For those who are still trying to get the most out of their Windows 7, I have put my entire Windows 7 setup package on my web site for quick and easy download. It's a RAR file, which I'm sure won't bother anyone here.
Put the downloaded rar file in a new folder and unpack it there.

Here are a few files for you to (www(dot)drwho(dot)in)

Also, if you use Spybot Search & Destroy, or want to set it up for friends or family, my complete install instructions are on the site too, for easy download. Have it printed and in-hand when you install Spybot S&D.
The program works much better when installed according to my instructions.
Remember, Spybot S&D updates are posted on Wednesday, every week. It's a three step process, , , 1. Download Updates, 2. Immunize, 3. Scan.

By the time that Windows 8 is finally released, I will also have all my Windows 8 Stuff posted on my web site.
Right now, that's a work in progress.

Cheers Mates!
TM

Thanks again TM! You probably have forgotten more good things than I know. I'll make sure to follow these instructions when using Spybot S&D. Perhaps that's why it's usage is slowing, or isn't as popular as it once was, people don't know how to use it. I suppose mainly because these weren't on the site that I originally got it from (File Hippo).

File Hippo has many good free selections, but the end user must know what to do with them, no instruction manuals included. I used to run that app quite a bit, when all that I ran was Windows 2000. At the time, combined with Avast Free, it was a great 1-2 punch, hard to reckon with. Spybot S&D is Passive protection, as I recall, it's strength was in prevention. But it also could cure.

Thing was, back then, I never got infected. I know all about what Mary Jo stated about W2K, the thousands of security holes it contained (as well as her not being allowed in the door for a bit). Well, until XP SP2 was released, it was my sole OS, that I used on my job. In fact, I didn't begin to use XP SP2 until I first went on medical leave, in 2006. It was also at that point that I began to become acquainted with viruses, XP was a reluctant move for me. Once SP3 was released, I got things under control.

Anyway, thanks again for the software, some of which can be put to use on my wife's ThinkPad. I'm looking forward to seeing the Windows 8 Stuff on your website, we can NEVER get enough security these days. Seriously.

Cat

When I get a call, to set up a new laptop with W7 on it, I'm usually able to double the efficiency of the PC.
All PC's with Windows installed, include tons of just pure old fashioned CRAP, that if not removed can have a very negative effect on any computer, but on a laptop it's worse, due to limitations of the hardware itself.

Getting the Windows Kernel up off of the S...L...O...W hard drive and into ram is a biggie! It works great on every computer but on laptops or Netbooks, it's especially valuable.
Then shutting down all the un-needed Services, is another big help, for the CPU.

Most all of the tweaks I use on W7, also work on W8. The two OS's are more alike than most people think.
A few things that work on W7, had to be re-written (upgraded) for W8, like the Classic Shell.

I find the biggest difference in OS's, from 98 on up, are the Takeaways, not the new features.
For instance, MS took away O.E.6 in Vista, but gave us Windows Mail, then in W7 they took it away. Grrrr!

There are more 'Services' in W8 than there were in W7, so my batch file to disable services will have to be updated. That info is already on the Black Viper web site, for those able to use it.

Cheers Mates!
TM

Speaking of getting Windows off the Slow HDD, one company that I buy software from, Raxco, the ones who sells Perfect Disk, a great defrag app, is now offering trials of something called "RamDisk", or similar wording. I've trashed the email.

I found the ad for it, here's the Pro version. Note that as a Raxco customer, I was offered 50% off on the service. But I wouldn't buy it, just wonder if your solution is similar.

High Speed Virtual RAM Disk - RamDisk Plus

Cat

It's not MY solution. I'ts something that's been built into Windows as far back as '98.

When Windows (any version) is running, it accesses the Kernel thousands of times per day. The default location for the Kernel is the hard drive. That was done to save ram, back in the day when ram chips were VERY expensive and most computers did not come with very much. (256k, if you were lucky)
But now that we can buy cheap ram and plenty of it, why not go ahead and load the kernel into ram memory on boot so it can be accessed thousands of times faster? Eh?
It speeds up the whole computer!

I've been using that tweak for 12 years, or more. It still works!

TM

This thread shows the method.

