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Maintaining Windows XP System Performance?
jerud wonders: "I assume that most people on Slashdot are forced to, at some point, touch Windows. Further, I assume that many of them are forced to administer Windows boxes. I am in the unfortunate situation of using Windows for about 90% of my tasks, due to the nature of my job. As a firm believer in 'if it isn't broke don't fix it', I've delayed moving to XP for just about as long as possible, holding onto my Windows 2000 installation, while my brother spent a lot of time complaining about the XP issues he dealt with, at work. Finally, I made the transition and, low and behold, it didn't seem to bad. In fact, there were a few things that I really liked. Now, a few years later I have quite a few XP machines and they all share the same problem: over time they have slowed so noticeably that they have made even the most solid configurations run like they were made in 1999. Is there any regular treatment out there that can minimize this kind of system degradation?"
"Solid practices are in use on most of these machines, or at least the ones that are completely under my control. Even with that, I know these machines are much slower now then when I bought them. I really don't want to spend two weekends every year starting over from scratch, simply because thats the only way to reclaim performance."
Start -> Run 'services.msc' Cut off most of these. Many are useless, and yet are enabled by default.
defragment your hard drive. Of course, you can't defrag the registry. So use sysinternal's PageDefrag utility which can. Over time, the registry accumulates a lot of stuff, and defragging it can help quite a bit.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
http://www.mlin.net/StartupMonitor.shtml - it's a freeware app that tells you each time something tries to register itself to run at startup. Those damn on-startup apps are what slow the machine down the most, especially for non-technical home users. You'll be amazed at how many things believe they must run every time you start your computer.
My Dell laptop seemed full of crud. I know that I had installed quite a few systems just to test them over the first year that I had the laptop. And now it was showing mysterious symptoms - Programs would seem to just hang when I started them. The responsiveness seemed down.
So I wiped the hardrive and re-installed XP plus all the packages that I knew I needed. After I got it all running again, it seemed as repsonsive as when I first got it.
But that was 10 months ago. Now it is back to the same feeling of molasses at times with the inexplicable behaviour. So obviously I have installed something that has slowed things down. But what? There is no way to tell what it is. So it looks like I am headed for the yearly rebuild again.
[Note 1 that in all of this, I have been using virus protection, adware protection, software firewalls, and up-todate patches]
[Note 2 To all you people who will say wipe XP and put *nix on. I can't as I have custom software development tools that *only* run on windows. And no, it is not possible to rewrite them from scratch - and anybody who thinks so hasn't been out in the world of PLC programming and heavy industries]
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
And that includes re-formatting the partition.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
Nikon slidescanner attached via FireWire; couple of years old and every now and again gets put on a new machine, scan time improve but the after all the updating both windows and Antivirus etc do suddenly slows.
Ask around, do dependancy checks run spy+ no great insight
Then a friend says "What anti-virus you use?"
"AVG, you know the free one"
"ARGHH dumpit, replace it with something else"
Turns out AVG puts some drivers into the pipeline so it can scan ethernet,USB and FireWire, so everytime the scanner sent a glob of the slide this software was checking to see if it was a virus!
And yes this continued AFTER I removed the 1364 network stuff, I even go as far as trying another card
My scanning speeds have droped from 5 mins a slide to 1.35mins, do you know how much more of a life I can have!
So have a look at device manager, choose view->devices by connection & tick hidden devices box, right near the top you'll see among much else you Antivirus drivers, some dumb some not so dumb
1)Like Lone Starr said in Spaceballs, "Take only what you need to survive". Basically only install what you need for the primary task the computer does. The more stuff you install, the slower it gets.
2)Disk Cleanup, Chkdsk, and Defragment the hard drive at least once a month. a lot of speed can be gained just by doing this regularly.
3)Protect windows like the plague. Patch to the latest revisions of Service packs, critical, and recommended updates. also use third party protection to protect against malware. Spywareblaster, Microsoft Antispyware and Grisoft AVG free edition are my personal favorites.
4)Keep system restore on and always make a restore point before you install anything. That way, if it screws up the machine after you installed it, you can uninstall it and roll the computer back to ensure that the system is totally clean of it.
5) If you got Norton ghost lying around, use it to make an image of your machine after you set it all up, that way you can roll back to that image just in case something really hoses windows.
So far, I've kept this mantra going with my machine. It's been a good 1 to 2 years since I reinstalled windows either from scratch or by ghost and I've haven't noticed any slowdown to date that I couldn't attribute to the machine getting more obsolete by the day.
