So at this point, I have given up trying to convince people about how bad Vista is. People who understand my arguments tend to already dislike Vista, and those who don't either want "The Advanced MS OS" or don't care. This page was built for those people.

For anyone else, I suggest trying out Ubuntu or any other wonderful, fast, and free Operating System.

Index:

Why should I fix Vista?

This question gets asked a lot, normally by people who:

  1. Have Vista installed by default, as their first OS.
  2. Have upgraded their computer for Vista.

If this is the case, you do not have a reference point for how fast your computer actually is. Vista will seem "fast enough", or "working fine", and so forth, mostly because people do not realize how nicely it CAN run. Here is some criteria to determine if you need to bother with this tutorial at all:

  1. How long does your computer take to start? A fast computer can start in less than 2 minutes, and should never take over 5 or 10 minutes to begin.
  2. How many windows can you open at one time, before you are unable to do anything? A Vista compatible computer should be able to open 20 or more file browsing windows with no issue.
  3. Does your computer feel sluggish and unresponsive? You should only have sluggish reactions in an operating system (if at all) during times of heavy computer use (Indexing your hard drive, Defragging your computer, running 50 programs, watching video while listening to music and TV, etc).

Some people will never experience such slowdowns and problems, and if so, you can stop here. However, if you are becoming distressed over the speed and other issues with Vista, maybe this tutorial can help.

Notice:This tutorial may disable certain items to increase speed.

Since nothing is deleted, you can choose to turn them back on if you so desire at a later date.

What are you going to suggest?

I am a big proponent of free, open source, and low hassle. Any tools I suggest will be available free online, and the majority of changes will be done using Vista's built in options and tools. The goal is to force Vista to be faster, not just to replace it with something better.

Please back up your Registry before changing Registry values.

Holding that firmly in mind, here is a short list of the software I will be suggesting:

  • Mozilla Firefox Web Browser~ Free fully functioning web browser.(Link)
    • Adblock Plus~ Block advertisements inside web pages. (Link)
    • NoScript ~ Block Javascript unless approved by the user. (Link)
    • FasterFox ~ Tweak some background settings to increase speed. (Link)
  • OpenOffice.org~ Free alternative to Microsoft Office (if you do not own Microsoft Office) (Link)
  • AVG Free Edition ~ Free antivirus, fast, small, and very good at cleaning viruses. (Link)

I am also going to use the following online resources:

Step 1) Removing the Fluff.

Microsoft Vista has an interesting dilemma: It has no target. Or to be more precise, it has no unified target. Vista is built in an attempt to appeal both to individual consumers and to the corporate environment, and this causes problems. Also, Vista turns on a lot of processes that can slow down your system in an attempt to give extra functionality. So lets disable some of that for speed.

0. Window's User Access Control. This does not affect computer power or performance, but it does become annoying. Here is one of the ways to turn it off:

0.1) Click "Start", then "Control Panel".

0.2) Select "User Accounts", and click "Turn User Account Control on or off".

0.3) Uncheck "User Account Control Box". Restart computer.

1. Window's Search Indexing. Windows continually lists everything on your computer, so that when you search for things it can find them faster. On the other hand, if you save things in a logical place (Like all docs in a folder called "Docs", etc), this can really slow down your system with no real gain.

1.1) Click "Start", and then "My Computer".

1.2) Right click the "C:" drive.

1.3) On "General Tab", Uncheck "Index this drive for faster searching".

1.4) It will pop up a dialog box, select "Include subfolders and files".

2.a. Window's Extra/Not Required Services. There are many services that run in the background of your computer. Some are vital for your computer to run, and others check for special cameras or printers, or see if you put a special type of disk in the tray, etc. These services slow your system, and disabling a few can really speed up start time.

2.a.1) Click "Start", and then "Run". Type "msconfig" without the quotations, hit enter.

2.a.2) Click on the "Services" tab (It should be the middle one in the new window).

