People just go "Windows sucks. Linux and Mac are sooooooooooo much better" (While I bet they're using Windows themselves and they don't even know how to operate a Linux and Mac.) For those who "think" Windows suck. A: Care to explain why you think that? Many people I ask that question to either give no answer, or respond with "Because it sucks". It's encouraging to see how many lawyers we are going to have among us in the near future.... Now seriously, if you can't come up with a good reason why Windows sucks and why Linux and Mac's are so much better, then don't make that claim. That line of reasoning is about as good as the following conversation: Person A: You're completely wrong about that. Person B: Why? Person A: Because you just are... Now of course this conversation would never involve me, because I actually back up what I am saying with facts and details. The bottom line with me is, if you aren't prepared to defend your position on why you think a certain way, don't express that opinion. I'm posting for people of the kind. Okay, so, back to the topic. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The following is what I do directly after a clean install of Windows XP. This does not mean that everything I do will work for you. Keeping that in mind and ensure you are fully aware of the risks of tweaking your system before doing so. Points to note: If you do only one thing on this page, make it "Number One." Ensure that you are logged in as an "Administrator" or have Administrator rights before performing any of these steps. Even though that I do these steps directly after a clean install, all of them with the exception of renaming the Owner and Administrator accounts can be done at any time. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number One Note: If you have previously used the "Owner" or "Administrator" account for "general purpose," your account options could be affected if you rename the accounts. I do not recommend to rename your account in this case. However, if you have not already, you should password them now! Most, if not all, games and applications require you to have "Administrator Privileges" to install them. Most, if not all, games require you to have "Administrator Privileges" to use them. Why should you do these things? Crackers need 2 things to access your PC: 1) A user name 2) A password. If you do not password your Administrator account, 100% of their work is done. If you do not disable your "Owner" account, 50% of their work is done. If you do not password your "Owner" account, 100% of their work is done. The following is only valid for Windows XP ---. For XP Home, skip down below the horizontal line: Disable the "Guest" account. Where? Administrator Tools > Computer Management > Local Users and Groups > User folder > Right click "Guest" and select "Properties." In the General Tab, check "Account is Disabled." -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This is only valid for Windows XP Home: Do this NOW!! Everyone on XP Home, by default, has Administrator privileges and the User name is "Owner." If I know that, so does everyone else on the planet. Change the name and / or password your account. If anything, password it. NEVER have an account unprotected! EVER! How? Start > Control Panel > User Accounts > Choose "Owner" > Select "Change my name." Also, you should (will) place a password on your account. How? Start > Control Panel > User Accounts > Choose "Owner" (or whatever account you named it above) --> Select "Create a password." If you choose not to rename the Owner account, you should always password them. The next time you install Windows, create a new user account and do not use Owner and Administrator for "general computing." The new account can have Administrator rights, though. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Two This is valid for Windows XP Home and ---. If you are experiencing "random" slowdowns and "high" CPU usage for no reason, these two services are the most likely cause of the problem. These services are also a major cause of "missing" disk space. System Restore Service could be taking up 3 GB of space, just on it's own.<o> System Restore Service creates system snap shots or restore points for returning to at a later time. Every time you install a program or new driver, plus on a schedule, this service creates a "restore point" to roll back to if a problem occurs. This service would have been nice in the Win95 days due to plenty of problems occurring (new DirectX version every 15 minutes) but not required for the "much" more stable WinXP. This is the FIRST thing that I get rid of on a clean installation. If you use this and enjoy it, good for you. I never will. I feel it is faster and less hassle to just install clean. A rather GOOD (and possibly the only) reason to use this "feature" is to roll back your OS after installing an unknown program or testing software. For example: BETA software of any kind or new, or before installing Service Pack 1. NOTE: If you disable this service, your previous "restore points" will be deleted. If, for whatever reason, you do not want this to happen, do not disable this service. Get rid of System Restore Service and Indexing Service. I disable both, plus check the box, just in case it may decide to fire back up. This is valid for Windows XP Home and ---. Where do you find it? With the default