In Soviet Russia, Trojan exploits YOU!
Macs are hardly immune to this slowdown. My eMac needs an archive/install every two years or so, at least. And besides, you're an idiot. You don't get an opinion.
This is the best way, by far! It's more secure and stops almost all spyware cold. And no spyware == better performance.
I run with system restore turned off. Also clearing out your logs Control Panel|Administrative Tools|Event Viewer may or may not make a difference. You may actually try reading some of them first, but good luck making sense of them.
/AUXSOURCE= flag to retrieve this description; see Help and Support for details
Example Log Entry:
The description for Event ID ( 20158 ) in Source ( RemoteAccess ) cannot be found. The local computer may not have the necessary registry information or message DLL files to display messages from a remote computer. You may be able to use the
On that note, is there a way to keep windows running smooth without rebooting it every two weeks?
I absolutely hate rebooting, but after a while of playing hibernate/standby/wake up with my laptop the system becomes more and more unresponsive, and some weird bug keeps cropping up that prevents the opening of new windows (even dialog boxes) until I close some of the old ones.
And how does linux handle this kind of thing for you? On my few tries I had even less luck with Linux and hibernate than with windows.
Height: 38U, Weight: 0 Newtons, Eyes: #0000FF, OS: Gray Matter 1.0 (Alpha)
As well as everything suggested above, run Crap Cleaner. This has cleaned so many gigs of junk from my computer over time, I don't know what I would do without it.
have you read the Moderation Guidelines Addendum?
Seriously. Install only the core number of applications that you need. In Windows, every program you install ends up creating registry entries. That registry DB grows over time, and needs to get parsed all the time - resulting in sluggishnes.
Use sensible applications wherever you can (like Firefox; it stores its config info in flat files).
Also, Microsoft products are the worst offenders - Visual Studio, Office, etc.. all become bloated pigs.
Don't think that a small group of dedicated individuals can't change the world. It's the only thing that ever has.
Most of the other tips are good, but nobody's mentioned CCleaner yet. That is one awesome app for cleaning out old cruft.
It's only an insult if it's not true.
I actually got sick of family and friends asking me to tune up their XP installs, so I wrote a detailed article on the entire process and posted it on our family website here: http://www.farleyfamily.net/articles/tuneup/
It's a comprehensive step-by-step of what any aunt or uncle should be able to follow in order to free system resources and make for a better (faster!) desktop experience.
Imaging, at the college I use to work at we would just re-image the machines on a regular basis. Of course this is assuming files are stored and accessed on a server as apposed to locally. Just a thought, the question doesn't give much detail as to how many machines or what the work environment is.
piss off
Windows won't magically start slowing down after time, it's all the crap that is installed (and/or uninstalled) over and over again.
Install windows.
Set your pagefile to the size you want it (max and min the same or put the whole thing on a separate drive to avoid fragmentation).
Install the programs you want.
Patch everything.
Defrag the whole thing (just to be sure)
Make a drive image you can keep for emergencies.
Then use it. (Log in as a limited user so that others don't install crap either.)
If you insist on installing loads of programs "just cus" then don't expect it to run perfectly forever. (But hey, at least you'll have a drive image you can quickly restore to.)
System Restore is the best place to get viruses from on your computer. Heh. Turn System Restore off permanently and things get much better quick. System Restore::Viruses -> Caves::Osama BinLaden
Microsoft built the gradual slowdown into Windows on purpose. When the machine slows, it convinces the average user that they need a new computer. They upgrade unknowingly, and pay the Micro$oft tax once more.
At work these two steps usually do the trick.
1. Run CCleaner. Both to find useless files AND to weed out unneeded registry entries.
2. Run Microsoft's Antispyware program.
Additionally you can run MS's antispyware program to look for unwanted apps that start at runtime.
As others have mentioned shutting down extra services you don't need may be a good idea. But in my experience those services don't effect a computer nearly as much as runaway Hard drive consumption by IE and unchecked spyware.
Go Gusties
Reformat and reinstall every six months.
In the meantime don't install anything you don't really need.
This is a good question. I'll be watching this thread!
Billybob
bamph
Anyway, Windows XP tries to defrag your HD when it is idle, which could be bad. I know my work laptop, now running XP, suffered a lot more fragmentation after the upgrade from 2000 (before I turned auto defrag off). I think it has to do with the fact that either I'm working on my laptop, or its off. There is some accidental idle time in there, but only enough time to fragment the HD even worse before I resume my work. So, I turned it off, and it seems to be fragmenting normally now.
