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View Full Version : Any tips on a good minimal Windows install?

singularity2006
09-16-2003, 04:27 AM
Aight, my college bound buddy is headed for college (obviously, where else would my buddy be headed?) but has a Dell Inspiron 4150. I've had to twinker with that thing many times over because she keeps installing junk and it slows down and such. In anycase, this is my third time getting Windows on there and I was wondering what Windows updates could I forgo to keep the system resources free? I'm tempted to not install any updates at all, but for a college student using wireless and such, are all these patches absolutely necessary?
elvis
09-16-2003, 04:40 AM
not installing critical updates is a road to certain disaster.

at any case, i would recommend installing all updates, critical and otherwise. i have yet to see a system in my entire life that slows down due to windows updates.

more often than not the reason for systems slowing down to unacceptable reasons is people installing massive amounts of useless crap from the web (ie: freeware and demo software that sits and bloats a system after time).

keep your work system down to the application syou use daily, and a good virus scanner. anything else can be installed at home on the kid's games machine.
singularity2006
09-16-2003, 04:50 AM
sounds good. How about the issue regarding NTFS? NTFS is a lovely file system but as discussed in a previous thread somewhere out there, the overhead it uses to process data can be quite lengthy. Sadly, I've already finished formatting this system and it's on NTFS but would FAT32 make that much of a difference on a laptop of this type? I remember putting FAT32 on my 450MHz laptop from Fujitsu... it crapped out horribly. Win98 even more so! But yeah, NTFS and overhead on a laptop? How would that work?
elvis
09-16-2003, 05:09 AM
on any system faster than 200MHz, the NTFS vs FAT32 debate is a moot point. the "overhead" that people keep referring to is virtually non-existent.

FAT32 is a horrible file system, and belongs with the dinosaurs. its file storage structure is such that any hiccup in the system means you put all of your files at risk.

NTFS5 which comes with WindowsXP includes journalling, which means you can kiss disk checks at system startup goodbye. NTFS on the whole is a far more sensible file system, and does not put every file you create at great risk if the system doesn't shut down properly, in the process not writing the table of contents correctly.
singularity2006
09-16-2003, 05:27 AM
sounds good. I should just setup the system and lock the user profile so no more junk can be included. =D
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