Tweak Vista for Audio

Windows is very in-efficient in the way it operates, especially in the way it handles streaming large files to and from a hard disk, such as the demands that audio and video recording and editing software place on a hard disk. When you need all the available power in your computer to finish off a large multi-track project, you will need every last bit of grunt out of your daw unless you begin making destructive edits. The following advice are safe and proven tweaks for win-xp on how to make your pc run better for both video and audio recording applications.

Keeping windows as close to standard as possible should be your goal, unless the default choices effect the way a DAW operates. I won't list all tweaks that can be applied to Win-XP as quite often they have adverse effects for DAW uses or effect your system stability. I would warn people away from applying tweaks that are not listed here from other sites as I have found many of them to have adverse effects to your system. Don't play around with "services" at all as you create many potential problems if you do that are very difficult to fault find. Disabling services only results in a slightly faster boot up time and wont effect the way windows operates once booted although some of the following win-xp tweaks will indirectly disable some services. If your interested in playing with services despite my warning a good site to visit is this one.

DISCLAIMER The owner and writer of this page takes no responsibility for any loss of work and/or damage to work, equipment, persons, family cat or any living or non living entity that may result directly or indirectly from using the tips that the following pages contain. Use at own risk. By continuing to read you agree that any negative effects from these tips are entirely your own fault and in no way mine. blah blah blah...

WARNING Some common sense may be needed when deleting files and carrying out other tweaks

Contents

First things first

Before beginning to tweak windows it is very important to first ensure that your Audio card and any other bus mastering devices do not share an IRQ with any other device besides IRQ steering or holder. Secondly you need to make sure that all your hard drives are using DMA mode to complete all transfers as this results in almost zero CPU overhead leaving more power to effects

This is only valid for Windows XP Pro:

Administrator Tools --> Computer Management --> Local Users and Groups --> User folder --> Right click "Administrator" and select "Rename." Do NOT disable this account. You may need it someday.

This is only valid for Windows XP Home:

Everyone on XP Home, by default, has Administrator privileges and the User name is "Owner." If I know that, so does everyone else on the planet... change the name and password your account.

How?

Start --> Control Panel --> User Accounts --> Choose "Owner" --> Select "Change my name."

Also, you should (will) place a password on your account.

Start --> Control Panel --> User Accounts --> Choose "Owner" (or what ever account you named it above) --> Select "Create a password."

Most, if not all, recording software, games and applications require you to have "Administrator Privileges" to install them and sometimes to use them.

Removing Messenger / MSN

Click on the start menu and select Run.
Copy and paste "RunDll32 advpack.dll,LaunchINFSection %windir%\INF\msmsgs.inf,BLC.Remove" into the text box and click on OK.
Let the process complete and MSN will be gone after a reboot.

Fast-User Switching

Available on XP Home Edition and on Professional when it's not part of a domain, fast user switching lets users of the same computer switch between accounts without logging off. It's a great feature when Mom, Dad and the twins all share the same computer, but keeping multiple user accounts active is a burden to a Pc's memory usage.

When more than one user is logged on, each user's settings remain active and the programs activated through his or her account remain open--even if someone switches to another user account. Sally left Word, Excel and Barbie Fashion Designer open and Bobby comes along, switches over to his account and attempts to play Red Faction, he will notice a definite degradation in performance compared to the last time he played it when Sally wasn't logged in.

Windows XP automatically disables fast user switching during installation if the computer has 64MB of RAM or less. For best performance, make sure only one user is logged in at a time, and if that becomes a nuisance, disable the feature altogether: go to Control Panel\User Accounts, click the "Change the way users log on or off" button, and uncheck "Use Fast User Switching".

Lose the Screen Savers

The need for screen savers evaporated in the early 1990s when monitor refresh rates increased, but people continue to buy them. There is absolutely no compelling reason to use them; from a technical standpoint, they do far more harm than good. The real danger with monitors is not the picture becoming permanently etched onto the screen; it's the phosphors wearing out from being overworked. Many screen savers have nearly as much movement as a fast-paced video game and make the monitor and CPU work about as hard as well. If your system is doing routine maintenance like scanning for viruses, checking hard disks for errors and correcting them, or de fragmenting hard disks--things it should be doing automatically, a screen saver interrupting those tasks will make them take much longer. If you're waiting for the computer to finish some time-intensive task, the screen saver steals valuable RAM and CPU power from that task. It also creates one more task for the computer to juggle--and one more reason for it to crash. Some screen savers have been known to crash systems.

Using the Blank Screen screen saver that comes with Windows is a good idea; it doesn't use any CPU power, and it gives your monitor's phosphors the opportunity to really rest, saving wear and tear on the monitor and reducing its power consumption. If you want to protect your monitor, use Blank Screen and give it a time-out period of 30 minutes. The use of any other screen saver causes more harm than good.

Some monitors eliminate the need for any screen saver altogether. If your monitor has digital on-screen controls, it may also have its own power management. If that's the case, set your monitor to put itself in power-saving mode after 30 minutes, which allows you to dispense even with the Blank Screen screen saver.

Lose the System Sounds and Desktop Schemes

The Microsoft Plus packs for Windows contain some gimmicks such as desktop themes than cause icons to spin as they're clicked. Unless you have an extremely high-end computer turn that stuff off. In many cases, it takes longer for the computer to spin the program's icon than it does to load and launch the program.

You also want to turn off animated cursors and system sounds, as these toys can steal large amounts of memory and CPU time. If you need system sounds to warn you of important things like critical events, program errors, or incoming mail, go ahead and use them, but refrain from assigning sounds to every event. On the majority of systems, I go into the Sounds control panel, select the schemes box, and set it to No Sounds.

If you want to express your creativity without dragging down your system or alienating your friends, family, or coworkers, there are other, less expensive ways to customize your system. Try coming up with your own color schemes, or changing Windows' font sets and sizes instead. Right-click on the desktop, select Properties, and click on the Appearance tab. Use those settings to express yourself, rather than CPU-hogging cursors and sounds. You can also try playing around with Lite-Step

Compressed Drives Don't use compressed drives for obvious reasons, more power to the CPU.

Virus Protection  While it is essential to have protection, don't leave it running in the background when recording. This goes for all programs especially ICQ. If u must have programs loaded then get more RAM, 512 Mb is the bare minimum for win-xp 1 gig is where its at these days especially with VST instruments or Virtual instruments. More things that run means more latency is needed and less tracks/effects.

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