So, YMMV, I've done no quantitative analysis on this, it may be due to changing usage patterns, but if your users keep their computers busy, turning off auto defrag could help. It certainly won't make it worse then you had before the upgrade, since you're back at Windows 2000 behavior.
Another thing I thought of, but haven't tried, is set the registry size limit to something low like 1 MB, possibly cutting down on all the crud in there. I'd do it myself, but my laptop is too important to risk downtime, and the rest of my machines don't have registries.
The real path to male liberation
Run msconfig. Despite what your better judgement might say, you can safely disable everything in the startup tab. Then glance through the list and recheck anything that you can both identity and wish to have running in the background.
Other small speedups:
Switch to the classic win2k theme.
If your wallpaper is a gif or jpeg, replace it with a bmp and disable active desktop. For anything other than bmps, it uses Internet Explorer to render your desktop.
Get more ram.
If less than about 20% disk free, delete stuff you don't need and then defrag.
Disable window animations and other eye candy.
Check for malware.
Install and run ShellExView. Some programs install shell extensions which can (but not usually) cause slowdowns and pauses in Windows Explorer. It should color code items depending on if they come with windows, if they are known, if they are known to be bad, or if they are unknown. I encountered a system where a Eudora shellexecute hook was causing the system to freeze for 2 minutes whenever you tried to start a program.
Disable the indexing service.
Disable/uninstall your virus scanner, if you're the type who never installs viruses.
16bit color is sometimes faster. You'll have to test for yourself.
Sometimes I get lucky with this one: In control panel->hardware->device manager, open the properties for the "Primary IDE Channel" and see whether it's in DMA or PIO mode. If it's in PIO mode, right click the "Primary IDE Channel" and click remove/uninstall, and reboot. I've encountered several systems where this was the cause of major slowdown. Windows occasionally encounters timeouts reading from the hard drive, and sometimes mistakingly assumes that stepping down to a slower transfer mode will solve the problem. I see it happen most on systems that go to sleep a lot. Microsoft's website says it's fixed, and shouldn't happen much at all in the future, but you'll still need to do the fix I described on systems that already have the problem.
Some people suggest removing System Restore. I've had occasions where it helped out a lot, like when a Microsoft Windows Update badly broke my system, so I can't recommend disabling it unless you don't mind the occasional reinstall.
I'm typing this on Linux, so some of the above instructions might be slightly off, but are generally correct.
It's interesting. I have a Windows XP machine that is a pretty barebones configuration that I use mainly (okay, almost solely) for gaming purposes. And I have another machine attached to the same monitor via a KVM. The machines are identical in every way (1.6GHz Athlons with 1GB Ram, only the windows machine has a monster video card).
But when my Windows machine starts boggin' down I just fire up X on my debian box and the speed difference is inCREDIBLE. The pointer just moves so fast on that GUI that I can barely keep up with it! So I even play some games on it using WINE (like the classic Starcraft). Not particularly helpful for your situation, but it sure illustrates for _me_ the difference in how the two OS'es make use of system resources.
Quod scripsi, scripsi.
Every system I get I've installed the "base" set of applications, antivirus, patches and so forth and then ghosted a working configuration to an external drive. A base XP will take about 4-6 gigs of storage compressed which sits on your external drive until you need it. I've ghosted my Win2k3 machine and my linux machine all to my external drive.
When (not if) the machine goes south as it did when I was testing the various beta's of Visual Studio, I backed up my important source files and ghost loaded back over my machine. From a screwed up install to a fully working copy of Windows in 11 minutes I call pretty good. Six minutes for my laptop is all it takes.
So when your XP install becomes sluggish, backup the important files, ghost, and spend an hour or two downloading up-to-date patches and installing your new apps.
Once you've done it 20-30 times (over a 3 year period, all from testing software) it's like drinking coffee.
Why do overlook and oversee mean opposite things?
The only solid practice for maintaining Windows, if it can be said to be one, is to re-install on a regular basis. Set a schedule for yourself, somewhere between every 1-6 months. Keep a list of all the things you need to do (settings, software to re-install, etc).
11*43+456^2
...it didn't seem to bad...
Too bad. Too bad.
format C:!
DYWYPI?
Ironically enough, when I was stuck trying to remove the "lower filter" from my sister's DVD driver on her new laptop after she installed the Sony rootkit, I ended up giving up and rolling back, because I hadn't yet turned off her restore.
