Each tab displays a huge list of settings and options that change a tremendous amount of things in Windows Vista. The Security tab alone for instance displays 33 check boxes which allow you to hide drives, hide or disable settings in Internet Explorer or disable the ability to write to flash and USB drives.

The options available are numerous and it can sometimes be confusing for novice users. It can be used to turn on and off Aero as well which has previously lead to some confusion. I would say users can access more than 100 options and settings that change the behavior of Windows Vista.

Related posts

• WinGuggle change Vista performance settings and OEM information (6)
• Windows Vista Game Explorer Editor (4)
• Windows Updates Downloader (6)
• Vista4Experts Windows Vista Tweaker (1)
• Tweak Windows with TweakNow WinSecret Professional (0)

Some of the optimization that I made can be found in Klines articles as well. If you are new to Vista or just would like to read what others are doing to speed up Windows Vista it is definitely worth a read. I would not recommend some of the tips that he is giving but most make sense.

What I really recommend are the tips 2,6,7 and 8. Those are ‘Disable Aero’, ‘Get rid of the sidebar’, ‘Defender has a use?’ and ‘Tweak your services’. Why don’t you head right over and check it out.

Read More:

10 Simple Ways To Speed Up Windows Vista

Related posts

• Windows Vista SP1 Download (12)
• Windows Vista SP1 breaks applications (2)
• Watch three webcasts get vista and office for free (1)
• Tweak Vista Freeware (3)
• Things to check before switching to Vista Part 1 (1)

If you are not using a program that needs the timestamp you can easily edit the registry key in vista to speed up your system. Hit Windows + R, type regedit and press enter.  Navigate to the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem

Right-click the key NtfsDisableLastAccessUpdate and change the value of it to 1. While you are there you could also disable the creation of files in Dos format (8+3) by altering the value of the key NtfsDisable8dot3NameCreation to 1 as well.

Related posts

• Tweak Vista Freeware (3)
• Join multiple video files into one (12)
• Increasing the performance of Windows Vista (6)
• Faster Access to XP system tools (1)
• 10 Simple Ways to Speed up Windows Vista (7)

EasyBCD is a tool that is able to tweak the Vista bootloader. I only suggest you install and download the tool if you need to work with the bootloader because you have a multiboot environment for instance. Once installed you should start by creating either a system restore point or so called snapshots of various settings to be able to revoke changes that have been made.

The tool offers five different sections that contain information and tweaks, those are: System Information and Tweaks, Miscellaneous Tweaks, Visual Tweaks, Internet Tweaks and Utilities. If you click on one of the options all available options of that category are displayed. Some are not accessible in the free version and you receive information about subscribing to their service to be able to use them.

Each so called plugin opens a new page with many tweaks and information that can be accessed. If you click on Internet Explorer Tweaks for example a new window pops up with three tabs and more than one hundred settings combined.

I like Tweak Vi but it really needs some time before you have the needed overview. Beginners will have troubles with all the settings and options. There is no right-click help or explanation next to the settings. It is also highly confusing that you have to click on the X of a plugin window to be able to exit it and see the main window again.

Related posts

• Top Xp Freeware that every user needs part 3 (5)
• Shock Aero Task Switching for Windows XP, 2000 and 2003 (1)
• Remove unwanted programs from Windows Vista (1)
• Pimp up the Vista startmenu (0)
• Increasing the performance of Windows Vista (6)

This tips might also be useful to those users who use an old computer with Windows Vista. My Vista installation is using about 430 megabytes of Ram in default state with only one instance of Internet Explorer 7 running as well. The following paragraphs contain a list of changes that I made and their effect on the system.

• Disabling the Sidebar
• Changing the Design to Windows Classic
• Changing the Background image to one color
• Disabling the Windows Firewall and Bitdefender

Those changes alone dropped the ram usage by 60 megabytes to 370 with one Internet Explorer window open. There are many settings that can still be tweaked to gain even more performance, for instance removing unnecessary services and indexing. I will take a look at those in the coming days.

The question of course remains why you would like to change to Vista if you disable everything “new” that Vista offers. I personally think that it introduces lots of gimmicks that freeware on XP offered for years. And if it is security that you want you should take a look at Linux instead.

Related posts

• Tweak Vista Freeware (3)
• 10 Simple Ways to Speed up Windows Vista (7)
• Windows Vista SP1 Download (12)
• Windows Vista SP1 breaks applications (2)
• Windows Vista Editions – Do you know the differences ? (6)