Question:

Hi.. I’m just wondering if its possible to disable some services to make vista run like xp or make it like xp. Im having problems playing games. The game runs in slow motion. It runs way faster in XP.

Answer:

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Question:

Can you comment on if the new system of using CF cards as a memory boost really increases Windows Vista performance.  I think they call it ready boost.  I have tried it on a new Dell Quad Core system with an internal card reader and there does not seem to be any benifet at all.  The card I am using is an 8 gb 120x speed Transcend CF card.  Was this just a marketing scam on Microsoft’s part ?   I also have the 4 gb memory frustration that everybody else seems to have.  My system shows 3 gb installed.

Thanks,

Ed

Answer:

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Your computer is bogged down, so you open Task Manager and check the processes tab. There’s the culprit: Svchost.exe. Svchost.exe represents many different services, however, so it doesn’t really tell you what’s causing the problem.

In Windows Vista, you can easily determ determine which specific service is using resources. Just follow these steps:

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Follow-up–I answer some reader questions about this topic here. Read this article first, though.

Question:

Hi, I found your website today during a search on Vista. My question is will 32 bit Vista Ultimate support more RAM? IE 4 or 3?

Answer:

I thought this was a slam-dunk, but it turns out to be a damn good question! The short answer is, the practical upper limit is usually about 3GB of RAM.

The long answer takes some explanation… Here’s the official answer from Microsoft:

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If you’re a subscriber, check out the Vista: Not Slow article in the News & Trends section of the latest issue of PC World.

In summary, the article concludes:

• Overall, Vista is 5-25% slower. It’s especially bad with integrated graphics, so get yourself a separate graphics card.
• Having a dual-core processor helps Vista catch up or even pass Windows XP for multitasked programs, because Vista is optimized for multitasking.
• Aero doesn’t slow things down. Yey.
• You should have at least 1GB of RAM. True, though Vista does fine with less memory, in my experience. Upgrading to 2GB improved Photoshop performance 5-20% but didn’t help with most tasks. In my experience, for desktop use when running many applications (like I do), 2GB is a MUST.
• Everything is slower on 64-bit Vista than 32-bit Vista. Their tests showed 64-bit as 0-25% slower, probably averaging around 10% slower. Should I say I told you so?
• ReadyBoost slightly hurt performance. They admit that the test scenarios might not be well suited to it. My tests showed ReadyBoost can help A LOT, or not at all, depending on your hardware.

My summary:

• If you have a single-core processor with integrated graphics and less than 1GB of RAM, Vista will be a little more sluggish than Windows XP, at least with current drivers.
• If you have a dual-core processor and a separate graphics card, you probably won’t notice any performance difference.
• Wait six months and test Vista performance again. I bet Vista will win once driver developers optimize their code a little better.

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Microsoft funded a study by Principled Technologies to compare the performance of the Windows XP user interface to the Windows Vista Aero interface. Here’s my summary:

• Comparisons were done with a variety of different computers, some more powerful than others. Naturally, the Aero tests required computers capable of running Aero. So, these results don’t necessarily apply to your old XP computer.
• With or without Aero, Vista performs about the same on business tasks (like opening Office documents). Some things are faster, some are slower, but it’s a wash overall.
• Vista with Aero performs about the same as Vista without Aero. So, don’t feel like you need to disable Aero for performance.
• Though all my computers are capable, I can’t run Aero because screenshots look awful. I’m fine with either interface. I’m just saying, even if Aero did cause a performance impact and you wanted to turn it off, the other Vista improvements more than make up for it.

Windows Vista constantly examines performance problems. If your curious about the busiest processes and the slowest drivers on your computer, check out the performance diagnostics log. First, open the Computer Management console by following these steps:

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