Then, use it for all your "real" computing needs-- e-mail, web browsing, word processing, etc.
Run one last time, and then uninstall, your virus checker and anti-malware apps from the XP box-- they slow things down, and you won't need them anymore. Disconnect its network connection, and use it for nothing but games.
If you want a minimal Windows install, use nLiteOS -- it creates an install CD for Windows from your existing copy, only including what you choose.
Also, remember to have a sane partitioning scheme, in case you need to reinstall. You might want to use FAT for your data partition; that way, you can read it via a Knoppix CD in a real emergency.
At work I maintain about 30 computers and many of them are different configurations. I make a 4 gig partition and when I'm done installing windows, updates, and the base apps we need I put an image in that partition. Restoring each pc is easy and I don't have to keep digging up all the different drivers I need. It's especially useful since different people use different apps.
It's not Windows' nature to maintain performance however how hard you try. I rescued myself after switching to Mac.
A more open altenative for Norton Ghost is Ghost For Linx. Only downside: no multicasting.
--> Insert Funny Sig Here
I make 2 partitions, one for My Documents and one for my C: drive that will have the Windows partition and the program files and all that good stuff. Then I update Windows and get the latest everything installed. Then I install all my programs. I make all my registry tweaks (I found one that auto-unloads DLL's after you close an application to be incredibly handy, and to keep my XP fresh and fast), install all my drivers, and get everything set up perfectly. Then I create a system restore point, where everything is perfect.
That way, should I ever have a problem, I can just role back to when it all was perfect; or if I should need to reformat, I don't have trouble backing up all my data. Just move all the special folders with configs and save files and anything else important on the C: drive over to the D: partition, reformat and reinstall Windows on the C: partition, and you're good!
I don't run any antivirus besides MS Antispyware Beta, Adaware Personal SE, and Spybot S&D. Haven't had any problems whatsoever for at least 6 months.
The following registry tweaks should be used with caution:E T\CONTROL\Session Manager\Memory Management\IoPageLockLimit. If it is no there you can create it. This is DWORD value. For systems with at least 256MB of RAM, 8000 hex (32768 decimal) or 10000 hex (64536 decimal). You can use 20000 hex (131072 decimal) on systems with 512MB+ of RAM. Warning: this setting may not be compatible with some drivers; especially video drivers. Enabling this option could cause critical processes and services to fail. You might not be able to log in.
E T\CONTROL\Session Manager\Memory Management\LargeSystemCache. If the key is not there, you can create it. This is a DWORD value. 0 for disabled. 1 for enabled.
E T\CONTROL\Session Manager\Memory Management\DisablePagingExecutive. This is a DWORD value. 0 for disabled. 1 for enabled.
IoPageLockLimit: increases the amount of pages that can be locked into memory. Changing this setting can improve performance although there is some controversy over this setting's effectiveness. Make sure that you have at least 256MB of RAM. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CONTROL\CURRENTCONTROLS
LargeSystemCache: This setting is primarily used for servers but can help improve performance. Again, it's effectiveness may be controversial. It is located at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CONTROL\CURRENTCONTROLS
DisablePageExecutive: Again this is a controversial setting. You may or may not notice a difference in performance and it is driver sensitive so be forewarned about using it. It too has the potential to cause crashes after being enabled. This setting prevents kernel memory from being paged. It is located at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CONTROL\CURRENTCONTROLS
Note: Any problems encountered from changing these settings will be noticed on next boot. They are a "either it's fine or it isn't" settings.
To reduce boot time, you can disable autodetection of devices on IDE controllers that have no devices connected to them. This can be done from the device manager. Also, adjust Windows for best performance and turn off the themes service.
Lastly, there's XPlite which can help cut down on some of the fat. Also, be sure to check out TweakXP.com for more XP performance tweaks. And there's nLite. Unlike XPlite, nLite allows you to remove Windows components before installation. It also has service pack integration.
If you've got multiple partitions, try installing a maintenance OS on an extra partition. If you've still got a license for Windows 2000, just install it on the other partition, it should go smoothly and give you a nice boot menu when you're done.
The main advantage of doing this is that you'll have full access to your XP installation without having any system files blocked. What I did was take a fresh install of XP (with all of my base drivers and applications installed) and make a copy of the Windows, Program Files, and Documents and Settings directories. Now, if I feel that my XP installation is getting bloated to the point where I can't fix it anymore, I can "reinstall" XP by booting into my maintenance partition and replacing those directories. As long as you are booted into another partition when you do it, Windows is completely oblivious to the fact that you've just replaced your primary OS.