Category Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Performance and Maintenance 4. Select System 5. Select System Restore Tab 6. Check "Turn off System Restore" 7. Select the Ok button to apply the settings With the Classic Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select System 4. Select System Restore Tab 5. Check "Turn off System Restore" 6. Select the Ok button to apply the settings -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- After that, Disable and Stop the System Restore Service: With the default Category Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Performance and Maintenance 4. Select Administrator Tools 5. Select Services 6. Select "System Restore Service" (Double Click) 7. Select General Tab 8. In the Startup type: select "Disabled" 9. Select the Ok button to close the panel With the Classic Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Administrator Tools 4. Select Services 5. Select "System Restore Service" (Double Click) 6. Select General Tab 7. In the Startup type: select "Disabled" 8. Select the Ok button to close the panel While you are at it, you can disable and stop the Indexing Service: With the default Category Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Performance and Maintenance 4. Select Administrator Tools 5. Select Services 6. Select "Indexing Service" (Double Click) 7. Select General Tab 8. In the Startup type: select "Disabled" 9. Select the Ok button to close the panel With the Classic Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Administrator Tools 4. Select Services 5. Select "Indexing Service" (Double Click) 6. Select General Tab 7. In the Startup type: select "Disabled" 8. Select the Ok button to close the panel -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Three I turn off Automatic Updates. I disable the service and also check the "disable" box. This is valid for Windows XP Home and ---. I highly recommend you DO NOT disable this function. After the installation of Service Pack 1, you may configure how "often" updates are checked. Using default values, WinXP "Automatically" downloads the updates and asks to "install" them. A few reasons why you may think this is unacceptable in your situation: You still have a dial-up connection. If XP feels like downloading when ever it wants, it just may not allow you to do what "you" want. You may want to know: What, when and how an update is installed before using any bandwidth. About the update before downloading. Why you need it and what it fixes. It is very important that if you decide to disable the Automatic Updates service, you check the Windows Update site often to ensure the latest critical updates and security patches are installed. Again, I highly recommend you DO NOT disable this function. Where do you find it? With the default Category Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Performance and Maintenance 4. Select System 5. Select Automatic Updates Tab 6. Select "Turn off automatic updating." 7. Select the Ok button to apply the settings With the Classic Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select System Select Automatic Updates Tab 5. Select "Turn off automatic updating." 6. Select the Ok button to apply the settings -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- After that, Disable and Stop the Automatic Updates service. With the default Category Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Performance and Maintenance 4. Select Administrator Tools 5. Select Services 6. Select "Automatic Updates" service (Double Click) 7. Select General Tab 8. In the Startup type: select "Disabled" 9. Select the Ok button to close the panel With the Classic Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Administrator Tools 4. Select Services 5. Select "Automatic Updates" service (Double Click) 6. Select General Tab 7. In the Startup type: select "Disabled" 8. Select the Ok button to close the panel I highly recommend not to disable this function. It is very important that if you decide to disable the Automatic Updates service, you check the Windows Update site often to ensure the latest critical updates and security patches are installed. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Four Remove Remote Assistance and Remote Desktop Sharing. Take note: Remote Desktop Sharing is NOT available with Windows XP Home. You may request assistance from someone ONLY using Windows XP ---. Where do you find it? With the default Category Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Performance and Maintenance 4. Select System 5. Select Remote Tab 6. Uncheck both "Remote Assistance and Desktop Sharing" options 7. Select the Ok button to apply the settings With the Classic Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select System 4. Select Remote Tab 5. Uncheck both "Remote Assistance and Desktop Sharing" options 6. Select the Ok button to apply the settings -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Five Adjust the Page File to a respectable level. This is valid for Windows XP Home and ---. Can you get rid of the page file? Yes and no. If you have a boat load of memory (greater than 512 MB, but I recommend 2 GB) you may be able to function just fine. Some games REQUIRE a certain amount of swap space to be created to even run, no matter how much RAM is available. Also, under certain conditions, my sound card goes crazy (or does