vista: valuable tweaks for the enthusiast

[cL1cKm3.exe]

hard to say if someone hasnt already posted some of these but never hurts as a reminder if so

 

A COOLER BOOT SCREEN

 

the default boot screen is...well you know, here is a cooler looking one

type RUN

type MSCONFIG

under boot tab select NO GUI BOOT

now it says starting vista or something like that and a somewhat cooler background

 

EXTEND ACTIVATION

 

for those who want to try out vista without activating it, you can extend the activation period an additional 30 days...you can do this a maximum of 3 times.

at start menu's search bar type SLMGR -REARM

 

 

AN ENTHUSIASTS WINDOWS EXPERIENCE

 

the windows experience score is rather vague, you can see a more comprehensive board to show you more details of how your pc is doing over its lifetime.

right click on computer and select manage

select reliability and performance and take a look at your system's reliability monitor in the collection of monitoring tools...its on the left hand side, click on the "down" arrow to show more tools, select the one that says RELIABILITY MONITOR. this index gives a weighted value of how stable your pc is based on data collected over its lifetime, little red X's show where failurs occured

on upper right side you can select all or select a specific date and time....very valuable info for any enthusiast.

 

TALK TO VISTA'S SEARCH

 

you can search by speaking instead of typing...if you have a microphone on your setup.

its on the search tab in the FOLDER OPTIONS CONTROL PANEL....now you can say files created last month or music by tom lehrer

 

MAKE THAT CPU SING

 

some people think vista is slower than xp, sometimes the result of lesser hardware but if your hardware is up to snuff then it could be the default power options.

in power options, the default mode only uses 50% of cpu, select max power usage to make vista sing

 

my final tip of the day is concerened with readyboost, i'm informed that using a usb stick with same amount of memory as your system memory will max performance, i doubt its noticable though

[Simon9one]

Good tweaks

[dark]

usually with ready boost, they recommend a 1:2 ratio (ram:usbstick)

so say if you have 1gb of ram, they recommend up to 2gb for the usb stick.

 

only up to 4gb you really need however, as page filing doesnt get bigger than that.

[kestrylr]

<snip>

MAKE THAT CPU SING

 

some people think vista is slower than xp, sometimes the result of lesser hardware but if your hardware is up to snuff then it could be the default power options.

in power options, the default mode only uses 50% of cpu, select max power usage to make vista sing

<snip>

If this works, I think I love you!

 

Just loaded Vista Ultimate yesterday on an Alienware w/ dual 3.2GHZ, 4G RAM, 1G RAM on video card & 10,000 rpm HD, and I swear, I have seen banana slugs move faster. Haven't had time yet to make sure the drivers are current, etc... plan on doing that tonight.

[kestrylr]

 

Just loaded Vista Ultimate yesterday on an Alienware w/ dual 3.2GHZ, 4G RAM, 1G RAM on video card & 10,000 rpm HD, and I swear, I have seen banana slugs move faster. Haven't had time yet to make sure the drivers are current, etc... plan on doing that tonight.

 

Well, that wasn't the main problem, but it did help a lot once I discovered what the real problem was... I had loaded the 64-bit when I should have loaded the 32.

 

Now that I've got the right version loaded, settings the way I want them, and most of my programs loaded, I hate to admit it, but I think I like it. (And I haven't taken to any version of Windoze this quickly since Workgroups 3.1...)

[ravenatic]

Wow, here I was cussing having just started up a new pc with vista, about it's sluggish-ness. Power settings! Thanks for the tip, a world of diference.

Edited August 4, 2007 by ravenatic

[Tempest_x3]

I did the max cpu set and also the no gui.thanx very much for this help,after a reboot,I got a message saying many programs are now disabled...?????????

[judge17437]

Thanks for the tip on the power options, looks like it solved my problem with running so slow.

judge17437

[jdavis1137]

How do you find where to change the CPU from 50% default to max CPU?? I type in power options and it just talks about the battery, hibernation, sleep and all that stuff. I am a newbie. THANK YOU

[Simon9one]

I had some problems with the no GUI boot screen. I scheduled a CHKDSK and when I rebooted, it hung on that screen. Same thing happened with a defragmenter that was supposed to run at boot time. I turned off the no GUI boot and it all worked again.

[Y kawika]

How do you find where to change the CPU from 50% default to max CPU?? I type in power options and it just talks about the battery, hibernation, sleep and all that stuff. I am a newbie. THANK YOU

 

 

Start>Control Panel>System and Maintenance>Power Options>High Performance

 

If you wish, you can change the plan settings too. I have mine set as:

 

Turn off the Display: 15 minutes

Put the computer to sleep: Never

 

You can set yours to suit your needs, just be sure to click "Save Changes" before exiting the menu page for the plan settings.

 

Take a look here as well: http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/e...c0b49e1033.mspx

 

:)Y

[Louannie]

Thanks so much on behalf of my son....he just KNEW he would finally be able to run his NASCAR game, but it was still not running smoothly even with 2 G of RAM and Vista Premium. I changed the power settings as you suggested....running smoothly for the first time since he got it about 5 years ago! He's having so much fun....thanks again for taking your time to post this.

[BudVugger]

hard to say if someone hasnt already posted some of these but never hurts as a reminder if so

 

 

MAKE THAT CPU SING

 

some people think vista is slower than xp, sometimes the result of lesser hardware but if your hardware is up to snuff then it could be the default power options.

in power options, the default mode only uses 50% of cpu, select max power usage to make vista sing

 

 

 

 

Is this safe to do on a laptop? My first laptop and concerned about overheating. Thanks

 

 

 

Edit* Nevermind, my Vista default was on full CPU.

Edited August 27, 2007 by BudVugger

[d0nut]

Is this safe to do on a laptop? My first laptop and concerned about overheating. Thanks

Edit* Nevermind, my Vista default was on full CPU.

 

I am using it on my Acer without problems. Just don't use High Power when running direct from the battery. With a PSU, it's fine.

[EssexBiker]

How do you find where to change the CPU from 50% default to max CPU?? I type in power options and it just talks about the battery, hibernation, sleep and all that stuff. I am a newbie. THANK YOU

 

Control Panel > Power Options