Over at ActiveHowto.com, they have a quick howto on tweaking Windows’ default setting to improve your computer performance. Most of the tips there are pretty simple to perform, to disable some unnecessary services or remove some eye candy features. For instance, this one is quite useful to increase the shutdown speed:
IMPROVE XP SHUTDOWN SPEED
This tweak reduces the time XP waits before automatically closing any running programs when you give it the command to shutdown.
Go to Start then select Run
Type ‘Regedit’ and click ok
Find ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelDesktop’
Select ‘WaitToKillAppTimeout’
Right click and select ‘Modify’
Change the value to ‘1000’
Click ‘OK’
Now select ‘HungAppTimeout’
Right click and select ‘Modify’
Change the value to ‘1000’
Click ‘OK’
Now find ‘HKEY_USERS.DEFAULTControl PanelDesktop’
Select ‘WaitToKillAppTimeout’
Right click and select ‘Modify’
Change the value to ‘1000’
Click ‘OK’
Now find ‘HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESystemCurrentControlSetControl’
Select ‘WaitToKillServiceTimeout’
Right click and select ‘Modify’
Change the value to ‘1000’
Click ‘OK’
Make Your Windows Fast As Never Before! – [ActiveHowto.com]