2.a.3) Check the box “Hide all Microsoft Services” (Just in case).

2.a.4) Uncheck the items you don't want, or don't think you need. Click "OK" when done.

To help out in this, here is a small list of services you can disable:

    • Windows Error Reporting
    • Tablet PC Input Service ( don’t disable if you are using a tablet PC)
    • Remote Registry
    • Offline Files
    • IKE and AuthIP IP Keying Modules
    • Distributed Link Tracking Client
    • Computer Browser

2.b Window's Extra/Not Required Startup Programs. There are many programs that start with your computer that you may or may not wish to begin with your computer, such as MSN messenger, Quicktime, etc. Disabling them from startup will not delete or harm the actual program.

2.b.1) Click "Start", and then "Run". Type "msconfig" without the quotations, hit enter.

2.b.2) Click on the "Startup" tab (It should be second to last in the new window).

2.b.3) Uncheck the items you don't want. Click "OK" when done.

3. Window's Printing Search. This one is annoying: Vista continually searches for printers on the network as you search through your files, slowing down things. Once you get your printer set up, lets disable this one.

3.1) Click "Start", and then "My Computer".

3.2) In the explorer window that opens, go to the "Tools" menu.

3.3) Select "Folder options", and go to the "View" tab.

3.4) Uncheck the box "Automatically search for network printers”

4. Window's Remote Differential Compression. Remote Differential Compression checks for file changes to reduce network bandwidth. This can slow your system down as it constantly checks files for changes.

4.1) Click "Start", and then "Control Panel".

4.2) Switch to "Classic View" and select "Program Features".

4.3) Choose "Turn Windows features on and off".

4.4) Scroll down and uncheck "Remote Differential Compression".

5. Window's Automatic Disc Defragmentation. This one is a maybe. If you can remember to defrag your computer once a month or so, then it is a good idea to turn off this automated process to gain speed. If you don't know what Defrag means, you might want to skip this one.

5.1) Click "Start", then "Computer".

5.2) Right click on the "C:" Drive and click on Properties.

5.3) Select the "Tools" tab.

5.4) Click on "Defragment Now", and uncheck "Run on a schedule".

6. Window's Aero. Aero is pretty, and it is a resource hog. While disabling is an option, you can actually achieve speed boosts without completely removing Aero from your life.

6.a. Disable Aero's Transparency. This adds very little utility to the desktop and yet can be a drain on your systems resources. If you can live without transparency, this is a great idea.

6.a.1) Right click on the desktop, select "Personalize".

6.a.2) Click "Windows Color and Appearance".

6.a.3) Uncheck "Enable transparency".

6.b. Disable Aero's Min/Max Window Animations. This helps the system to feel more responsive to your commands, with no loss of utility. Another useful item to remove.

6.b.1) In the Start menu type “SystemPropertiesPerformance”, press enter.

6.b.2) Click the "Visual Effects" tab.

6.b.3) Uncheck "Animate windows when minimizing and maximizing."


6.c.1) Right click on the Side Bar and choose "Properties".

6.c.2) Uncheck "Start Side Bar When Windows Starts".

7. Window's Hibernation. If you don't use the Hibernate feature, then disable this to get back some system resources and speed. If you do use it, then skip this step. On a side note, this is really buried in there for some reason. Took a while to figure this out.

7.1) Click "Start", then "Control Panel".

7.2) Click "Power Options".

7.3) Click "Change Plan Settings".

7.4) Click "Change Advanced Power Settings".

7.5) Expand the "Sleep" option, then expand "Hibernate After" option.

7.6) Crank the selector to zero (Or enter zero).

7.7) Click Apply. Whee.

Step 2) Editing for Speed.

1. Setup Window's Ready Boost. This is a great way to pick up some speed. Find a flash drive which is as large or larger then the amount of Ram you have (A 2GB stick would be nice). A high read/write speed would also be lovely. Hopefully you will have one around the house...