Having a maintenance partition is also advantageous when defragmenting your primary partition, since no system files will be locked. It's also handy if you suspect you've been infected with a rootkit, since that seems to be a trendy topic at the moment.
How does one turn this off?
A lot of the system slowdown on Windows boxes can be traced to explorer. Explorer is a single threaded application, and when used on a network, over time it tends to collect many network relative paths to resources like icons. Later the network shares dissapear or are moved. The result is, every time explorer tries to generate lists of icons to display for files it pauses - using 0% CPU - waiting for non existant network hosts to respond.
And it's dangerous. If the hard drive has a flaw, defragmenting it risks propagating the fault or even breaking the drive itself. An extreme case: Once I was called out to fix a machine with problems. The owner thought it'd be nice of him to defrag the drive before I arrived. When I came, it would not boot at all. The problem turned out to be defective ram, and defrag, combined with faulty memory, had destroyed the directory structure of the drive.
A better cure for slow HD performance is to get a bigger/faster drive to begin with. Big drives are inherently fast, and assuming the user doesn't just fill it up with junk, there'll always be enough space that fragmentation becomes a non-issue.
I'm in a Unix state of mind.
Set your Anti-virus program to scan at least weekly, and automatically update itself, Update and sca with Ad-Aware and Spybot weekly at a minimum, and update and protect with SpywareBlaster weekly at a minimum.
It is absolutely ridiculous that a person should have to do this to keep their computer running decently. We get so many Windows machines in the shop that it isn't even funny, but thusfar, whenever we have managed to convince someone to upgrade to a MacOS X machine (Typically when their Dell, Compaq, HP, E-Machines has a motherboard failure). They have came back completely excited and astonished that they don't really have to worry about spyware and viruses so much.
My reccomendation on keeping your WIndows XP machine in top performance. Go buy a high-end Mac and run VirtualPC if it can run whatever program you NEED to run (Note: Games do not count), if you cannot run your Prorgram under VPC, buy a low-end PC and keep it off the network.
+(norad) if you rearrange the letters in mother in law, you get woman hitler
Regularely doing these things:
/purgecache" to empty the system file checker cache.
Running "sfc
Emptying the folder "C:\windows\prefetch" to clean the prefecth buffer.
Defragging.
And the usual things like removing spyware etc.
I found a fast warez site: http://warez.it.kth.se
We use Startup Monitor and ZoneAlarm Security Suite software firewall. The newest ZA pops up a window the first time anything suspicious happens. It's a big problem convincing users to report the ZA popups, but if they do, Windows is much safer.
However, it's a losing battle. The problem is that Microsoft makes more money if its operating systems self-destruct. What you call "vulnerabilities" billionaires call "maximizing shareholder value".
If rich people sold good operating systems, poor people would not buy the next upgrade.
Using an operating system is like having a partner in your business. If it is a Microsoft OS, your "partners" want some things that are bad for you. If you use Linux or BSD, you can breathe a huge sigh of relief; your partners want what you want.
It's absurd that governments of countries use Microsoft products. It's even absurd that state governments in the U.S. use Microsoft products. The U.S. federal government spends more money on world-wide surveillance than any country in the history of the world. Exploiting computer systems is now one of the biggest new frontiers in surveillance.
The U.S. government's Echelon surveillance system watches everyone all the time. (Echelon quote: "Since the close of World War II, the US intelligence agencies have developed a consistent record of trampling the rights and liberties of the American people.")
The biggest discretionary expense of the U.S. government is the cost of war. The president and the vice-president of the U.S. are people who themselves and their families and friends made their money through oil and weapons. Is it any wonder that the price of oil is so high and we have war?
When a country uses Microsoft operating systems, it effectively has the U.S. government as one of its partners. Given the present climate of corruption and conflict of interest and adversarial behavior and using war as a justification for anything, why do countries want the U.S. government and U.S. billionaires as partners?
If volunteers can make a secure operating system ("Only one remote hole in the default install, in more than 8 years!") is it difficult to believe that the amazing number of vulnerabilities we've seen in Windows are deliberately allowed?
A lot. Sounds like a joke, but experience has shown that the OS just needs to "freshen up" a bit every once in a while.
Who knows what goes on inside that black box...
