OH!!!!!!!!!! (SLAPS SELF ON FOREHEAD!!!)
Easy fix.
My personal choice is CCleaner (It will clean up old garbage file / unneeded registry issues and especially unload startup programs - under tools) It's free & easy to use.
If you need more there are the following ideas.
Several steps needed though.
WARNING - IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING SKIP THIS STEP!!! * Check the Boot Optimize Function registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Dfrg\BootOptimizeFunction. If the Enable string value is not set to Y, change it. (This is enabled by default.) Exit regedit and reboot. A boot up defragment will now take place. This will optimize the position of the boot files for a faster boot.
* Check the BIOS: Look for quick Power On Self Test (POST), and Boot Delay enabled. (On pressing the power button you will have to quickly press one of a number of keys. Esc, F1, F2, F10 and Delete are commonly used. It varies according to the BIOS manufacturer.) If you never use a floppy drive, turn off the option for seeking a boot up floppy.
* Completely defrag your boot/system drive: Unfortunately, the defragger provided in XP is a limited version of Executive Software’s Diskeeper. Opinions differ as to the best defragger for XP. Popular choices are Diskeeper, O&O Defrag and PerfectDisk. Worth investigating is a good, full-featured defragger available from: http://www.whitneyfamily.org/Hacks/?item=Defrag. This is a complete defragger. Multiple instances can be run simultaneously (if you have multiple disks). It features individual file defragging, with wildcards and recursion and will defrag NTFS, FAT and FAT32 file systems on any media (HD, Zip/Jaz, floppy, etc). Depending on the size of the hard drive, its free space and the number of files involved, this can take several hours.
* Remove the garbage and optimize the registry: Be very wary of know-all, do-all, and promise-all registry cleaners. Your choice should have an undo function. Norton One Button Check Up/Norton WinDoctor have their devotees. The freeware EasyCleaner available at
http://personal.inet.fi/business/toniarts/ecleane.htm is more aggressive than these Symantec products, but when used carefully is beneficial. But my personal choice is CCleaner (available @ filehippo.com / download.cnet.com / all over the net.)
* Use a Registry Optimizer: Download the excellent freeware program Erunt V. 1.1h from http://www.aumha.org/freeware/freeware.htm. This includes a tool for backing the XP registry and one (NTregOpt) for optimizing it. NTregOpt optimizes by compacting the registry hives to the minimum size possible.
*Eliminate unwanted programs loaded during boot up: Run msconfig to access the system configuration utility and press the start up tab. This gives access to started applications running in the background. By researching file names and folders, you can get a feeling for what is unnecessary. Viruses and worms can hide and disguise themselves with authoritative sounding Windows system file names. If you are unsure do a Google search and if uncertain leave alone. The Start Up folder can be a depot for nasties, so research any unrecognizable shortcuts as Windows does not place critical files in this folder. A very useful listing of essential, non-essential and harmful start up programs is available at
http://www.pacs-portal.co.uk/startup_index.htm
*Disable unnecessary services: Windows XP runs many services in the background. Disable those that are not actually necessary for the day-to-day operation of your PC, but do your homework first! Careful research is necessary here, depending on the work done by your computer. A comprehensive Services Guide for Windows XP is at http://www.theeldergeek.com/services_guide.htm. The Indexing and System Restore services can occupy a lot of disk space and system resources. The Indexing service is not crucial. However, keep using System Restore (or its equivalent) as it can be a life saver. Loss of boot up speed may not be worth the consequence of crippling System Restore.
*Disable unneeded devices in device manager: For a quick fix disable any unused devices in the XP’s device manager.
If your shut down time is excessive look for possible causes amongst the following.
* Disable unnecessary services: Once again, the more services you have running, the longer the system takes to start up or shut down. As mentioned previously, prudent research is required to determine what services should be stopped.
* Is your paging file being cleared at shut down? There may be over-riding security reasons for this. However, clearing the paging file greatly increases shutdown time. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management and check the value for ClearPageFileatShutdown. If the value is 1 it is cleared, if 0 it is not. Reboot if a change is made.
* Registry hacks: By editing registry settings and changing them to lower values, you can considerably decrease the amount of time that Windows XP needs to shut itself down. However, doing this is not without its risks for programs, tasks and services all require time to close. Taking suitable precautions, try these hacks. For open applications, go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\. Highlight the WaitToKillAppTimeout value. Set it to (say) 10000 (the default should be 20000). These values are in milliseconds. Now highlight the HungAppTimeout value. Set it to 10000 also. For shutting down active services, go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\ to decrease the amount of time Windows XP will wait before shutting down active services after receiving a shut down command. Highlight the value WaitToKillServiceTimeout. The default is again 20000. Try 10000. Careful experimentation is required to obtain optimum results. (Of course you can increase shut down times by using larger values than the defaults.)
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