Windows Vista Performace Tips

[techguy]

Techguy’s Techtip 4:

Many of Windows GUI (Graphical User Interface) options can be disabled to improve performance and other settings can be changed to simulate the interface of older versions of Windows if you do not like the latest default interface.
Display Setting in Windows Vista:

1. Right Click on the Desktop
2. Click “Personalize”
3. Click “Color and Appearance” *
4. Click “Open classic appearance properties for more options”
5. The Windows 2000\XP style of Appearance panel will appear.

*You can change the color of the Default Aero Interface from this window

1. A second way to improve graphics performance in Vista:
2. Click on Control Panel (in Start Menu)
3. Double Click “Performance Information and Tools”
4. Click “Adjust visual effects” (in the upper left of the window) **
5. Select one of the predefined options using the radio buttons or manually select what options you want to use by checking\unchecking the checkboxes.
6. Click OK
**You may get a UAC window at this point. Click OK to proceed. :comp26:
:wavey:

[Big Dan]

This is a wise tip, you can turn off a lot of the memory eating junk this way and save yourself some resources.

On underpowered systems with XP I'd switch back to the Win98 style menus which gave me a nice little boost.

[popowich]

I like to make my XP act like Windows 95.

Use the legacy start menu, no background image n old computers, etc.

Oh, that's a good one. Does not using a windows background and choosing a simple color speed video and redrawing up?

I remember that being a tip from the old days at least.

-Raymond

[Big Dan]

My guess is it does because when you have a graphical background it has to be loaded into RAM for display. If you have a big picture say 500k that's half an MB saved. In older systems every little bit counts. :)