not function) in some games with no swap file (oddly enough, Age of Empires 2). If you decide to test your luck with no swap space or page file, you are on your own. Please do not E-Mail me with your war stories about no swap. Every system is different. I usually do not have one "unless something requires it that I am running that day." Where do you find it? With the default Category Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Performance and Maintenance 4. Select System 5. Select Advanced Tab 6. Under Performance, select the Settings button 7. Select Advanced Tab 8. Under Virtual Memory, select the Change button 9. Adjust as needed, or select "No paging File," then select the Set button 10. Select the Ok button to apply the settings 11. You must reboot for the changes to take effect With the Classic Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select System 4. Select Advanced Tab 5. Under Performance, select the Settings button 6. Select Advanced Tab 7. Under Virtual Memory, select the Change button 8. Adjust as needed, or select "No paging File," then select the Set button 9. Select the Ok button to apply the settings 10. You must reboot for the changes to take effect If anything, create (preferably on a separate partition), a swap space of constant size. For example, select Custom Size and place 1000 in "Initial" and 1000 in "Maximum" Size boxes, then click Set Button. This will reduce the amount of work needed to dynamically resize the page file, usually when you need it most. Some definitions need to be explained: Physical RAM ~ The amount of Memory installed on a system. Physical RAM is "way" faster than a "swap file" or "swap space." Swap File ~ The file that is located on your hard drive that "acts" like Physical RAM but is way slower. Virtual Memory ~ The name used for the sum of Physical RAM and the Swap File. In other words: Physical RAM + Swap File = Virtual Memory. You cannot "disable" Virtual Memory even if you disable the Swap File. Meaning, 2 GB RAM + 0 MB Swap File = 2 GB Virtual Memory. From Fastest to Slowest, these are the configuration you can try: No swap file at all. Some software may fail. You also need "much" memory to do this. Greater than 512 MB, but I recommend 2 GB. A static swap file on a separate hard drive (and preferably, controller) from Windows and frequently accessed data. A dynamic swap file on a separate hard drive (and preferably, controller) from Windows and frequently accessed data. A static swap file on a separate partition, but on the same physical hard drive as Windows. A dynamic swap file on a separate partition, but on the same physical hard drive as Windows The default: A dynamic swap file on the same partition and phyiscal hard drive (usually C as Windows. Many factors affect performance of the I/O and Hard Drive system. Namely, "where" on the drive the particular swap partition is located, as well as fragmentation of the swap file itself. Graphics card benchmarks are "not affected" by the status of a page file in these configurations. Only you can decide if it is worth it to you during game play and on your system. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Six Reduce the overhead associated with WinXP's new Themes. This is valid for Windows XP Home and ---. I have observed between 4 MB to 12 MB of RAM used for the new themes. With the default Category Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Performance and Maintenance 4. Select System 5. Select Advanced Tab 6. Under Performance, select the Settings button 7. Select Visual Effects Tab 8. Select "Adjust for best performance." 9. Select the Ok button With the Classic Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select System 4. Select Advanced Tab 5. Under Performance, select the Settings button 6. Select Visual Effects Tab 7. Select "Adjust for best performance. 8. Select the Ok button -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- After that, Disable and Stop the Themes service. With the default Category Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Performance and Maintenance 4. Select Administrator Tools 5. Select Services 6. Select "Themes" service (Double Click) 7. Select General Tab 8. In the Startup type: select "Disabled" 9. Select the Ok button to close the panel With the Classic Control Panel: 1. Head to Start 2. Select Control Panel 3. Select Administrator Tools 4. Select Services 5. Select "Themes" service (Double Click) 6. Select General Tab 7. In the Startup type: select "Disabled" 8. Select the Ok button to close the panel I also remove the desktop picture. Why? Usually, back in the old days, the desktop picture was a ".bmp" which is very uncompressed. Since I do not like a bit map taking up so much memory (from 1.2MB to 3 MB per image) I make them go away. Small tiles are better if you just HAVE to have a desktop pattern and not a blank color. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Seven Adjust for any additional unneeded services. This is valid for Windows XP Home and ---. Do NOT adjust your service configurations using msconfig. If you have not already, reboot now. If you have rebooted, do it again. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Eight This is valid for Windows XP Home and ---. Go to the "Add Remove Programs" and click the "Windows components." Here, take out all the crap you do not need. Such as "MSN EXPLORER" and such. After Removing the unused Windows components, ensure that you check back up on the services that you disabled. Some like to go back to Automatic after playing with the Windows components (namely COM+ and Help and Support). You may also adjust a file to "allow" you to remove other Windows components, such as MSN Messenger. Here is how: TAKE NOTE: You will need to enable "hidden file" viewing to see the inf files. IF YOU ARE SCARED, DO NOT MODIFY THE FILE... Also, you may experience a delay of around 30 seconds or more when loading up Outlook before you can do anything. Putting Messenger back will allow Outlook to function properly again. If you use MSN Explorer, Messenger will also be running in the background. It is how Bill is getting to the ".NET" stuff. "Software as a service" is coming soon. Go to your Windows..inf folder. The default is ~ c:..windows..inf edit the file called "sysoc.inf" Remove the reference of "hide" in this line: Code: msmsgs=msgrocm.dll,OcEntry,msmsgs.inf,hide,7 To make it look like this: Code: msmsgs=msgrocm.dll,OcEntry,msmsgs.inf,,7 You may also remove all references to "hide" in all of the other lines as long as you KEEP the commas. Some components you cannot "uncheck" in the add/remove programs GUI. If you do get them to uninstall, I do NOT support it. You are on your own. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Nine This is valid for Windows XP Home and ---. Download and install ALL updated drivers from the hardware manufacture sites. I cannot tell you what site you need to go to, but do your computer a favor and get updated drivers for everything. Reboot again. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Ten After updating all my drivers, I remove any excess icons (all of them, basically) from the system tray (lower right) and recheck the services to ensure nothing else was installed (like NVIDIA's "driver helper." Contrary to popular belief, those little "quick access" icons take up a lot of room. For example, MS messenger takes up about 3.6 MB just sitting there... not even logged in... Bring it up, select tools, options, then uncheck "load at startup" and "allow to run in background." ICQ's little "Net Detect" sucks up WAY to much memory. Make it go away. Various Quick Tweak icons and even EZCD creator's icon annoys the hell out of me. Make them all go away. If you just HAVE to have that quick access to those programs, place them in the "quick launch bar" (located in the lower left by default, where IE and "Show Desktop" buttons are). The icons will not clutter your desktop and you can easily hit them from any normal windows application. To top it all off, they do not take up memory or resources constantly running in the background. Another plus, this will reduce your boot up time. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Eleven I run msconfig and get rid of any annoying startup programs that may be hiding from me. If you are not familiar with the operation and features of msconfig, I am not going to go into them here. Do NOT adjust your service configurations using msconfig. 1. Head to Start 2. Select Run 3. Type "msconfig" without the quotes 4. Select OK or hit Enter -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number Twelve Defrag the hard drive. Even if XP tells you that it does not need to, do it anyway. It has much tolerance for what "needs" to be done and what should be done. After all, if it was really efficient, there would be no need for you to read this page. Defrag again after installing your applications and games. After that, there should be little need to do it again for awhile unless you delete/uninstall/reinstalla lot of stuff. 1. Perform a hard drive defrag. *This is the best way to speed up a computer* 2. Do a full virus scan with your antivirus program. This sometimes is the cause of a slow system (not usually, unless you have a VERY badly virus infested computer) but is never a bad idea. Be sure to remove EVERY infected file no matter what it is. 3. Spyware Removal Use these spyware scanners to erraticate your spyware problem: * Use ALL 6 of these scanners. Whatever one of them does not detect, the other 5 will. * Make sure you check for spyware definition updates for all of these scanners before using them. Ad-Aware SE Personal 1.06 http://www.lavasoftusa.com/ Spy Sweeper 5.3.1 Build 2344 http://www.webroot.com/ Spybot S&D 1.4 http://www.safer-networking.org/ Spyware Blaster 3.5.1 http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/ CWShredder 2.19 http://www.trendmicro.com/cwshredder/ Windows Defender http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/s...re/default.mspx 4. Uninstall any old games or programs that you no longer use to recover hard drive space. 5. Set the size of your swap/paging/virtual memory file. To find out how to change the size of the paging file, go here (1) = MS notes on that page that you can let Windows manage the size of your paging file. I do not recommend this. Through past experience when letting Windows handle the paging file, I noticed that the system would slow down by quite a noticable margin. (2) = When setting the size of the paging file, for optimal performance use my Paging File Calculator on the Downloads page. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This listing is by no means complete, but it does hit on the high points. I dunno if thats not allowed, too.
