I personally disabled the defrag service because I pay for O&O commercial defrag software. No point in having O&O and Windows try to defrag together right? It's my understanding that hard drives are bad at trying to do 2 intensive things at the same time.
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should I use xp or windows7 ?
- Thread starter eckndu
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I personally disabled the defrag service because I pay for O&O commercial defrag software. No point in having O&O and Windows try to defrag together right? It's my understanding that hard drives are bad at trying to do 2 intensive things at the same time.
And you've yet to show proof they don't do either. Milliseconds to load? You're just throwing out a random guesstimate. Then you say it "most likely" wont help startup or system performance. Well you go can believe your most likely, and a 5 year old post that was argued back then for 15 pages. Any resource you look up on tweaking windows involves disabling services. Yet somehow you guys have your secret MS tech guy that has refuted the idea, and didn't let the secret out to the other big websites promoting the tweaks. So you can believe what you want, I have tried it (since the xp days) and it does help. Mainly speeding up boot time by quite a bit, and lowering the used ram being wasted on the useless fluff.
hrm, how long has that site been around, 10 years? I mean there were a lot of legitimate reasons for it way back when memory was measured in MB and CPUs were single cores. Nowadays with W7 I think the risk far outweighs any potential benefits.
You want proof? Fine, just boot up Windows 7 on modern hardware and you'll see it takes all of a minute. You're not going to "get better FPS" from disabling random services, any jackass could figure that out.
Exactly. Those crappy tweaks listed on his site are ones that were carried over from the XP days (and even then were considered shitty). They are completely irrelevant now.
Right, and that reasoning totally makes sense. Blackviper's site and Biznatch are saying just disable random stuff and it'll "give u more MHz!!1!"
Well hell. I might as well be the naysayer here. On that hardware, I might go for XP. (Assuming you can get drivers for the rest of your hardware... either way, that would be my gating factor) Did the machine come with an XP license?
The reason I trim down my OS is I'm often using them as base Virtual Machines for development. Every machine resource I have to give the guest OS is carved out of my host - both disk and RAM. There is a very active community for removing most of the unneeded services that a default install gives you. A set of stickies here covers most of them. The same tricks make for a much snappier laptop too.
http://www.msfn.org/board/forum/89-nlite/
XP is much easier to trim down than Win7. They greatly reduced the footprint from Vista, but... Win7 is a bit harder to optimize than XP. The less resources the OS uses, the more CPU/RAM is available for your apps. For me, I only care about my apps running stable. I turn off most of the OS/desktop stuff, so a funky menu bar or transparent windowing is not a feature.
Your CPU is 64-bit. Does your chipset support 64-bit instructions as well? If it does, there are options there too. I have a Thinkpad x61s laptop with the 1.6ghz Core2Due L7500 CPU, a Mobile 965 chipset, and 8G of RAM. I trimmed down and benchmarked Win7(x64), Vista, and XP(x64) when I need the base OS to be running in Windows. I ended up going with XP64. YMMV, but that was the sweet spot for me. The on-board video does not support any of the fancy aero stuff, and the rest was just chewing up CPU/RAM. (One of the nice things about having work provide an MSDN Universal subscription, you get to actually try them all)
If the chipset does not support 64-bit OS, I'd probably go XP over 32-bit Win7 since you will only have 3-something gig of RAM available.
The reason I trim down my OS is I'm often using them as base Virtual Machines for development. Every machine resource I have to give the guest OS is carved out of my host - both disk and RAM. There is a very active community for removing most of the unneeded services that a default install gives you. A set of stickies here covers most of them. The same tricks make for a much snappier laptop too.
http://www.msfn.org/board/forum/89-nlite/
XP is much easier to trim down than Win7. They greatly reduced the footprint from Vista, but... Win7 is a bit harder to optimize than XP. The less resources the OS uses, the more CPU/RAM is available for your apps. For me, I only care about my apps running stable. I turn off most of the OS/desktop stuff, so a funky menu bar or transparent windowing is not a feature.
Your CPU is 64-bit. Does your chipset support 64-bit instructions as well? If it does, there are options there too. I have a Thinkpad x61s laptop with the 1.6ghz Core2Due L7500 CPU, a Mobile 965 chipset, and 8G of RAM. I trimmed down and benchmarked Win7(x64), Vista, and XP(x64) when I need the base OS to be running in Windows. I ended up going with XP64. YMMV, but that was the sweet spot for me. The on-board video does not support any of the fancy aero stuff, and the rest was just chewing up CPU/RAM. (One of the nice things about having work provide an MSDN Universal subscription, you get to actually try them all)
If the chipset does not support 64-bit OS, I'd probably go XP over 32-bit Win7 since you will only have 3-something gig of RAM available.
Way to repeat the same useless stuff and misquote people. I never said to disable random services, thats retarded. Yes you can eff stuff up if you disable services windows needs, every site makes that very clear. I also never said it will give more FPS, stop putting words in my mouth jackass. You know how I know it works? Because I have tried it on modern hardware with win 7. I'm glad your slow ass modern hardware boots in a minute, mine boots in 20 seconds or less. Welcome screen? I don't even see it, its just a flash before getting to the desktop. So I have tried it, and it does work. How about you do the same instead of talking out your ass? And just because you thought they were shitting back in the XP days, does not mean they were. You were ignorant then, and nothing has changed. Have fun in your imaginary world where windows can magically run services utilizing no resources....