Windows Installations definitely don't have an artificial lifespan. I have one Windows XP installation still going strong after 3.5 years of heavy use as a software developer. A second work installation for 1.5 years (it's a newer machine) and a home installation for 2 years without a hitch. What is the secret? Don't install things!
You don't need that random app that someone said was cool. You sure don't need that cool new screensaver, or that "rad" game.
All you need to install are driver updates (when your apps require them or heaven forbid, a security hole is released) and security patches.
Also some other tips I have used:
Stay away from shell extensions, as they often slow down Explorer.
Turn off desktop wallpaper. Why are you looking at the desktop anyways? You are supposed to be using the computer for something useful!
Set page file min and max to the same size IMMEDIATELY after booting Windows for the first time. Why? So you can keep it from getting fragmented.
No, this isn't for every situation. Common hardware is a must (or at least a real help). But, it does neatly solve other common issues, like system builds.
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A freind of mine does just this on his home system about once a month (well, and at work...as he says, we're not in the business of installing an OS by hand anymore). I'm going to take the same plunge. Pick an automated system rebuild method, test it, build new systems with it and rebuild your systems on some sort of regular basis. There are lots of caveats to the Microsoft methods (ADS/RIS... single partition systems, you need BOOTP, blah blah blah). And, the image-based methods can be tricky (Ghost? Oh come now). Other options like nLite might help, too.
It may not be what the doctor ordered, but it will simplify your life when you need to build a new workstation. And, if one gets pokey beyond the reach of the other tools mentioned, blow on a new image. Plus, if you're using XP, you can use folder redirection to keep the user files someplace else, so you don't neccesarily have to rely on draconian policies regarding where they should save files (well, you can't let them save files just anyplace, so a few policies may be in order).
Is this the ultimate insult that the best way to manage Windows workstations is to automate reinstalling them? Well, maybe, depending on your viewpoint. But, it is what it is, so we build automated methods to learn to live with the limitations.
Humbly submitted, here are some of my bookmarks on the subject:
http://www.cmu.edu/computing/andrew-windows/andre
http://ani.sourceforge.net/
http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb
http://www.livejournal.com/users/lotso/1863.html
http://isg.ee.ethz.ch/tools/realmen/
http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/how
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/archive/risover.msp
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/wind
http://unattended.sourceforge.net/
http://www.windowsitpro.com/Articles/Index.cfm?Ar
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/wind
Amateurs discuss tactics. Professionals discuss logistics.
CD-ROM and DVD-ROM drives can revert to using PIO mode, despite being set to use "DMA if Available." Here's how to make Windows XP redetect the DMA capabilities of the drives.
o l\ Class\{4D36E96A-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}\000x
This behaviour occurs with the following conditions:
Windows XP is the operating system
A CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, or sometimes even a HDD, which is known to support DMA mode now works only in PIO mode.
The drive controller is set to use "DMA if available" but reports to be only in PIO mode.
Following is the mechanism that has worked for me, please try it at your own risk, it involves hacking the registry:
Open RegEdit
Find the following KEY:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contr
The last four digits will be 0000, 0001, 0002, 0003, and so on.
Under each key, delete all occurences of the following values:
MasterIdDataChecksum
SlaveIdDataChecksum
Reboot the computer. Windows will now redetect DMA settings.
This happens if a device on the bus has been getting periodic errors either because of a hardware problem or because of scratched or copy-protected CDs. XP steps down the DMA to try and stop the errors because it assumes it is a hardware problem.
Those who open their minds too far often let their brains fall out.
1) When keeping an older machine in service, you really need to max out the RAM. A large chunk of the delay I experienced was excessive swapfile access, shown by Sysinternals FileMon utility. The amount of hard drive thrashing before that was ludicrous.
2) Use older applications versions whenever possible-- newer ones tend to hog more RAM and CPU cycles. In particular, I noticed that downgrading from Symantec's Corporate Antivirus 10 back to their 7.6 offering (still in my master drive archive) made for a major speed increase. Yes, 7.6 doesn't report itself correctly to Windows' Security Center; I suspect this may be one reason for the speed improvement. Tell the security center to sit down and shut up. Similarly, testing Office 2003 versus Office 2000 showed the older program was less of a hog. Given that result, I now say "budget constraints" keep us from upgrading Office licenses on machines over 3 years old. I've found fewer than 10% of my users can tell the difference between O2K, OXP, and O2K3, anyway — and of those that can, half prefer O2K.
