features you disabled in Vista?

[Linkinfamous]

I can understand the sidebar (Even I don't use it)

But UAC, System Restore, Superfetch?

Wow. Why run Vista at all if you're not going to take advantage of its improved caching, superior backup skills (I love Shadow Copies. They've saved my ass so many times...), or enhanced security? Those are some of its most appealing features.

[The Rev]

None Diddly one...

[A Clockwork Lime]

Superfetch does NOT slow down games. I have tried superfetch on and off and games and intensive apps that need tons of memory perform the same and apps launch faster. When an application needs memory the cache is instantly purged which is no slower than allocating free memory.

Superfetch also does NOT cause hard drive thrashing, if you have constant drive thrashing it is something else, not superfetch. For me and I have 4 gb of ram superfetch only takes a minute of two to load everything into ram which is hardly "constant thrashing"

I have only disabled the sidebar and put UAC into silent mode on my desktop and laptop. Completely turning off UAC is pointless when you can use silent mode.

Once again: Your experiences may vary.

The only change I made was turning off SuperFetch. My system's performance improved. That's all the evidence I need. I'm glad you don't have such issues; I did, I resolved them, disabling SuperFetch was the resolution.

[kl33per]

The "Start Navigation" sound and that's it.

[bryonhowley]

None there is no reason to disable anything in Vista it runs great just the way it is.

I may get a UAC pop up once a month not a problem.

Superfetch DOES NOT slow your system down so no need to disable it.

System Restore point can be cleaned by running Disk Cleanup if need be so no need to disable it. But if you are that low on disk space it might be time for a bigger one they are not that expensive anymore.

[tomasarson]

0.

i can understand disabling some.

but those who disable uac i will never understand.

no matter how smart and safe you think you are about downloading stuff/surfing the web.

[cork1958]

I can understand the sidebar (Even I don't use it)

But UAC, System Restore, Superfetch?

Wow. Why run Vista at all if you're not going to take advantage of its improved caching, superior backup skills (I love Shadow Copies. They've saved my ass so many times...), or enhanced security? Those are some of its most appealing features.

Obviously, you either take very high risks with your system, or simply don't know what you're doing, to begin with, if the backup skills and shadow copies have saved your ass so many times already, with Vista having only been out as long as it has.

Personally,

I disabled them all, including Vista itself after a month, by wiping the POS off the system totally and loading XP Pro onto it. Can't even count the number of machines I have done this too already.

[-Hiroshi-]

Obviously, you either take very high risks with your system, or simply don't know what you're doing, to begin with, if the backup skills and shadow copies have saved your ass so many times already, with Vista having only been out as long as it has.

Personally,

I disabled them all, including Vista itself after a month, by wiping the POS off the system totally and loading XP Pro onto it. Can't even count the number of machines I have done this too already.

I hear you, I got Vista installed and I don't intend to install XP unless I have major problems, things seem to be working nicely this time around, but I don't know for how long.

[Titoist]

none

o.O (at people disabling superfetch)

[Titoist]

Obviously, you either take very high risks with your system, or simply don't know what you're doing, to begin with, if the backup skills and shadow copies have saved your ass so many times already, with Vista having only been out as long as it has.

Personally,

I disabled them all, including Vista itself after a month, by wiping the POS off the system totally and loading XP Pro onto it. Can't even count the number of machines I have done this too already.

I guess "its a southern thang" to blast Vista and install XP on computers specifically designed for Vista. Shadow Copies are for files and documents that the user changes, for example, writing a resume and then deciding to add stuff to it, but you realize that u shouldnt or want to change it back, a shadow copy would be the easiest to do this without doing a complete edit, for example. I believe thats what he was talking about, NOT Vista "deleting" or messing up his documents. Backups are also great if you visit pr0n and get a virus for going to "no no sites" or doing programing where your own coding may mess up the system if ur playing around with system settings.

[insomniac9]

I've disabled the following:

Sidebar

Windows error reporting service

Remote registry

Tablet pc input service

All system sounds

[WastedJoker]

UAC because TVersity won't work with it switched on in any form.

Sidebar because it's a bit useless and I'd prefer not to lose that screen space on something I find useless.

Security Center because I use commercial third-party firewalls/anti-virus/malware software and have no use for the inbuilt firewall/notifications.

System sounds - not a big fan of aural notifications of clicking something. I'M clicking it so I don't need a sound to tell me I'm doing that!

Disabling superfetch is a bit weird - never really experienced much hard-drive thrashing but that could be because I'm not constantly installing/uninstalling software and am not constantly using CCLeaner to save 48MB of HDD space at the end of a day.

