We have posted service guide for Windows XP in past and now its turn of Windows Vista. In this tutorial we'll learn about the services which are not essential and can be safely set to MANUAL to speed up your system:
1. Right-click on My Computer icon on desktop and select Manage, it'll open a window, in which goto: Services & Application -> Services. To disable or Set a service to MANUAL, double-click on the service and select the desired option in Startup list box.

2. You can also open the same by going to Administrative Tools and open Computer Management.
NOTE: Always set the service to MANUAL, never disable it. So that whenever windows needs to start a service it can easily start and use it. If you set any service to DISABLED, then windows will not be able to start it and will give ERROR.
So here is the list of services that can be safely set to MANUAL (Many of them may be disabled automatically on some systems):
- Application Experience
- Computer Browser (If your computer is not connected to any network)
- Desktop Window Manager Session Manager (If you don't use Aero theme)
- Diagnostic Policy Service
- Distributed Link Tracking Client
- Indexing service (If you don't use Windows Search feature frequently)
- Offline Files
- Portable Device Enumerator Service
- Print Spooler (If you don't have Printer)
- ReadyBoost (If you don't use ReadyBoost feature)
- Remote Registry (Always disable it for Security purposes)
- Secondary Logon
- Security Center
- Server (If your computer is not connected to any network)
- System Restore (If you don't use System Restore)
- Tablet PC Input Service
- TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper Service
- Themes ( If you use Windows Classic theme)
- Windows Error Reporting Service
- Windows Media Center Service Launcher
- Windows Search (If you don't use Windows Search feature frequently)
- Windows Time (If you don't want to update system tray clock time automatically)
PS: You can see the details of each service so that you can determine whether it should be disabled or not.
Further read:
Speed Up Windows Vista – Master Tutorial to Make Windows Vista Super Fast
This article was posted by VG in following section: Windows Vista.
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Vishal
Hello,
Good post.!
Ramesh
Gr8 ! Post
Task Scheduler's startup type can't be changed
ravi
Nice post buddy
boardtisne
Great post . It works ! Thanks a lot!
babylon
:?:
You suggest disabling Readyboost service if users do not use Readyboost flash memory. However, I seem to recall reading somewhere that Readyboost service is required for other purposes.
sunthr
mr. vishal. i m using windows vista homa basic for my dell laptop(inspiron 640m). with i.5gb RAM n 72gb hard disk. but my laptop is still slow. so i dnt really knw wat to do.so i search in the web finally i got into your forum n got some solution. but i still having the same prob. n my windows media player 11 starts late in my windows vista n also stop n plays when a songs reaches the end. i will really appreciate if u can help me with it. Thank u. n i wish u to reply to my email add if u dnt mind. this is my email add(world2020_tnr@yahoo.com)
VG
^^ Try to follow instructions given in following topic:
http://www.askvg.com/master-tutorial-to-make-your-windows-vista-super-fast/
Also post your HijackThis log file in following topic:
http://www.askvg.com/is-your-system-infected-with-a-virus-spyware-adware-trojan/
Tom
Setting services to MANUAL does not make your Windows faster, instead it makes it slower as those services need to be started by request. Besides that, the only real improvement is disabling indxing/searching if you don't use it. Disabling ReadyBoost will only get your performance down.
Why are people still posting these hoax tweaks, has anyone ever did a benchmark? And a few MB memory less is not an improvement at all.
Lawence Codye
Thank...you...I needed this badly...
Firedemon7
@Tom: This works because if those services are useless and are never started [Like I don't have a tablet PC and don't use tablet PC functions] setting them to manual will speed up your computer because they are not running...Although when they are needed it will take longer becuase they were off until that point...