1.1) Insert your USB Flash Drive.

1.2) Click "Start", then "Computer".

1.3) Right click the USB drive, choose "Properties".

1.4) Select the "Ready Boost" tab, and choose "Use this device".

1.5) Select as much space as you want for Ram usage.

2. Enable Advanced Write Caching. If you have SATA (Serial ATA) hard drives, Vista can support write caching. This improves your data retrieval speed, allowing faster disk access. Make sure your computer is on a battery backup if you decide to do this one.

2.1) Click "Start", then "Computer".

2.2) Right click the hard drive, and choose "Properties".

2.3) Select the "Policies" tab.

2.4) Select the radio option "Optimize for performance".

2.5) Check the boxes "Enable write caching on the disk" and "Enable Advance Performance".

3. Increase Internet Explorer 7 Downloads. IE7 only allows two files to download from one server at a time. Lets fix that.

3.1) Press "Start", then "Run". Type "regedit" to open the Registry Editor.

3.2) Expand the following keys:

3.4) Increase the decimal value from 2 to something higher (Like 10 maybe).

3.5) Right click the key "MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server" and choose "Modify".

3.6) Also increase this value to something higher. Restart the computer.

4. Tweak "Flip 3D". This allows you to speed up the "Alt" + "Tab" switching hot key. This one should be changed based on your personal preference.

4.1) Press "Start", then "Run". Type "regedit" to open the Registry Editor.

4.2) Expand the following keys:

4.4) Assign any value between 4 and 9 to the new key. Restart your computer when done.

Step 3) Adding Replacements.

1. New Internet Browser: Mozilla Firefox. Firefox is a popular alternative to Internet Explorer that has tabbed browsing, spell checker, and support for extensions. It is available for free from the developers, as are the extensions I will be suggesting.

1.a) Where to download.The Firefox download page can be found here. Here also are the links for Firefox Extensions and Firefox Plugins.

1.b) Suggested Extensions.Firefox is a very fine browser by itself, but a couple of extensions is almost required to fully take advantage of it.

1.b.1) Adblock Plus ~ Blocks advertising inside of web pages. Does a very nice job.

1.b.2) NoScript ~ Blocks Javascript (Controls popups, moving menus, etc) unless approved.

1.b.2.a) Configuring NoScript: NoScript will actually get a tad annoying if you do not set it up correctly. After installing this extension:

I) Click on "Tools", then "Addons".

II) Click "NoScript", then "Preferences".

III) On the "General" tab, check "Temporarily allow top-level sites by default".

1.b.3) FasterFox ~ Tweaks some background settings in Firefox for more speed.

2. New Document Editor: OpenOffice.org. OpenOffice.org basically does everything Microsoft Office does, with some improvements. This program has robust options for saving files and the ability to guess what you are trying to type. It is offered for free by the developers.

2.a) Where to download.The OpenOffice.org download page can be found here.

2.b) Tweaks for Speed.OpenOffice.org can be made faster and more effencient with only a few tweaks. A good source for tweaking can be found below:

3. New Virus Scanner: AVG AntiVirus Guard (Free Edition).AVG Free Edition is a fast, small, and powerfull virus scanner that can detect both viruses saved on your hard drive and viruses in active memory. It is offered for free by the developers, with a paid version that protects against spyware, adware, etc available if needed.

3.a) Where to download.AVG (Free Edition) can be found here. AVG also has the ability to scan your computer once a day, and then turn itself off, saving system resources. Please remember, do not run two Anti-Virus programs at the same time... not even in the system tray.

Mostly Done!

If you have followed some of what this tutorial suggested, Your computer will feel faster and more responsive. To undo any of the changes, just follow the original instructions and check instead of unchecking (Or visa versa) any options you changed.

I highly suggest trying out other OS's, or even installing multiple ones on your computer to see the differences... if you are interested, here is a series of (hopefully) useful links: