So, you got that new computer and it came with Vista and you may not be too terribly happy with the performance.  Unfortunately there isn’t much you can do about that, there aren’t many software fixes and if it is running slowly the only solutions are to turn off the advanced features or upgrade your hardware and I have pity for you if it’s a laptop.

ZDnet is running an article on some common sense things that you can do to improve the performance of Vista.  The first suggestion is to add more memory (RAM).  Everyone has said this at one point or another.  Some machines are shipping with Vista Basic and are only equipped with 512MB of memory, that’s merely adequate for Basic.  Most computers will come with Home Premium, Business or Ultimate and for those 1GB will allow it to run but it really shines with 2GB of memory.

The author suggests that 4GB of memory isn’t overkill for Vista but the problem is that 32-bit versions of Vista are limited to 3GB of memory.

The next suggestion is to run ReadyBoost which is a feature that caches data to high speed USB flash drives but on systems with 2GB or more of memory, that feature won’t do much good and you will really see no performance benefit from using it.  Systems with 512MB to 1GB of memory might see some improvement by making use of that feature but I don’t promise it.  It’s not the same as adding physical memory.

If you have a fast processor and lots of memory and Vista is still running slow, then the video card isn’t good enough to run Aero Glass well.  Some low-end computer manufacturers are shipping computers with Vista Premium and better but not equipping them with video cards good enough to run Aero Glass at acceptable levels.  There are two options here, turn Aero Glass off or get a better graphics card and if you’re going to play games on Vista then get a DirectX 10 capable card.

Next there are many useless startup programs but I wouldn’t bother with the “Software Explorer” as I find it useless, like a lot of Vista’s “handholding” features.  You will want to use msconfig which is a much more powerful utility for managing startup items though make sure you know what you’re getting into.  Things like “Adobe Reader,” “Qttask,” “iTunes Helper” and anything Microsoft Office can be safely eliminated from starting up, these items will start when they are needed (you do not need them at startup).

Running Aero Glass will come down to user preference and the speed of the system running Vista.  I don’t recommend turning Aero Glass off unless there are real performance issues and the system is nearly unusable with it enabled.

Also, I like the indexing option and I have it index my whole hard drive, I suggest leaving it to scour your whole hard drive for files, if you are the unorganized put that file in any location type of person, like I am.  I don’t care what folder or where the file is so long as indexing can find it, I’m happy.

Disk Cleanup and Defragment, yes, it’s necessary but don’t use Vista’s built in utilities, they are basically useless, like in every other version of Windows.  You will want to download Auslogics Disk Defrag and CCleaner, both run on Vista and both are much more thorough than its simple tools.

The next to last two items are adjust power settings (which only applies to laptops) and turning off the sidebar which could be as much a performance issue as it is user preference.  I found the sidebar to be in the way, taking up unnecessary space and it isn’t too terribly useful either, some like it, a lot of people just hate it but it will depend on you, turning it off will increase performance, all the better if you don’t like it (which makes eliminating it a no-brainer).

As far as power settings, desktops should be set for “High Performance” - I don’t really care if my desktop eats up power and takes down a neighboring power grid, I care about performance not how much power I’m wasting doing so.  If you do care then maybe the “balanced” plan is best for you.

As I said earlier and ZDnet concludes with turning off Aero Glass as a “last resort” - I concur.  Don’t buy a computer that can’t run Aero Glass because Aero Glass is what makes Vista “Vista.”  Don’t install Vista on a computer that won’t be able to run Aero Glass, for the same reason.

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Related:

Vista’s ReadyBoost lacks punch

Boot Vista faster using multiple processor cores

Enable any flash drive for ReadyBoost on Vista

Microsoft CEO expects to ship 90 million Windows Vista licenses this year

Microsoft updates Windows Vista search to version 4.0

Entry was posted on Wednesday, August 8th, 2007 at 6:10 am under Microsoft, Tips, Vista.  Print This Post

Read more entries by Jonathan Schlaffer.