Windows XP Tricks

This info is for my record.  If you choose to use them, back up your registry and assume all responsibility for yourself if your computer stops working.

Move the Kernel to run in RAM.

Software or services running in RAM are always going to be faster that anything that has to pull data from the hard drive or virtual memory. The kernel is the core of the XP operating system, so by having it run in RAM we can speed up our computer.

NOTE: Only use this on machines with more than 256MB of installed RAM!!

Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\COntrol\Session Manager\Memory Management once in Memory Management choose DisablePagingExecutive . Change the value of DisablePagingExecutive to 1. This will set the kernel to run in RAM. Changing it to 0 will set everything back to normal. Exit the registry and reboot the computer for the changes to take effect.

Speed up the Start Menu.

Although the menu wait thing may look cool, I always found it disconcerting to have to wait for it to come up. After all I need to get in there… I dont care how cool it looks coming up. To change this navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop. Choose MenuShowDelay, it should be set at the default (400), changing it to 0 will make the menu show up instantley. This maybe be a bit overwhelming so you can experiment for yourself. I set mine to 50.

Prefetch Parameters.

Prefetching refers to the bootup process of caching system boot files for faster loading of the operating system. This will really only help with the initial bootup of the system. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\COntrol\Session Manager\Memory Management\PrefetchParameters\EnablePrefetcher. The values in this key can be 1, 2 or 3. 1 will prefetch application launch files, 2 will prefetch boot files and 3 will prefetch as many files as possible. To get an idea of what files it will attempt to load look in C:\Windows\Prefetch. As you can see, it is a substantial list.