Or even simpler....download my "Windows 7 Stuff" file from my web site, and run the Win-7 registry tweaks.
The work is already done for you. (stay out of the registry, unless you really know what you're doing)
My site: www(dot)drwho(dot)in

TM

It's certainly worth a shot trying it out. Will do so on my desktop, as I've already (possibly) made some modifications to these entries on the other. Being that I have 8GB RAM in my notebook, & a SSD, my page file is very small, & some other services disabled, including in Properties for each partition (Win 7 & 8 RP), have unchecked "Allow files on this drive to have contents indexed in addition to file properties", this causes a large amount of files to fly by in a box, being a SSD, it's only a minute & a half, as well as disabled Superfetch. These are recommended practices with these drives.

Also had to manually disable the option to optimize drives, I figured like Windows 7, this was a given, disabled by default. SSD's shouldn't be defragmented. This causes unnecessary wear & tear. Garbage Collection takes care of this, freeing up any cells, simply by the Logoff option, & leave it idling for a few hours, or overnight. There's no wear, as the SSD isn't spinning.

But I will give this a shot on my desktop, I've already downloaded the file that you've provided. It has only 4GB RAM (it's max), still that's plenty for my use of the OS there. One would think that the HDD would last longer this way, being that more is loaded into the RAM, less is being written to the drive. Or so it would seem.

Raxco makes the 2nd company I've seen that sells this type of thing, if indeed it's the same, or accomplishes the same. That seemed to me to be a high price, even with my 50% discount. Unless it's for a workstation computer, handling the OS & 2 or 3 VM's (it was for the Pro version), I just can't justify the cost.

Cat

I think I've mentioned this before, but I'll hit it again.

MS has no idea, when it creates an OS, what type of PC it will be run on....
whether it will be an old D** with 256megs of ram or a brand new custom built PC with 16gigs of ram.

MS writes their OS's with a ton of "Safe Defaults" built in, so their OS will run on even the most Lame systems. By default, much of the OS (the Kernel) is left to reside on the hard drive. The number of CPU Cores that the OS will use, by default, remains at One (1) till the user changes it.
For slow systems, there is a 30 second delay built in to the boot up routine. Likewise, shutdown is designed to run SLOW, so that every program has plenty of time to close.
Also, services that take advantage of everything the OS is capable of, are loaded into RAM on boot.

We've discussed how to bypass all these SAFE DEFAULTS, in other threads, so I won't dwell on them here, but just to mention, that every on of them can be eliminated, for a much faster and more efficient PC. It's what I do, on every new PC that I set up, or at the first time I work on any PC.
Using registry scripts and batch files, the whole process only takes a few seconds to do most of this. The only part I'm still doing manually, is to set the Boot delay from 30 sec's down to just 3 sec's. and to set the number of CPU Cores to the actual number present in the PC.
(all done from within, MSCONFIG > Boot.ini > Advanced)

Every little thing you do, can make a difference in the overall efficiency (speed) of the PC.

Cheers Mates!
TechnoMage

Sure does, all of the little things adds up fast. All of which are 100% Free, TM has shared tips here & on other places on this forum. No, they won't make a powerhouse out of an eMachine purchased at WalMart for $299, but these performance tips will get the most out of it, w/o the dangers of overclocking. Speaking of which, Windows 8's power management features are far superior than any OS that MS has previously released, & on a low spec computer that Windows 7 may push hard, Windows 8 RP runs really good on these.

This is key thinking for those of us who can't buy a new computer at this time, getting the most out of what we have. One good thing that we won't have to deal with on Windows 8, & this may be part of why Vista & Windows 7 is a bit power hungry, is that Aero is gone. While Aero on Vista & Windows 7 did give us a more attractive screen, on low spec computers, it made many scream.

So take away Aero & implement some of the things that TM has mentioned, as I have on my wife's XP based ThinkPad, there will be noticeable performance gains, w/o sacrificing security to do so. In fact, there's a clear security plan for these computers spelled out in his link above.

Try them out, one can really see the difference with these free tweaks. Mainly a lot of unneeded services loading at startup that penalizes us during the loading of the OS at boot time & wait time for shutdown. These same services also causes slow page rendering, when going from site to site & opening different apps. But, they're still there when we need them, just not at startup.

Cat