There are a multitude of system services which can be disabled or set to manual startup. By switching the following services to manual or disabled, you can realize an increase in speed, both in bootup and in standard use.
- Application Experience
- If you do not connect to other computers on your local network, you can turn off Computer Browser
- Can you do without Aero? Then turn off Desktop Window Manager Session Manager for a bit of a boost.
- Disabling the Diagnostic Policy Service will stops problem detection and troubleshooting by Windows by and of its components. Turn this back on if you start having problems.
- The Distributed Link Tracking Client service tracks links for the NTFS file system. If you have a shortcut to a program, and you change the location of the program, this service will update the shortcut accordingly.
- IP Helper is useful for working with the IP configuration, mainly in a programmatic fashion.
- If your machine doesn’t travel, you can safely turn off Offline Files
- If you’re not on a domain, you can disable Portable Device Enumerator Service. This service is only used for enforcing group policy settings for removable mass-storage devices.
- If you don’t use a printer, you can turn off the Print Spooler.
- Protected Storage can be disabled, if you want to live a little less securely. This service is responsible for protecting sensitive data from users, processes, and other services that are not authorized to access them. Stuff like passwords and encrypted data.
- If you don’t need to edit your Registry from a remote comptuer, disable Remote Registry.
- Secondary Logon
- Security Center
- You can disable the Server service if you don’t have other computers on your local network that need to access your machine.
- Don’t have a touch interface? Turn off Tablet PC Input Service
- Microsoft said NetBIOS was going away. Eleven years later, it is still hanging around. But can turn off TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper
- Get rid of Display Themes, including Aero, for some speed. You’ll be using the classic theme if you turn this off.
- Turning off Windows Error Reporting Service will only prevent error reports from being sent to Microsoft, and can be safely turned off.
- Get a sizeable boost by turning off Windows Search. The downside is that searches of your hard drive will take much, much longer.
- Windows Time, used for syncing your system clock with an external source, can be disabled safely. You’ll have to manage your time manually, though.