Trimming down Task Manager in XP for best PC performance...

Hi

Now with more time on my hands, just got back into Flight Sims.
In order to mimimise background progs running and slowing down any flight
sim applications, I always start from a basic msconfig startup setup.

With regards to Windows Task Manager however, I've never disabled anything,
at the risk of fowling up. Any guidance with regards to which applications
it is essential to NOT disable would be appreciated.

Is there anyway of saving and booting with these preferences..............
like the "old days" with a boot disk...

Thanks

John Helligsworth

"John Hellingsworth" wrote in message
...
Is there anyway of saving and booting with these preferences..............
like the "old days" with a boot disk...

First, try to understand that not all processes listed in the Task Manager
are really problematic for running FS or other games. Generally speaking,
what causes problems are *non-idle* processes that a) use significant CPU
time and/or b) use significant amounts of RAM *when they are active* (an
idle program listed in the Task Manager that uses a large amount of RAM does
NOT affect performance). For most of the processes listed, they don't do
either, and eliminating all them might give you a 1% improvement at best.

Processes that are likely to take away from game performance are likely to
be those that you have explicitly approved. Things like email programs
(which are usually configured to "wake up" periodically to check email) for
example. These are usually easy enough to stop just before you run a game.

Personally, I exit all applications before running a game, and don't bother
with any of the other processes. It's just not worth the time and hassle,
both with respect to figuring out what I can stop and with respect to
tracking down problems if I accidently stop something that turns out to be
important later on.

(Terminology note: I'm using "applications" and "processes" in the same way
that Task Manager does. An application is a process with a top-level window
with which you as the user can interact. All applications are processes,
but not all processes are applications. There should be NO applications
that you need to run, but there are processes that are required.)

With all that in mind, it's not too hard to reduce the process load on the
computer, nor to do it by default, if you are willing to use regedit. You
can save and restore the
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es key, which contains the
settings for which services are enabled or disabled (of course, the key
contains many other things too, but it won't hurt things to load those
settings too, as they'll be the same each time as long as you don't change
them).

Basically, go into regedit, save the current state. Then go into msconfig
(or the Services control console) and disable whatever services you don't
want to run. Then go into regedit again and save the new state (under a
different name, of course). At that point, you ought to be able to simply
restore whichever settings you want and reboot.

You can do similar things with the other kinds of processes that start, but
they are going to be harder to find. The easiest ones are in the
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\Curr entVersion\Run key. Some
legacy stuff might still be found in system.ini or win.ini, and there may be
things in the "Startup" menu. Since these are all either files or registry
entries, it's easy enough to save and restore settings you want, but
obviously the wider variety of things you want to mess with, the more hassle
it will be to go each and every one. You could create a batch file to
handle the hassle though (registry settings can be restored using the "reg"
command line program, and files obviously can just be restored using the
"copy" command).

Most people wouldn't bother with any of that, even if they found services
and other stuff they don't want running. For many of the services, you
don't really EVER need them, so it's safe to simply disable them
permanently. There are web sites that have pages dedicated to listing which
services you can do without; since I don't bother with that, I don't know
them off the top of my head, but Google ought to find them for you easily.

Like I said, personally I don't find it worthwhile to do ANY of the above.
It doesn't produce a performance improvement that justifies the hassle and
headaches. Your mileage may vary.

Pete

On Sat, 18 Sep 2004 21:42:46 GMT, "John Hellingsworth"
wrote:


With regards to Windows Task Manager however, I've never disabled anything,
at the risk of fowling up. Any guidance with regards to which applications
it is essential to NOT disable would be appreciated.

Is there anyway of saving and booting with these preferences..............
like the "old days" with a boot disk...

Thanks

John Helligsworth

Hi John.

I've been using FsAutoStart, and found it really is a nice way of
trimming down XP for flight sim use. I use to while I fly Aces High
on-line with excellent results.

The program will stop programs and services, launch the game, and upon
exit re-starts everything that it stopped. In addition, during the
configuration setup it gives some pretty good advice on what's 'safe'
to stop and what is really needed.

Here's a link
http://www.softpedia.com/public/cat/12/2/12-2-188.shtml


Take Care,
James Lerch
http://lerch.no-ip.com/atm (My telescope construction, Testing, and Coating site)

Press on: nothing in the world can take the place of perseverance.
Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent.
Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb.
Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts.
Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.
Calvin Coolidge

"James Lerch" wrote in message

I've been using FsAutoStart, and found it really is a nice way of
trimming down XP for flight sim use. I use to while I fly Aces High
on-line with excellent results.

The program will stop programs and services, launch the game, and upon
exit re-starts everything that it stopped. In addition, during the
configuration setup it gives some pretty good advice on what's 'safe'
to stop and what is really needed.

Here's a link
http://www.softpedia.com/public/cat/12/2/12-2-188.shtml


--





Thanks for the tip.

FsAutoStart works very well.