xpgeek
24-01-2007, 02:00 AM
Now on Windows Vista official release, its time to start talking tweaks.
Any forum member please feel free to share your thoughts on tweaks listed here or reply with more not discussed here yet. This should be the main Vista Tweaking post on this forum so new users will not have to browse through dozens of scattered posts.
For anyone wanting better performance out of their Vista, the obvious place to start is the Aero theme.
The full on Aero Glass theme requires some very decent video graphics power to fully function properly, and switching to Vista Basic theme can make a significant increase in system performance.
My system and video card handle it quite nicely, but I actually still prefer the basic theme. I wish I could change the basic theme's rampant blues to a cooler gray, but I still prefer it over Aero Glass. Vista just feels more responsive for me and just feels faster.
If don't care about visual looks at all and want the very best performance, there is still the Windows Classic look as well, which doesn't even look that bad on Vista.
Choice of theme of course comes down entirely to user preference.
The next thing to look at is graphical affects. Just like Windows XP, Vista comes with plenty of animation affects enabled by default, such as menu shadows and fading affects, Disabling some of these purely cosmetic affects can make quite the difference in performance.
Registry Tweaks
Registry tweaks should be done with great caution as a user can severely damage their installation of Windows by altering the registry.
This section will be updated as more tweaks are discovered.
Just a simple few I've done so far.
* HKEY_Current_User / Control Panel / Desktop - MenuShowDelay
Controls how long menus and submenus take to pop out. Default value is 400, I prefer a little quicker of a response and change to 100.
* HKEY_Current_User / Control Panel / Sound - Beep
Default value is Yes, may change to No. Stops your computer from producing somewhat annoying beeping sounds when doing various things. Seems to require a log off or a reboot to take affect.
Services
For instructions on how to tweak and disable services see this post (http://www.experiencewindows.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1075) about tweaking services for Windows XP.
Do Not disable every service in this list. Look over them, reading the description Vista provides for the service and decide for yourself if you need it running.
Way too many services in Vista to go over every one here. www.BlackViper.com has it all for you.
Any forum member please feel free to share your thoughts on tweaks listed here or reply with more not discussed here yet. This should be the main Vista Tweaking post on this forum so new users will not have to browse through dozens of scattered posts.
For anyone wanting better performance out of their Vista, the obvious place to start is the Aero theme.
The full on Aero Glass theme requires some very decent video graphics power to fully function properly, and switching to Vista Basic theme can make a significant increase in system performance.
My system and video card handle it quite nicely, but I actually still prefer the basic theme. I wish I could change the basic theme's rampant blues to a cooler gray, but I still prefer it over Aero Glass. Vista just feels more responsive for me and just feels faster.
If don't care about visual looks at all and want the very best performance, there is still the Windows Classic look as well, which doesn't even look that bad on Vista.
Choice of theme of course comes down entirely to user preference.
The next thing to look at is graphical affects. Just like Windows XP, Vista comes with plenty of animation affects enabled by default, such as menu shadows and fading affects, Disabling some of these purely cosmetic affects can make quite the difference in performance.
Registry Tweaks
Registry tweaks should be done with great caution as a user can severely damage their installation of Windows by altering the registry.
This section will be updated as more tweaks are discovered.
Just a simple few I've done so far.
* HKEY_Current_User / Control Panel / Desktop - MenuShowDelay
Controls how long menus and submenus take to pop out. Default value is 400, I prefer a little quicker of a response and change to 100.
* HKEY_Current_User / Control Panel / Sound - Beep
Default value is Yes, may change to No. Stops your computer from producing somewhat annoying beeping sounds when doing various things. Seems to require a log off or a reboot to take affect.
Services
For instructions on how to tweak and disable services see this post (http://www.experiencewindows.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1075) about tweaking services for Windows XP.
Do Not disable every service in this list. Look over them, reading the description Vista provides for the service and decide for yourself if you need it running.
Way too many services in Vista to go over every one here. www.BlackViper.com has it all for you.