Generally, running as a Power User is unnecessary. Occasionally, you'll find applications that appear to need this, but it's usually fixable by adjusting rights on specific files/directories/registry keys. Sysinternals' RegMon and FileMon are good tools for identifying where apps are bumping up against security. Occasionally you might have to tweak the local security policy but that's all.
You really should be running with LEAST privilege; a Power User can still (for example) walk all over the Program Files directory, and the ability to modify system time can cause havoc and renders any auditing suspect.
You've always got "Run as..." and the tips at Aaron Margolis's blog if you need to temporarily elevate your privs. I haven't had any lasting issues with running at mere User level, and my machine is as secure as a Windoze box gets.
pi = 2*|arg(God)|
One of the biggest killers in Windows performance is installing and uninstalling applications. It leads to registry bloat, stray files and directories, and disk fragmentation. You can be reactive and try to fix all that, but it's better to prevent it in the first place.
I've been virtualizing many of my applications inside of VMware and it's helped tremendously. Applications that I don't need all the time, or apps that I only need to use one time, or apps that I'm not sure will do what I need -- they all get installed in a pristine Windows XP VM. If they work, they get reinstalled in my "working VM" and the test VM gets destroyed (thus, stays pristine).
I used to do some of this with multiple PCs, but there's absolutely no need for that anymore, and it's more time-consuming re-imaging a piece of hardware back to its pristine state.
For what it's worth, I have a P3/850 that's running XP that hasn't been reloaded in almost 4 years. It's starting to degrade due to the fact that I violated the above rule a few times, but is still perfectly usable for stuff like e-mail, quick Photoshop edits, instant messaging, word processing.
I'm asumming that's what you were meaning, but A WHOLE WEEKEND? I can do it in a matter of about three to four hours. Full backup, full reformat with everything installed again, no problem.
Now the important step: As soon as everything is running correctly, do a backup of the C partition with Acronis TrueImage. The best program ever! Then you don't need to reinstall; your C partition will be bit-for-bit identical to the way it was when everything worked great. The most important advice: only do backups of installations that didn't actually get used. That way they're not all rotten. When you get new software, first restore the C partition from backup, then install the new software, make any other tweaks you deem useful, and immediately do another backup. This really works and has kept me reasonably free of WinRot. With TrueImage it takes about 5 minutes to restore a partition, and it really feels like you've just done your laundry, that out-of-the-dryer smell!
In my experience, a lot of the speed loss over time is because I like to keep up with the latest apps. More features = more resources = slower speed. I've also found that the resources taken up by antivirus and antispyware apps are continuously growing. The net effect is that rebuilding your machine will help, but it won't usually return you to where you were in the beginnning unless you rebuild with the app versions you had in the beginning. And, of course, that wouldn't be wise when it comes to your antivirus and antispyware software. Ultimately, it will always take a new machine to get the speed back and sometimes a new operating system version whose memory and process allocation has been retuned to the more modern application payload.
Try a visit here, and do the works.. http://safety.live.com/
If you're very lucky, the worst that will happen over a period of months with Windows is a bit of clutter in the registry and startup menu caused by programs that are generally considered benign [iTunes sneaking in with quickTime, iPod Manager etc. comes to mind]. That's the best-case scenario.
If you're not lucky, you'll get hit by some spyware that creeps in through IE, or worse, a serious exploit like the one mentioned earlier. Most Windows boxes of students I know tend towards having at least a couple spyware apps snuck in, or general slow-down-ware that's hard to classify (the crap from Real, WeatherBug, programs like Norton(?) that sneak copy-protection crap into the MBR, registry and god knows where else..) . I know, I spend a fair amount of time having to clean the bad cruft up. You can't really fault the user if they've gotten crap loaded by those #$(ing Sony CDs or from IE exploits.
Back to my original point -- you should prepare for the unexpected. You never know when the next major Windows worm is going to infect your PC, even if you're careful. After you install Windows with all service packs , just use a Knoppix boot disk and dd [ dd if=/dev/hda of=/dev/sda1/hard_driveA.img, with sda1 being a USB drive... also works for network backups, see here] , or pay for Norton Ghost or similar commercial software. If you anticipate having to use it often, or on multiple PCs, install any programs you think you might need (antivirus/antispyware/other apps) before making the backup, and you'll turn an afternoon job into a half-hour job.
