if you choose to tweak 7 instead of using lite builds which may or may not contain viruses or other unwanted good visit Black Viper's Web Site and look at which services you may be able to turn off. some of these will impact performance but you should proceed with caution and only turn off features that you understand what they do and know you do not need. i'd also create a backup disk if you haven't already.
The best way to trim your startup and shutdown times is to have the latest drivers and disable any listings from msconfig>Startup list that don't absolutely need to startup with the computer.
If you still have slower startup and shutdown than you want, set HD first to boot in BIOS setup, check the Diagnostics>Performance log for what is hanging, and enable bootlogging at f8 prompt in Startup - then check your bootlog for what driver might be failing to start quickly.
I used Black Viper as a survival guide when Vista first lumbered in. Had always used it for XP, too. Seems they slipped a lot of his service edits into SP's, besides Win7's success being built on setting most Services to Manual.
What Auto services have you found are expendable in 7? The only ones I look for are Offline Files (in Ultimate) and Tablet PC. Everything else seems important or it is set to Manual and therefore harmless.
well for myself i have various pc's throughout the house that i use for different purposes. so there is always something i can turn off because it won't be needed on that particular machine. for the average person with 1 general purpose machine i'd say most of it is in fact needed. but i'd recommend the OP have a look there before they start messing with builds other users have chopped down to nothing.
monky91, I think you can slim down the Acer disks if you are willing to get your hands a little dirty. This should be straightforward, but may get a little confusing.
1. Install the Windows 7 clean from the Acer disks.
2. Install another partition of Windows 7 next to it (both are temporary). It doesn't matter if you use the Acer disk for this one, but you can whatever is available. You aren't gonna activate it anyway.
3. On the first partition, apply every tweak you want to make it fast. Run CCleaner, autoruns, Black Viper service guide, etc. Just make it the way you want. Install all your software, but do not put in the antivirus (or any other automatically running software) yet. Also, uninstall the crapware you don't need (Acer and other brands shovel the crap in there so they can sell it cheaper. Don't be fooled, it's all just marketing).
4. On the second partition, run GImageX and choose to capture the first partition into a .WIM file. Use the appropriate flags, like HOMEPREMIUM if you have Home Premium.
5. Now, just replace the install.wim file on your install DVD with this one. Be sure to name it install.wim though. Now, run it through vLite or use 7SLimmer. Now you can test it out in a virtual machine, or if you want, just try your luck.
The advantage you get is that you have all your drivers already to go, you don't need to worry about your registry becoming bloated down when you install more software, and the boot times should be the same, or similar to a clean install. Best of all, you have this DVD to reinstall it whenever you muck up your Windows. It's just ready to go.
Hey, all the pros here.. Thx for all ur guides...
For sausage hacker.. I will try when I get some of my games insatllation.. Borrowed from fren now need the disc to install back, if I do your way.. But thx anhyway... Will try soon.. COnsider a speed freak here.. haha
I will agree with that.
a/v themselves probably have more negative effect on a pc than 95% of malware.
There is a few windows services which can affect performance noticeably, but these can simply be turned off, there is no need to remove them from the installation. I did use nlite on windows XP but not to remove features, I used it to customise default options and to integrate apps and drivers.
In future is possible I will do the same on windows 7 but again it would only be for customisation and to integrate stuff.
Also on windows XP it was handly to make the install disc unattended as default it asks you many questions so you have to be present, the default behaviour on windows 7 is far improved so after you pick the hdd to install to it wont ask you anything else until the end.
I think you can get performance improvements from more than just services and processes.
With a Lite disk, there are a lot less hooks that need to be loaded. You don't notice this as much on startup, but apps load a little faster.
Windows in general tends to slow down after you use it for a few days after a fresh install. A Lite disk takes a lot longer - if at all (if you do it right :) )
Quote