So now back to the simple facts I said before. Blackvipers site, is just one of the MANY sites that recommends disabling SPECIFIC services. It explains what each service does and what will stop functioning if you disable it. There are a TON of sites that recommend this, his site has the most information packed in 1 place, which is why I posted it. Disabling this stuff will speed up boot and reduce ram wasted by the OS. That's a fact, I'm not pulling stuff out my ass like you are.
I used that same forum to find the list of stuff to trim from win7 to get the footprint down to 6.5gb (after disabling hibernate). Here is the specific link I followed, which also has a link to the RT 7 software needed to trim windows since Nlite is basically EOL. http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/145036-windows-7-roadmap/
NLite is mature - I'll give you that. Can't see Microsoft coming out with a SP4. I'll look into the current state of trimming Win7 again.
Just as a comparison, my base VM image (not including paging file) uses a total of 337M of disk space. That has all the services needed to run JDeveloper, Oracle Database 11gR2, Weblogic, (which are hdd pigs by default too) and a few other bits. Might be able to get that OS footprint smaller, but good enough for whatever I've needed to do in Win32.
Nothing has changed? Yeah, except that two OS's have been released in that time-frame.
OS's that are vastly different (and better) than XP. And please, keep your empty insults for the kindergarten playground.You've still yet to provide any proof that disabling random services will help increase performance. You continue to draw attention away from my questions by trying to insult me, and you're "advice" has been debunked by countless other people and threads. The truth is blackviper is a well-known joke by anyone in the enthusiast community.
To everyone else I apologize for breaking the rule "don't feed the troll".
Once again, putting words in my mouth. It's not random services, and I said it decreases ram use and boot time. Now I argued before that these processes consumed cpu cylces, but since I can't prove that (not going to waste the time just for this thread), I have stopped arguing that point, but still believe it to be the case. Please show me these countless threads that show running services consume no resources, as I have searched and come up with nothing. And because you think someone is wrong, does not mean you speak for the community.
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Disposed
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Just make a backup of your current setup and try XP. My guess is it wont be much different on that slow hardware.
YeOldeStonecat
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Who the hell is saying "disable random services?" Blackvipers site, if you know how to read english past the 3rd grade level, has explanations of each service, and you can further easily (I say easily for some of us that have worked with Windows for a while and have some grasp of it) figure out dependencies.
I used to use Blackvipers site as a reference (til I had them all memorized after building so many) when building public gaming servers. Following those allowed me to get the OS so stripped down it ran like a raped ape, night and day difference. Naturally most of those services are needed for a game server, plus disabling many of those is part of the lock down routine to make it more secure.
I don't use any of those tweaks for a desktop OS...but saying "disable random services" and "non of that works" is ridiculous. ...because if you can read, it's not random. And it does work.
It depends on the older hardware.
My current emergency rig (parts from two older PCs while saving up for a new motherboard for Mighty Mouse) has arguably one of the weirdest old motherboards from the Age of the P4 - MSI Computer's 845EMax HT-Ready.
This corporate-targeted oddball (MSI-6266) has an Intel chipset (generally a good choice), an AMI BIOS, and even supports up to 4x AGP - however, the chipset is the 845E (no onboard graphics, unlike the more well-known 845G; USB is a 2+4 affair), and the BIOS does not support no-emulation DVD booting (hence, it requires modified DVDs for either Vista or 7 OEM or full versions to be installed onto bare drives - otherwise, a custom install is necessary) even when fully updated.
However, once 7 *is* installed, the Intel chipset heritage shines through, as it is just as solid as the triplet of more well-known chipsets in the family tree (845G, 865PE, and 875P). I mentioned the 2+4 USB configuration - all six ports are USB 2.0 compliant; this was not the case with the original Intel 845 (no E or G). There's no onboard SATA or LAN support (this model does not include the optional LAN support; SATA was not an option); therefore, I have an old RealTek 100 mbps LAN card and SMC USB wireless-G stick adapter handling router-connection duty. The lack of SATA support stings; the largest PATA drive I had available is only 40 GB (the smaller of my pair of SATA hard drives is five times that size). For graphics, I have AMD's X1650 PRO AGP (in 512 MB trim) handling those chores (though strictly DX9c, and dating back to 2005, it runs like a charm). The audio side is handled by the same X-Fi XtremeGamer originally from Mighty Mouse (and the stage 3A UNserver before that); why fix what isn't broke? The printing is another old workhorse - HP's Deskjet 940C. I've owned it for five years (it dates back to the UNserver 3A and XP Professional); as long as I keep it stocked with ink and paper, it works. (I've *never* used it connected via the LPT port, though it supports both it and USB - I have used it solely as a USB printer, despite not always running Windows. It works just fine not just in Linux, but even in UNIX - specifically Solaris 9 and later. The reliability is flat-out scary in this age of *throwaway* inkjet printers.)