Trust me, this will save you a lot of time in the long run. I can believe that it is possible to tightly lock down a Windows box so that you'll never see performance decreases or malware sneaking in... but in reality, I'd bet it's almost impossible. Myself, I use linux just because I find it has fewer "surprises" that are essentially unfixable. I'm not trying to denigrate Windows, I know it's handy for a lot of stuff, just saying to be careful and be prepared if you do use it.
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what exactly do you define as "solid practises"?
i personally say they are these...
regular spyware scan (by adaware, spybot S&D, and MS antispy)
regular defrag (not with the windows defrag. i like diskeeper)
about the only way that is sure fire is to backup/wipe/reinstall. it helps if you make a disk image after a clean install once you install as the applications. i would say update the image about every other year or in the event of an OS upgrade (duh).
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
Seriously, its your PSU. Shitty PSUs (ones that you get with computers taht are pre-built and nearly any PSU that cost you less than $60) get even shittier over time. Get yourself a good PSU and you'll notice a HUGE performance increase.
Our laptops and PCs come pre-hosed as a matter of corporate policy. IT shoves a metric boatload of crap into auto-run, slowing it to a crawl both on boot and in operation. Some of it is reasonably necessary: backup software, antivirus software, firewall software. Some of it is of questionable value. For instance, they run SMS scripts that catalog the last time I accessed each file on my hard drive, what software apps I have installed, when I last ran them, etc. (Yes, they monitor that crap, and it all goes into a big database somewhere.)
:-) I'm getting a new IT-bullcrap-laden laptop soon. Hopefully it'll run my backups and virus scan (which currently weighs in at about 4.5 hours) significantly faster. It has a newer, faster HD, which I hear makes a very big difference. In the meantime, I do my part to prevent it getting ever more craptastic by running Firefox instead of IE, and periodically delousing it with Spybot and related software. It also helps that I don't browse the web with abandon, although some of the adservers on sites linked off Fark seem to leave interesting crap on the HD. (I've had a couple Java "trojans" show up in the browser cache, and I'm pretty sure that's the vector.)
Then there's our backup software. <rant> Backups are reasonably necessary, but I'm particularly annoyed with ConnectedTLM. First off, what is it with Windows apps insisting on popping something up to tell you they're doing something? I don't mind a tray icon to tell me a backup is in progress, but why pop up something over my work? Furthermore, why does it literally take 5 minutes to cancel a backup if I miss the little "defer" popup that gave me the option to not interrupt my work at the moment? (Happens like clockwork that I get up for a rest break, come back, and ConnectedTLM is thrashing away my HD.) And finally, what is it with meaningless progress bars? If you've ever seen ConnectedTLM, it'll make its way up to about 70%, and then hover between 68% and 72% forever before suddenly getting to 100%. (Yes, it goes up and down! WTF?)</rant>
I feel better now.
--Joe
Program Intellivision!
I part run a school network and not only do the machines regularly slow down kids also use them!!!! Yes we have a few respectfull kids but when you take into account the amount of paper ive pulled out of drives this week you start to wonder what the state of the OS is like. So we came up with a simple answer keep an image of each type of machine on our server and use symantic ghost to image the Pc whenever it looks the slightest bit dodgy. Its simple takes about 30 mins to create the image (only needed once) and the same to completly re-make the machine (with apps and all). With ebay selling servers at around £200 this is cheap and will last. Also great virus protection when u get 1 dont bother to fix it just wipe the disk.
They fitted George Orwell's coffin with rollers so he could turn over more easily years ago.
some firewall and antivirus programs will take your connection down when you disabled them from start up, others will look disabled, but they're really running as services and you're just disabling their GUI's (which'll cause all kinds of fun when you're trying to do a Windows update and you're not seeing the little pop up from your anti-virus to allow it). Some Creative Labs soundcards stop working when you disable their start up items (I know, bad design, but they own the market more or less). Some printers won't work without their startup items too. I'm sure somebody could come up with other examples of stuff it's a bad idea to disable too. I used to love it when I'd go do work on someone's computer and the only problem was they'd been playing willy-nilly in msconfig. Just check normal start up and you're done.
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Here's a few apps/tweak files I haven't seen mentioned.
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NTRegOpt: http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt
Defrags XP's registry, reduces the overall size.
Microsoft Bootvis: http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=664
A tool made by MS specifically for optimizing XP boot up times.
MaxTweaks: http://www.tech52.com/ (scroll down page for file and description)
A cumulative XP tweak and fix install file. Highlight: Enables "Show hidden devices" in the Device Manager to display unused devices - like what you would see if you booted 98 in safe mode.