Startup, services,...at boot! What the differences?

[paulobao]

Hi,

At msconfig I've a lot of services and startup items! I've a laptop (Toshiba Tecra R840). I unchecked all startup items except:
-Alps Pointing-device Driver
-Toshiba HDD SSd Alert
-Toshiba HDD Protection
-Microsoft Security Client
-Google ToolbarNotifier
-Bluetooth Stack for Windows by Toshiba.

I'm using a bluetooth mouse!

Everytinng seems to work fine! I loosed flash cards but I can use all the Fn keys!
But for the services I've not unchecked anything (and they are lots of them, I mean non Microsoft services!).

What the difference between these 2 items (services and startup items)?
What the imact in the boot time?

paulo

 

[oxymoron02]

Startup items are things which can theoretically all be turned off, they'll make Windows boot faster but you'll have to enable them later if you require them (for example, your bluetooth mouse most probably would not work until the BTStack process was running). Disabling them will not impact your system at all.
I would disable the Google Toolbar entry, though. The two Toshiba SSD and HDD entries will be safe to disable too, as they're providing a nearly useless service.

Services are things which run in the background and are safe enough to leave alone unless you want your system to run at utmost efficiency, or know you will never use them. For example if you don't have or use a printer, then Print Spooler is safe to disable.
Just as with startup items, disabled services will make your system boot faster (although we are talking in the order of fractions of milliseconds).

I personally use The Elder Geek Home to judge which services are safe to disable and for any not listed, I just use my own initiative.

 

[paulobao]

Thanks for the tips!
My Tecra is booting really slow (80s - 140s)....
This is really nasty because my wife's satellite with a 1,4 GHz Pentium is booting in 55 sec and with all startup and services that came from factory!!!! And Norton 360 too (I swap for MSEssentials).
What a disapointement :-(

 

[oxymoron02]

No problem buddy, just go through the list over at Elder Geek and disable anything it says it safe to do so, if you think you're not going to use it. Any entries you don't understand, even if EG says it's safe, I'd advise to leave alone.

If you need any further help just post in here and I'll be alerted

 

[paulobao]

Thanks a lot

 

[gregrocker]

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