Phr33x Tw33x #24

Each month we present the best of our user submitted tweaks. We test them, explain what they do and give them a rating of Atomic goodness. Send your coolest, bad-arse tweaks to phr33xtw33x@atomicmpc.com.au

Getting Windows XP services working better for you

I: Precious resources can be freed by disabling a number of redundant or unused services in XP, 2K or NT, giving more room for applications, network bandwidth and so on.

While many of these services are critical to the smooth operation of Windows, and should be left as they are, there are others that are plain useless and should be nuked.

FartyPants

O: Windows NT, 2K and XP run a bunch of services in the background -- regardless of whether you will ever use them or not -- and they all use valuable system and network resources. It's fairly easy to free up these resources by editing or deleting background services: go to START/Settings/Control Panel/Administrative Tools/Services then double click on the service you wish to edit. Or alternatively, type services.msc into the RUN box.

These recommended settings are XP specific (I haven't messed with them too much under Windows 2000) and there are a bunch of services not listed here.

There are three startup types to any Windows service: Automatic, Manual and Disabled. 'Automatic' indicates the service will be started when the OS loads; 'Manual' means the service will not start until required; and 'Disabled' shows the service is not available, even if called on by an application. Not all the recommendations here will be appropriate in all circumstances, but most of them will free up system resources or reduce network overhead, so decide which services are best for you.

Obviously there are all kinds of opinions on which services are best left at default and which are best for messing with, so it's a 'suck it and see' type of deal.

At www.blkviper.com/WinXP/xpprofiles.htm you will find a cute little tutorial on setting up different service profiles, so you can mess with multiple configurations for different tasks or users.

Here are some recommendations that might suit your system --of course, use them at your own risk, because what works on some systems might well break others.

Automatic Updates -- Allows Microsoft to update your Windows installation automatically without even asking. Disable this service and you can still update manually.
ClipBook -- Allows others to view the content of your clipbook over a network. Pfft... boring. Set this one to disable.
Distributed Link Tracking Client -- Maintains links between NTFS files within a computer or across computers in a network domain. Disable if you are not using an NTFS partition, or not on a network.
Distributed Transaction Coordinator - Co-ordinates database transactions, file systems and message queues. No biggie, disable it.
DNS Client -- Resolves and caches Domain Name System (DNS) names for your computer. If the service is stopped, the system will look elsewhere to resolve DNS names. If it can't find an alternative DNS, cable/ADSL users may have some problems. Disable, but be prepared to set to Automatic should things go weird.
IPSEC Services -- Manages IP security policy and starts the ISAKMP/Oakley (IKE) and the IP security driver, allowing for authentication of hosts before file transfers, as well as other tools for the paranoid. Set this sucker to Manual.
Messenger -- This is not to be confused with Microsoft Messenger. It allows you to send and receive messages across the network, for example using the NETSEND command (fun at LANs). If the Alerter service has been set to manual, then you can do the same to this one.
Network DDE and Network DDE DSDM  -- Network transport and security for Dynamic Data Exchange (DDE) for programs running on the same computer or on different computers (such as Office collaboration). Manual.
NetMeeting Remote Desktop Sharing -- Allows remote access of your computer across a network. Disable this unless specifically needed.
NT LM Security Support Provider -- Support for Telnet and Message Queuing. Disable, unless you actually require it.
Performance Logs and Alerts -- Monitors system performance of local or remote computers, based on defined schedules. There are better tools available to do this. Disable it.
Portable Media Serial Number -- Unless you have a portable media player connected then this service is pointless. Disable it.
Print Spooler -- If you don't have a printer then disable this. Else, set it to automatic.
QoS RSVP -- Isn't it strange a tool that is supposed to monitor bandwidth to assist in optimisation by load balancing bandwidth between applications, uses up to 25% of your bandwidth in the process? Disable this.
Remote Desktop Help Session Manager -- Unless you are in to remote desktops, disable.
Remote Registry -- Gee, this is handy. A user can remotely edit my registry. Err... no thanks. Disable.
Smart Card -- Hands up anyone who uses smart cards at home? Unless you do, you should disable.
Smart Card Helper -- see above.
System Restore Service -- Up to you. If you disable it, your system will no longer take snap-shots of itself for use by System Restore. Feel game? Disabling it will free up resources.
TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper - A throwback to the networking days of olde, which is not really relevant in most current networks. Disable unless you are sentimental about those things.
Volume Shadow Copy -- Handles volume shadow copies for use in backup utilities. Most people can disable this.
Wireless Zero Configuration -- Lucky owners of 802.11 wireless networks will want this. Everyone else, disable.

Score 6/10 (not all settings will work on all systems)