Squeezing extra performance out of your Windows XP installation might help you get added value from your PC.

With the release of Service Pack 3 imminent, early reports suggest that adopters can expect up to a 10% increase in performance over SP2. I thought it wouldn’t hurt to make sure you are squeezing every last drop of horsepower out of your computer. Handily, Steve’s Tech Guide has a useful tweaking guide to ensure you can do just that.
I consider the following of his points most valuable to novice Windows users:

  • Step 6 - Turn off Indexing Service
    The Indexing Service is a real resource hog, and unless you are doing a lot of searches, and I do mean a lot, then it is probably wise to switch it off.
  • Step 8 - Disable Hibernation
    Makes sense to get some processing power back for a less-than-useful feature, unless you are a laptop user of course.
  • Step 9 - Disable automatic search for network folders and printers
    This is a good one if you don’t actually have a home network, as it speeds up file browsing, access and system responsiveness.
  • Step 10 - Defragment your hard drive
    An absolute must, as hard drives are fast becoming the bottleneck in PC performance these days. I recommend this step to anybody who has a moderate amount of files on their PC.

More advanced users will get good performance benefits from:

  • Step 19 - Use MSConfig to disable any unnecessary startup items
    Makes booting up into Windows a lot faster, but be careful what you disable.
  • Step 22 - Disable unused Windows XP services
    Every service that is running is consuming resources - and there are a lot of services running in Windows XP even before you install any third-party applications. Your applications and operating system have to compete for available resources, leading to the biggest cause of poor PC performance.

His list is very good, and all the items he discusses will bring performance improvements to your desktop. Head on over and take a look, and then get implementing his suggestions (his article has instructions for applying his tweaks).

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