Stop services permanantely

[Jeremy]

Task Manager doesn't give even remotely correct figures on memory usage.

What does?

[Takeshi]

There's no need to take extreme views on the subject.

The logic behind the following two statements taken together is false.

• Disabling system services does not increase system performance.

• Therefore it's wrong to disable system services.

The opposite is not necessarily true either.

• Disabling system services increases system performance.

• Therefore it's right to disable system services.

The above makes the assumption that system performance is the only factor in consideration.

Afterall, this isn't the likely reason why MS changed the Alerter, Messenger and Telnet services to disabled by default in XP SP2.

[Jeremy]

Well, let's take the Error Reporting Service for example...

Disable it and you can't send the error info to M$. So what? Just Google the error message and you're bound to have the solution in a few minutes if you try researching the problem.

[Tarun]

If you don't report it, they won't be able to fix it. When you report it, they do indeed fix it.

[Synapse]

what happenes when you click that send error report button..

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2943736722728060847

lol, but yea if no one reports the error microsoft usually doesn't catch on to it.

I personally wouldn't recommend anyone change anything about their services. even some services like wireless zero configuration service, even if you're on a wired line, you won't see any performance loss, but if you ever go wireless you'll have to start it back up, and if you forget you disabled it.. then it's a pain to find out what the problem was.

[Thunderbolt 2864]

Well, I disabled some services and there is nothing wrong with it. Though I liked it how it decreased the boot time. So no need to agrue about it people.

[LLXX]

Stop spreading myths. I can already see one major hole in your reasoning.

[...]

Seeing how far I could go, I tried BootVis optimiser.

Talk about spreading myths... BootVis is not an optimizer

Please note that Bootvis.exe is not a tool that will improve boot/resume performance for end users. Contrary to some published reports, Bootvis.exe cannot reduce or alter a system's boot or resume performance. The boot optimization routines invoked by Bootvis.exe are built into Windows XP. These routines run automatically at pre-determined times as part of the normal operation of the operating system.

Source: Fast Boot / Fast Resume Design (Microsoft Windows Hardware Developer Central)

That's from M$, and from what I've seen regarding their statements, I don't trust them too much. In fact, the above statement was worded very interestingly -

"Bootvis.exe cannot reduce or alter a system's boot... performance" It definitely didn't reduce (both of) my system's boot performance, it increased it, noticeably too. Note that BootVis has a menu option that reads "Optimize [sic] System" - if it's not an optimiser, what's that for?

More notable BootVis improvements: http://www.tweakhound.com/xp/bootvis/index.htm

http://www.weethet.nl/english/hardware_bootvis.php

[Ctrl-X]

That's from M$, and from what I've seen regarding their statements, I don't trust them too much. In fact, the above statement was worded very interestingly -

"Bootvis.exe cannot reduce or alter a system's boot... performance" It definitely didn't reduce (both of) my system's boot performance, it increased it, noticeably too. Note that BootVis has a menu option that reads "Optimize [sic] System" - if it's not an optimiser, what's that for?

More notable BootVis improvements: http://www.tweakhound.com/xp/bootvis/index.htm

http://www.weethet.nl/english/hardware_bootvis.php

Interesting reading... I suppose you're right: the wording is open for interpretation. For instance, the phrase "Please note that Bootvis.exe is not a tool that will improve boot/resume performance for end users" could also mean that it does improve performance when used by an administrator or developer. I'll download a copy of BootVis and do some testing of my own. Will keep you posted...

[LLXX]

I personally wouldn't recommend anyone change anything about their services. even some services like wireless zero configuration service, even if you're on a wired line, you won't see any performance loss, but if you ever go wireless you'll have to start it back up, and if you forget you disabled it.. then it's a pain to find out what the problem was.

wzcsvc only needs to be enabled if you want to use the built-in Windows configuration program for your wireless adapter, which has much reduced functionality over the manufacturer-supplied program. A notable exception is the case of Intel's latest wireless products - the driver itself is over 10Mb, and the configuration program is another 40Mb (the entire download is 50Mb ) so I would recommend using the wzcsvc built-in. Then again, if you're on an NT-based OS and encounter problems one of the things you should know is to check the services.