Why is hard-drive thrashing such a bad thing for many people? My hard drives are very quiet and the trashing only happens when idle - soon as the mouse is moved or keyboard keys are pressed, it stops.

I think too many people pay attention to the Vista-haters or the tweak sites.

[Ji@nBing]

System Restore. I use Acronis instead. That's all. There is no need to disable anything else in Vista. You don't get the same performance increase that you did in XP.

[wellofsouls]

Why do people really disable superfetch? Your most used applications will start faster, and although it takes up ram, it will free it up if you need it. So there is no win situation in disabling it.

because when some program says "it takes up ram, but it will free it up if you need it", chances are, it doesn't free it up when you need it, or takes an excruciating process of disk thrashing or something to free it up when you need it.

it happened with Firefox 2 and Opera 9 before, and it is happening with Superfetch right now.

Never trust a problem when it says "I'm eating tons of RAM now, but I promise that I'm SMART so I'll free it up when you need it". because it definitely won't be smart enough.

[raider360]

Just installed Vista (64bit) last evening and disabled right away:

1) Windows Defender

2) System Restore

3) UAC (I hate this thing :p )

[ProiektHat]

Only start navigation sound...Vista just works great with default settings.

[Cosmin Tătaru]

Only start navigation sound...Vista just works great with default settings.

Totally agreeing with you. Also I prefer to start up the Windows Sidebar manually after logon only if I really need it, because it adds a lot of delay time to startup.

It just works with the default settings, and I think that instead of using their time to research what to tame in Vista most new Vista users should spend time learning about the new features and how to use them most efficiently.

[neo158]

Obviously, you either take very high risks with your system, or simply don't know what you're doing, to begin with, if the backup skills and shadow copies have saved your ass so many times already, with Vista having only been out as long as it has.

Personally,

I disabled them all, including Vista itself after a month, by wiping the POS off the system totally and loading XP Pro onto it. Can't even count the number of machines I have done this too already.

I have one question for you.

Why are you posting in a Vista Support Forum when you hate Vista so much that you don't even run it?

Anyway, I've disabled no services at all on either my Desktop or Laptop, they run just fine with them all enabled

Edited August 30, 2008 by neo158

[ViperAFK]

because when some program says "it takes up ram, but it will free it up if you need it", chances are, it doesn't free it up when you need it, or takes an excruciating process of disk thrashing or something to free it up when you need it.

it happened with Firefox 2 and Opera 9 before, and it is happening with Superfetch right now.

Never trust a problem when it says "I'm eating tons of RAM now, but I promise that I'm SMART so I'll free it up when you need it". because it definitely won't be smart enough.

Superfetch does NOT take itself as a higher priority than other applications, If I open a game for example it instantly frees ram, and when superfetch frees ram there is NO disk thrashing, it just purges it from memory and the superfetch data is already on disk and will only be loaded back into memory when you have free memory again. Superfetch does not touch the disk when it is freeing memory for something else it happens instantly.

[UncleSpellbinder]

Vista Sidebar, that's it.

[Yuxi]

I disabled System Restore. I image my hard drive regularly. Speaking of which I haven't backed up in a while... *goes to grab external hd*

[Achal]

UAC

Sidebar

Security Center

[Pupik]

The ones that don't disable UAC or just put in silent mode, are probably the same ones that complain on forums that an X game/application doesn't work under Vista.

Because even if you put it (UAC) in "silent mode" (in group policy), some games and applications just won't start. When you disable completely UAC, somehow the same game/application works perfectly. And if you enable it back, you'll just be annoyed with permit for every god damn action again, that ends with the same result as in "silent mode".

So to skip all that mess, I just keep it disabled. I know what I'm running on my machines and I don't need more than anti-virus running in the background for security.

[ViperAFK]

The ones that don't disable UAC or just put in silent mode, are probably the same ones that complain on forums that an X game/application doesn't work under Vista.

Because even if you put it (UAC) in "silent mode" (in group policy), some games and applications just won't start. When you disable completely UAC, somehow the same game/application works perfectly. And if you enable it back, you'll just be annoyed with permit for every god damn action again, that ends with the same result as in "silent mode".

So to skip all that mess, I just keep it disabled. I know what I'm running on my machines and I don't need more than anti-virus running in the background for security.

What games are you talking about? I even have old games that start fine. Have you tried running them as admin? (properties under compatibility)

[+Thom Vee Subscriber²]

Everything tied to media center. This cut my start up time in half (P4 3.0 GHz), and it just seems to run a lot better.

Function Discovery Provider Host

Function Discovery Resource Publication

PnP-X IP Bus Enumerator

Windows Media Center Extender Service

Windows Media Center Receiver Service

Windows Media Center Scheduler Service

Windows Media Center Service Launcher

Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service