REAL PROBLEM 3-1: Problems Starting Windows XP

Tim, a coworker who uses many different applications on his Windows XP system, complains to you that his system is very slow starting up and responding when he loads and unloads applications. You suspect the system is loading too many services and programs during startup that are sucking up system resources. What do you do to check for startup processes and eliminate the unnecessary ones?

This is a very frustrating situation as all of us have experienced. Any Windows environment needs to be configured for optimum performance.

For me the first step would be to shut down the computer and do a hard start. Once the computer has finished its system checks and is ready to start up, I would bring up the Task Manager. I would go then to Applications and confirm that nothing was running and then proceed to Processes tab. Knowing the bare-bones that this company should be running, I would begin inspecting and see what is running that should not be running, and either take notes or do a print screen. Investigate the process and then proceed to Services Console (RUN: Services.msc). Find the applications in question that are not required to be running and either disable start up or make them disabled, depending on the program. A reboot and check the process again to see if it was all running correctly.


Write down at least 10 things you should do or try that were discussed in the chapter to speed up a sluggish Windows XP installation.

1. Back up the system’s state before making any changes, just incase. Make sure that Windows is up to date on its downloads. This can repair fixes that could slow down a computer.
2. Check the Task Manager “Processes” for the processes that are running when no programs are running. Please refer to the first part of this answer.
3. Remove any and all unwanted items using the uninstall feature (not just deleting the shortcut!) Either by using the add/remove function or through deleting program files.
4. Only when you HAVE NO CHOICE go and delete registry entries, just make sure to back up the uninstall key incase you need to backtrack.
5. Check possible malicious software with Support.microsoft.com and see if this process is legitimate, and follow up with a Google search. Always do this before “stopping the process” following this up with malicious third party software (including antivirus software) and checking your firewall.
6. Refer to the Performance tab and identify which applications and processes use the most of the CPU. This will also show you the amount of Ram being used and the virtual memory. This can also show if you need to upgrade the computer. Checking and adjusting the performance options as necessary can change the memory settings and page file sizes can also assist with speed.
7. Within the Task Manager you can set priority of the processes and see if by changing the priority level this way if your performance is affected.
8. Trouble shoot using MSCONFIG (Run: msconfig.exe) to diagnose startup issues before making permanent fixes to the computer.
9. Use a third party software utility to diagnose problems.
10. Go straight to the services console and control Windows and all third party services installed. Reconfigure the Startup type manual status to have only the necessary items start up.