Tuning and Tweaking the G1S and vista

I've found many tips on how to optimize my G1S from this forum and other sites. My G1S has been running well and problem free for some time now and below is a summary of what I've done to date. Hopefully, some of you may find this useful. Note that a version of this post was originally posted this in a V1S thread here but this is more complete.

- Do a clean install. Initially, I avoided doing a clean install as there wasn't much bloatware so I just uninstalled a bunch of stuff. Later, I was forced to
do a reformat (my fault not the laptop) so I went ahead and did a clean install (use the restore cd and don't put in the drivers cd when prompted). I only installed the ATKs, direct console and updated drivers. It runs noticeably better and faster.
- You'll want to follow metril's driver installation procedure here to make sure that the sound control keys work
- I didn't bother to update my bios but I did install power4gear and wireless console - optional but I find them useful.
- Turn off search indexing, UAC, system restore, hibernation
- Turn on write caching. Go to Device Manager, Disk Drives. Right-click on your SATA hard drive and click Properties. Click the Policies tab, and click Enable Advanced Performance.
- In control panel, Programs and Features, Turn Windows Features on or off, uncheck:

Indexing Service
Remote Differential Compression
Tablet PC Optional Components
Windows DFS Replication Service
Windows Fax & Scan (unless you use a modem for faxing
Windows Meeting Space (unless you use the Live Meeting Service)​

- In Control Panel, Administrative Tools, System Configuration, Services Tab, uncheck:

Offline Files (unless you’re using Offline File Sync)
Tablet PC Input Service (unless you have a tablet PC)
Terminal Services
Windows Search (If you have already disabled indexing)
Fax (unless you’re using a fax modem)​

- Clean up startup programs. Type msconfig, look in the Startup tab. With the above tweaks, I now have Vista starting up with under 50 processes running.
Edit:
- Use the free Process Explorer utility from Microsoft which is a more detailed version of Task Manager. This utility is great to help figure out what processes are running on your computer so you can decide what processes are safe to stop.

- I had a 4 gig flash drive handy so I used readyboost. It does seem to improve performance (no benchmarks, totally subjective).
- Use Vista Basic instead of Aero
- The built in speakers are terrible but I find that choosing 'powerful' in the equalizer settings help a bit
- I regularly defrag and use TuneUp Utilities to clean the registry


In addition to this forum, links below proved useful:
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,2110595,00.asp
and
http://mostlysavingmoney.com/2007/06/top-10-windows-vista-speed-tweaks/

 

What good does turning off system restore do?

Also, any tips on how to get better battery life?

I get just under 2 hours with the battery saving mode and brightness at 7%......

Also, the space on my hard drive seems to be dropping fast. The thing is I have put nothing on my laptop to cause this. It went from 102 GB down to 91in just a month. Again, I have added nothing in that time.

-slow control panel still

3gb ram
160 GB 7200 RPM harddrive

 

In terms of battery life, run Vista in Classic mode, also did you have WIFI on or off, and what were you doing to get 2 hours of battery life?

As for your hard drive, it may be your temporary files, so you will need to clear them, manually.

You may want to format and install Vista and the drivers yourself, this should help with the slowness. Unless you have already done this.

 

Thanks for the reply. While using my battery, it is usually for typing notes in class, or watching a movie. Either way, battery life is just under two hours.

How do you turn the WIFI on and off? Will turning it off help with battery life?

Thanks for the tips

 

Just to add my own tips.. Apologies if I repeat any of yours.

First, obviously while on battery you'd want to be in Battery Saving mode. But I would suggest lowering the screen brightness to 7%. Also if you need Wireless, make sure Bluetooth is disabled.

I would also suggest closing Direct Console, so the OLED is off + the Direct Flash is off as well. I find that leaving Aero on can lower the battery quite a bit, so you should set it to "Vista Basic" instead.

I find I get around 2 and 1/2 hours with WLAN on using those settings. Hopefully you can push out more battery life yourself.

 

How did you get write caching to turn on? Mine keeps saying "This device does not allow its write cache setting to be modified."

 

Curiously, I wasn't able to do this when I first got the laptop but was able to do so after a clean install.

 

redzapper,

how's your NVIDIA driver did you update it? did you use laptop2go for update? what's the driver version you're using?

i'm interested in tweaking display setting also.

thanks

 

Surprisingly enough, I have not yet done so. I'm using the latest driver from asus. FEAR has been running great so I haven't had incentives just yet. I'm sure I'll have update the video drivers when I start bioshock.
I did try that with the hp dv9000t and found that the modded drivers distorted DVD playback on that laptop and had to revert back to the hp drivers. I do suggest trying the laptop2go drivers tho as they do generally improve framerates - just test it when you do to see that it works for your system.

I did install this hotfix:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/windows_vista_hotfixes.html
but I'm not sure if I see any noticeable improvement.

 

so you're now using 163.44 using nvidia hotfix download?

is there any difference using 163.44 of laptop2go website?

 

I installed the nvidia hotfix late last night so I only had time to fire up FEAR quickly to see if there was any difference. I'm not on the G1S right now but I don't believe the latest asus drivers are 163.44 tho.
I used to grab the latest drivers as fast as I can but it seems like they provide incremental improvement that's usually barely noticeable except in benchmarks. The hotfix+163.44 may prove otherwise (especially in bioshock) so I may try that combo tonight.
If you're curious, just give it a shot - can't hurt.

 

thanks redzapper.

i'll wait for your tweaking of display setting or display configuration because i'm not satisfied with my display setting.

 

Good first post, redzapper. It's pushing me to actually try a reinstall sometime, and maybe tie that in with the XP dual install I've been wanting to do for a while.

The hotfix website claims that it only works with the 163.44 driver installed. So it may not be working for you or maybe you do have 163.44 installed. Or the website tells fibs.

 

does it means that i should install first 163.44 NVDIA driver (using laptop2go download) and after installing 163.44 i'll download 163.44 hotfix from NVIDIA website?....is this the right way?

 

I didn't notice any increase in performance with that hotfix.. That's with 163.44 drivers too.

 

The hotfix and 163.44 didin't do much for me either.

I recommend the tweaks in the thread below - particularly the TuneXP tip. It shaved a bit of time off my bootup.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=166532

I also recommend downloading the free Process Explorer utility from Microsoft which is a more detailed version of Task Manager. Run this utility first thing after bootup to see what processes are running on your computer - if you haven't cleaned up your startup programs this will help you figure out what you can eliminate from the startup. Includes a we search for those hard-to-decipher processes.