the reason why windows sucks and Linux/OSX are better is because they're built ontop of Unix derivatives as opposed to ----ty QDos derivatives. the only thing worth a damn on that list is the instructions for disabling pagefile, which I have done. I currently have 2GB RAM right now and might have 4GB in the near future.
I dual boot ubuntu linux and windows. for general use ubuntu feals a fair amount snappier. I mostly game and use photoshop though and can't tolerate emulation/driver delays. As an operating system, both linux and OSx are undeniably superior... but 3rd party support pretty much seals windows in as the most useable OS.
I have used Windows 2.0 in the early 1990s and it was slow, slow, slow. I thought Windows 3.1 was a vast improvement even though it kept crashing like every 10-15 minutes. I kept quiet when Microsoft forced all computer makers to abandon MS-DOS and put Windows 95 (Win95) on all their new computers in 1996! The Command Window in Win95 and above is not true DOS. Don't let anyone fool you. Also, you had to buy new software for Win95 to replace the old software you had working in MS-DOS! Of course, more bugs were introduced. I quietly resisted by asking that my new computer still have MS-DOS and Windows for Workgroups 3.11. I even had to pay extra for this. I knew we were going further downhill when the "more stable" Windows 98 (Win98) was released and businesses around me tried to upgrade to it from Win95. The upgrade just made the slow systems even slower and buggier I tried to be understanding when Windows 2000 and Windows NT were released. Some bugs were fixed but other bugs took their place. You also had to buy other more expensive software to replace the older software you had running in the earlier version of Windows. This, of course, introduced more bugs. Windows is the BIGGEST SCAM in the computer field. It purports to make computers easier to use for everyone. However, quite the opposite has occurred. I believe the real reason why the return on investment for office computer productivity has been flat or increased little in the last 8 years is because of Windows. I certainly feel Windows has contributed to the computer productivity paradox. It may even be the main cause for the paradox! Waiting for this time parasite to bootup, restart after frequent crashes, time spent on installation of programs, dealing with program conflicts, etc. is the biggest time waster in any business! Further proof: 1. Why Bigger and Faster? Ever wonder why newer versions of Windows require you to upgrade your computer hardware? Ever notice your productivity remains the same or is less even though your present computer is hundreds of times faster and more powerful than the one you had just five years ago? Wake up people! It's a scam! You don't need a faster computer. You need a better operating system. Microsoft continuingly makes money by selling you the latest and greatest Windows. The latest Windows version is always the most inefficient yet, slowing down your fast computer. Also, now you have to upgrade all your other software too because different Windows versions are not compatible with each other! A hidden cost not mentioned at all. It's part of the scam. 2. Computer Crashes Are Not Normal. Believe it or not, your computer hardware was designed to run continuously for weeks and months without crashing. Crashing everyday is NOT normal. It is accepted as normal because of Windows. 3. Windows Help is Pretty Useless. What a time waster. If you want an overview, read the Windows Help or better yet, read the manual. If you need help on a specific problem, you can be sure Windows Help does not have that information. Also, I have never solved a problem I had using the Windows Help Troubleshooter. WinXP Help tries to be "smarter" by pointing to webpages. However, the URLs appear to be all broken in WinXP Help. It appears some idiotic webmaster at Microsoft changed all the support links rendering WinXP Help all but useless. 