[Zxian]

wzcsvc only needs to be enabled if you want to use the built-in Windows configuration program for your wireless adapter, which has much reduced functionality over the manufacturer-supplied program. A notable exception is the case of Intel's latest wireless products - the driver itself is over 10Mb, and the configuration program is another 40Mb (the entire download is 50Mb ) so I would recommend using the wzcsvc built-in. Then again, if you're on an NT-based OS and encounter problems one of the things you should know is to check the services.

But why disable wzcsvc in the first place? Almost all third-party wireless configuration managers will disable wzcsvc when they're installed, and then disable it when they're uninstalled, so why should you go ahead and do it manually? You're only running the risk of forgetting about it later.

Out of curiosity... what increased functionality do other manufacturers provide over the default Windows configuration? I've used Intel's ProSet, and the only thing that it does that Windows doesn't is recognize when I've turned on my wireless card and then it scans for wireless networks. I'm not that familiar with other systems, since I've only used Intel wireless cards.

[LLXX]

Out of curiosity... what increased functionality do other manufacturers provide over the default Windows configuration? I've used Intel's ProSet, and the only thing that it does that Windows doesn't is recognize when I've turned on my wireless card and then it scans for wireless networks. I'm not that familiar with other systems, since I've only used Intel wireless cards.

Those are the ones that you don't need to use their own software since it's huge (50Mb!) and Windows built-in software works fine with it. That's what I use on my laptop.

But for some reason my NETGEAR adapter in the other machine can't seem to find networks correctly nor connect all the time if I use wzcsvc.

[SunScapes]

HI,

Some Antivirus programs use Task Scheduler to schedule scans and other maintanence scans.

Even "Black Viper" tells you that.

Just my 2¢......

S.

[Tarun]

But for some reason my NETGEAR adapter in the other machine can't seem to find networks correctly nor connect all the time if I use wzcsvc.

I'd be willing to bet that had you left your install alone as a normal Windows XP install, you wouldn't be having these issues. You disabled or removed a needed service, you can't figure out why, and now you're blaming the OS for your mistakes. If people would just leave Windows XP's services alone and not try to "tweak" them, they wouldn't have any issues with their software or hardware.

[Ctrl-X]

Interesting reading... I suppose you're right: the wording is open for interpretation. For instance, the phrase "Please note that Bootvis.exe is not a tool that will improve boot/resume performance for end users" could also mean that it does improve performance when used by an administrator or developer. I'll download a copy of BootVis and do some testing of my own. Will keep you posted...

Okay, so I ran BootVis trace & optimize on a couple of systems. To be honest, I can't say that I notice any difference. However, this is probably due to the fact that these are managed domain member systems. I don't suppose BootVis has any influence on group policy loading or script execution times.

[Delprat]

The best XP Tweaks site ever made! Language Warning at the linked site

hmmm... this is a well spread guide since *ages* (at least a decade)

I don't want to be unpolite, but why on hell one should just follow step 2 ?

IMO, step 1 is correct, but step 2 should just read "use it" because the adventurous user that follows step 2 of your guide can get into BIG troubles (no joking).

About the other tweaks suggested/discussed here... seems strange no one is posting his own benchmarks ?!?!?

come on people, all these theories are pointless

only benchmark i saw here (but i may have read too fast) is bootvis on majorgeeks (a tool intended to debug driver loading delays, in other words, a tool for driver developpers...)... hey, i've got a better solution : just use hibernation feature not only it's faster, but it's also allowing you to keep, say, a firefox or IE session opened, or Word, or OO.org, or even some games (depending on the quality of the drivers on your system)...

okay, now if one using a decent computer(less than 5 years) can show everyone a list of tweaks that improve perfs for human eyes (for example : all delays between 10-40 sec are to be seen as "identical or nearly", all longer are "too long", and all shorter are "good scores"), i'm very interested... and with only tweaks that do not modify any of windows functionnalities

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