That's right - despite the quirks, 7 (Ultimate 32-bit, no less), actually runs pretty decently on this oddball ex-corporate mobo. (The CPU is an Intel Pentium 4 Original Northwood 2.4; the RAM is Buffalo Select 1 GB DDR400 x2. Both sockets are in use, hence full dual-channel is in effect.)
Yea, any actual *benchmarks* showing the difference, that can be checked and verified? I'd love to know what service(s) you think, when disabled, allows you computer to run like a 'raped ape.' Mine, with no services disabled, runs with 0% cpu and 12% memory usage, now you might be able to get that memory usage down a little bit (not much I suspect) but you are certainly not going to get the cpu lower than 0, I mean what does your 'stripped down' computer do? Run at -5% cpu or something? Services, as with most correctly written programs, only run code when that code is needed, so I have to agree with 'Quack Viper'...
GreenMonkey
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Yes.
While old, I posted the Anandtech thread about the tweaks. Performance did not improve. It did nothing. Even on a Pentium ****ing II. A PENTIUM TWO.
Seriously. Tinkering with services creates no benefit. So you're screwing with things that cause no benefit. Look at the cost/benefit analysis. Risk? Some. For what benefit? Zilch, except for some phantom placebo effect.
Yea, but the 20-30MBs you get back, if that, are not going to make much of a difference unless you just have the minimum memory possible, and it's certainly not worth a bunch of wannabe hackers crippling their systems who will then come on the internet talking about "windoze sux, stupid microslop" because they broke things without realizing it by doing tweaks with minimum returns, IMO.
Or use a lightweight linux distro.
The main reason for doing something like this is you can retrieve hundreds of megs of memory by removing services that are not needed or used. It can be significant.
On physical hardware or on a VM, 32-bit anything usually caps out at 3.2-3.4G total RAM. RAM becomes a precious commodity - you cannot add more. By reducing the footprint of the OS, you have more available RAM for the applications *you* are trying to run. In my case, a development environment most of the time. For many years, had to run the VM host from my laptop, with a guest OS inside. The t60p only did 32-bit, so much care was needed. Tuning turned a 28 minute startup into just over 6 minutes.
When running as a guest OS in a VM, the lower RAM usage, the more VMs you can usually stuff onto a box.
If you can keep the RAM usage low, the machine will have less need for paging to disk. Working in memory is an order of magnitude faster than disk IO. Swapping in a VM on virtual disk... kill me now.
Lastly, you are also more secure by running fewer services. Heck, on RHEL, I'll start with a router based install and still remove packages before yum'ing the support I need for the app,
Disposed
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There's actually a sneaky trick to get an extra 4GB of ram into a 32-bit O.S.
An extra 4gb or get to 4gb?
Hundreds of megabytes? From services? Sorry I don't believe that, can you provide some proof? (over a default install, not compared to every single service running)
And I didn't say disabling services was always bad, I just think in general it should be not encouraged because too many noobs will screw up their Windows install. (screw up in the sense that it won't function as they need, really not worth it 99% of the time.)
Yea my win 7 ultimate x64 typically runs on 860-920MB of ram. He also forgot to mention the decreased boot time that comes with windows loading less at startup.
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DaRuSsIaMaN
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DeathFromBelow
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There's actually a sneaky trick to get an extra 4GB of ram into a 32-bit O.S.
It's called physical address extension, and it's really not worth bothering with now that we have good 64-bit operating systems. PAE can cause various compatibility issues.
I was talking about mapping your page file to a 4gb gigabyte i-ram. Not PAE..........
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That's not a good idea since those drives are limited to the old SATA-I speed of 150MB/s. That's fast for a HDD, but slow for a SSD and incredibly slow and not good for system memory.
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That's not a good idea since those drives are limited to the old SATA-I speed of 150MB/s. That's fast for a HDD, but slow for a SSD and incredibly slow and not good for system memory.
I've had one of those. The read/write operations were very fast at the time. The drive's largest deficiency was it did not work well in RAID, so capacity was an issue as it supported 4x1G sticks max. For a long time it was the only drive out there that could come close to saturating the SATA1 connection.
(Worth pointing out this was a RAM based disk replacement, rather than a RAM extension. Typically you would put your swap on it, so when your system paged out to disk, the speed was faster than HDD IO.)
The modern equivalent is the Acard ANS9010 series. I've got one of the older Acard ANS9010 versions - SATA2, 8 banks of RAM, and two SATA ports in RAID 0. The write speeds are faster than the pair of Intel x25-m's that I have tn the same box, and made it a reasonable scratch area for my compiling and database operations. IOPS are very high on it, and it also was one of the fastest XP installs (when I was playing around with it) I've ever seen. Also, zero worries about too many writes. (And yes, in theory, this should not be an issue. I've also had CF cards used up because of a swap file which was set to the wrong file system did use it up)
The SATA controller becomes a bottleneck at a certain point. With 24G of system RAM (6x4G) now economical, the external drives are moot as a scratch drive.
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