4. What New Features? Microsoft constantly harps on providing new features in it's products. Features hardly anyone uses. You know what features I would like? I want EVERY Windows program to remember the LAST DIRECTORY I looked at. Also, I want Windows to remember the LAST FILE TYPE I was looking at. I hate opening My Computer and having to start at the top of the directory tree every damn time! It should put me in the last directory I looked at. I hate running Notepad and having to start at the top of the directory tree every damn time. Then I have to set the file type to "All Files" because Notepad insists on looking for *.txt files first! How asinine is that? I want to see ALL THE FILES, damn it! Just those two simple features would save untold hours of wasted time. It should be relatively trivial to implement. Those two features are the extra 10% that make using Windows 100% better. Do you think Microsoft will make this change to make life easier? A feature which will actually be used by everyone? A certain more bang for your buck effort? They have not in all the previous versions of Windows! 5. Idiotic Behaviour. Why does Windows blame the user everytime it crashes? After a crash, some versions of Windows insist on scanning the hard disk first before booting up. Meanwhile, Windows chides the user for not shutting it down properly! This can and does happen several times a day. It was not the user's fault Windows crashed. Microsoft, take responsibility for your buggy operating system. 6. Changing Procedures. One of the strengths of Windows is it gives the user a familar and common environment. All windows should behave the same way. Menu items should also behave the same way. Great. Then why do the procedures to do something keep changing between the versions of Windows? You force the user to relearn how to do what should be a simple task. For example, the procedure to enable/disable the hard disk caching is different in each version of Windows! Windows itself is behaving differently. Another example, how to disable programs that automatically startup in WinXP on bootup. It used to be simple. In earlier versions of Windows, you just move the program shortcuts from the Startup folder. But Nooooo, let's add 3-4 levels of difficulty: * First, DON'T MENTION how to do it in the Windows XP Help. * Second, let's put some Startup programs in using environmental variables and others in the some unknown space like the Windows registry where a tiny mistake can screw everything up. * Third, let's make one program so ONLY that program can make the changes. Let's not tell the user what that program is. And forget about the Startup folder/file model that everyone is used to. * Fourth, let's require the user to reboot his computer again just to break up his session and his train of thought. * Fifth, let's put up a warning that the system is now booting in "Diagnostic" mode to further confuse the user. Just because you disabled a program from starting on bootup, WinXP automatically assumes you are running diagnostics. It doesn't assume you JUST DON'T WANT that program starting up because it's simply annoying, takes up space, takes time to load, etc. Or that you didn't ask it to load on startup. It just rudely put itself there. 7. Busy Work. Windows introduces a slew of other problems that did not exist before. Whole industries have arisen to solve this busy work. (i.e. work that appears to be accomplishing something but in fact, does nothing.) The infrastructure that supports Windows is a separate billion dollar industry unto itself! This industry strives to make Windows "easier" to use. Since this has not happened, all the effort in the Windows industry is further productivity that is wasted. I cannot believe no one else has seen this. I use PCLinuxOS 2007 now and have had my pc run for 4 months with out crashing or having to restart the thing... try yourself www.GetPCLinuxOS.com
Cause it is . Here is the site he got from (if your talking bout the guy above you) http://www.eskimo.com/~webguy/writings/winsucks.html
because it references SP1 when SP2 was already out when the post was made. the world knows windoze is built on top of crap and that despite the countless workarounds and billions of dollar spent improving it that a complete overhaul ultimately needs to be done with backwards compatability implemented via API emulation or something similar... but that doesn't mean you need to revive a thread from half a year ago. and there are a lot more distros than just PC linux out there. People should look around, from gentoo to slackware to debian to fedora, there are a lot of good things out there.
