Tips & Tricks

Disable Indexing Services

What is that?  Indexing Services is a program that runs in real time, consumes huge amounts of memory, ties up your processor and, ultimately, does very little.  Microsoft thought it would be a good idea to have XP "index" or search in the background your files and folders.  Nice in theory, but pretty much fails miserably.  To disable Indexing Services, go to Start, Run, Services.msc.  Scroll down to Indexing Service, double click on it and change the "startup type" to disabled.  For a much better and useful alternative, install Desktop Search Toolbar.

Optimize Display Settings

XP may look "purty" with all the bells and whistles, but they use up a lot of resources.  Make XP run faster

• Control Panel, System, Advanced tab
• In the Performance tab, click Settings
• Leave only the following checked:
•     Show shadows under menu
•     Show shadows under mouse pointer
•     Show translucent selection rectangle
•     Use drop shadows for icon labels on desktop
•     Use visual styles on windows and buttons

Speed Up Folder Browsing

If you are not part of a network, XP wastes time trying to find folders that aren't there.  To fix this problem:

• Open up any folder and click on Tools, Folder options, View tab
• Uncheck "Automatically search for network folders and printers" check box
• Click OK

1) Make sure your pagefile (swap file) is optimized.  If you have 512 mB or more RAM, use a 1:1 ratio of swap:physical memory.  If less than 512, use 1.5:1 ratio.

2) Make XP use all available RAM before swapping out.  Windows will run a bit faster with this tweak.

• Open up Msconfig (Start, Run, Msconfig)
• Click on the System.INI tab
• Expand the "386enh" tab by hitting the + sign
• Click on New, then type "ConservativeSwapFileUsage=1" (without the "")
• Click OK, then reboot

Speedup Folder Access—Disable Last Access Update

If you have lots of folders and subfolders, XP wastes time by updating the last access time for a folder and all subfolders.  To stop this:

• Start, Run, Regedit
• Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem
• Right-click on a blank area on the right and select "DWORD Value"
• Create a new DWORD Value called "NtfsDisableLastAccessUpdate"
• Right-click on that value and choose "Modify"
• Change the Value Data to 1
• Click OK
• Reboot

Make Menus Load Quicker

**WARNING: THIS TWEAK INVOLVES EDITING THE WINDOWS REGISTRY FILE.  USE AT YOUR OWN RISK!**

This will make your machine 'feel' faster.

• Start, Run, Regedit
• Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop
• Select "WaitToKillAppTimeout"
• Right-click, Modify
• Change value to 1000
• Select "HungAppTimeout"
• Right-click, Modify
• Change value to 1000
• Navigate to HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desktop
• Select "WaitToKillAppTimeout"
• Change value to 1000
• Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control
• Select "WaitToKillServiceTimeout"
• Change value to 1000
• Reboot

Make Sure XP is Using DMA on Your Drives

Be sure your hard disks and optical drives are running at their fastest rate.

• Control Panel, System, Hardware tab, Device Manager
• Click on the "IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers"
• Click on the appropriate channel, depending on your setup (Primary and/or Secondary)
• Properties, Advanced Settings
• In the "Current Transfer Mode" be sure "DMA if available" is selected for all your drives
• For an added boost during startup, disable any channel you are not using in the Primary/Secondary channels; XP wastes time looking for drives that are potentially not there.