'Clear the road' for faster Windows XP booting (Part 2)

In addition to disabling unnecessary services, users can bypass many other functions that Microsoft has integrated in Windows XP.

Turn off Recent Documents History mode

Windows XP has the ability to track recently opened documents (Recent Documents History). The idea is to help users quickly reopen recently used documents. But the disadvantage of this feature is that Windows XP must be calculated to include what is there whenever the computer starts up, which extends the time to turn on the machine. Therefore, if you do not use Recent Documents History, you can disable this feature to start up faster. Disable this feature by:

1. Open Registry Editor (select Start / Run , type regedit , and then click OK ).

2. Find HKEY_CURRENT_USER "Software" Explorer "Windows" CurrentVersion "Policies" Explorer .

3. Create key NoRecentDocsHistory D_WORD . Double-click on the position box on the right.

4. Set the value in the Data Value box to 1 .

5. Click OK and close the Registry Editor menu. You need to restart the computer for the changes to take effect.

Turn off the Boot Logo

You can remove the boot logo when you open Windows XP. This change can save a few more seconds during startup. The effect of removing the boot logo is that you will not see boot messages, such as check disk. But if the computer has no problem, this is nothing to worry about.

To remove the boot logo, follow these steps:

1. Select Start / Run , type msconfig , click OK .

2. In the System Configuration Utility , click on the BOOT.INI tab.

3. On the BOOT.INI tab, put a check mark (x) in the NOGUIBOOT selection box. Click OK .

Remove unused fonts

The more fonts, Windows XP has to handle. To remove unnecessary fonts, perform the following steps:

1. Open the Fonts folder in Control Panel .

2. Select Edit , select Select All , then choose Edit again, select Copy .

3. Create a new folder on the desktop, open that folder, then select Edit / Paste .

4. In the new folder, delete all the fonts you don't want to keep.

5. Go back to the Fonts folder in Control Panel. Right-click the selected fonts, press Delete .

6. Go back to the new folder on the desktop, click Edit / Select All .

7 Go back to the Fonts folder, click Edit / Paste . Now, only the desired fonts are left in the Fonts folder.

This approach seems a bit confusing. By fact, you can delete fonts directly in the Fonts folder without copying and pasting into the new folder as above. But this method can help you make sure you don't make mistakes in the font deletion process.

Turn off Remote Assistance and Remote Desktop Sharing

Windows XP Professional has two remote networking features: Remote Assistance and Remote Desktop Sharing . These two features are useful in many situations, but if you don't use them, you can disable them to save boot time. If you want to reuse these two features, you can still re-open them easily. To turn off these two features, do the following:

1. Right-click My Computer , select Properties .

2. Select the Remote Tab tab.

3. Uncheck the boxes for Remote Assistance and Remote Desktop .

Update device drivers

Another thing that can slow boot time is an old device driver. If you are using a new computer that is pre-configured with Windows XP, you can skip updating the driver. But if you are using old hardware and installing the manufacturer's device driver yourself, you can go to the manufacturer's website and update new hardware drivers. Windows XP tries to be backward compatible with older hardware so the old drivers still run. However, old drivers are often slow. The only way you can update the driver is to download a new driver that the device's manufacturer uploads to. This is worth doing because the driver written for Windows XP will definitely work better than the written driver for older Windows versions.

Turn off Windows Messenger in Outlook Express 6

If you use Outlook Express 6, Windows Messenger is configured to run at startup. If you use Windows Messenger, you should leave it, but if you do not use it, it will waste your boot time and computer resources if Windows Messenger is always open. You can turn off to save boot time by following these steps:

1. Open Outlook Express 6.

2. Select Tools / Windows Messenger / Options .

3. Click the Preferences tab.

4. On the Preferences tab, uncheck the " Allow this program to run in the background " box, click OK .

Speed ​​up dual boot waiting time

If your computer uses Windows XP operating system with another operating system (like Linux), when you start your computer, it will display the choice of either operating system. If you frequently boot into Windows XP and don't use the other operating system, you can speed up the default operating system timeout. This time is usually 30 seconds, but you can change this setting to 10 seconds, enough time to select the other operating system if you want. Reduce operating system wait time by the following way:

1. Find the boot.ini file on your computer. It is the default hidden file, usually located in the C or D drive (eg C: "boot.ini).

2. Open the file with Notepad.

3. Change the Timeout value to 10 .

4. Choose File / Save and close Notepad.

Modify the Setup program

The Setup program demonstrates how the computer boots the operating system. Speeding up boot time sometimes also means speeding up Windows XP, because the Setup program also manages some programs, services, and processes that run when the computer starts. Enter the Setup program by holding the Delete key when the computer starts. Each manufacturer's setup may have a number of different categories and names, but if you look at it a bit, you will see two features if the change can reduce the boot time:

Quick Power on Self-Test : Set this option to Fast or Enabled , depending on the Setup program. This change will bypass the hardware and memory startup test. But you should know that this change will prevent you from receiving RAM or motherboard error alerts.

Floppy Search / Test : If the floppy drive is running well (or does not use a floppy disk), there is no reason to test it every time you start your computer. Switch this setting to Disable .