can become. By partitioning a drive, you limit the space in which for data to roam; thus allowing system performance to be faster and also system maintainance to be faster.
TMT. :cool:
Posted by: bart
Thanks for ALL the great advise for my pc as a bigginer need to get info from all the cleaver people out there
Posted by: RockyZ
"Run Disk Cleanup"
This is a much smaller thing that many people overlook.
I used to run those everyweek, but I finally came to a better solution.
CCleaner(Crap Cleaner) [url]http://www.ccleaner.com/[/url]
As the name suggest, it cleans up all the useless things in your computer.
I have a pretty big harddrive and usually takes windows about 15 minutes to clean up all my files using disk cleanup, with CrapCleander, it takes about 15 seconds.
As I've said earlier I run diskcleanup every week, once i installed the driver I cleaned out about 1.37GB of useless files, it is amazing how much stuff disk cleanup misses!
It is also a nifty program to clean up all the traces of oyur activity, to insure your privacy, if you know what I'm saying;)
Posted by: Disillusion
Very good tutorial. Helped me out a lot. I plan on saving this for future reference.
RockyZ, CCleaner is a great program. Downloaded it last night and cleared up a lot of crap!
I would like to add one thing (i don't think I saw it on the list), run disk cleanup and click on the More Options tab. Then clean up the system restore points by removing all but the most recent one. I freed up 2GB of hard drive space because my computer had created a restore point almost every day. Only do this if you know your current configuration is in perfect working order!