Would it help to tweak a fresh Windows 7 install? [closed]

Question

We're upgrading to Windows 7 Professional and Ultimate at work and I am wondering if there are any great tweaks that I could apply to a fresh Windows 7 install and make it more productive and stable?

I understand that there are tens of tweaks available; however this question is intended for super users and not for an average Windows systems administrator.

Answer 1

In case your after stability I think the best thing is to have stable drivers and don't install every crapware program out there (like I do)

Every BSOD I have on my laptop can be traced back to some driver or incompatible application. So perhaps it should be considered a tweak if you turn off features that are known to be troublemakers.

Keep your startup clean, there are a lot of programs that unnecessarily run in the background. If you need them, you'll launch them.

Here are some other recommendations from other posts on this topic:

• Black Viper's service recommendations
• A list of features you can tweak like Aero and ReadyBoost
• Create a virtual machine and test new software on that before running it on your real machine. You can rollback changes and it keeps your main machine nice and clean.
• Use SteadyState by Microsoft, it's like a simple reset of your Windows at every startup
• Uninstall programs you don't use anymore

Check this question for more tips

Answer 2

I did these as soon as i upgraded -

Despite good intentions, User Account Control pop-ups were one of the most annoying aspects of Vista, and a feature that most of us immediately disabled after a clean install. UAC in Windows 7 displays fewer warnings, but you can also fine-tune its notification habits by launching the UAC Settings from the start menu. Just type “UAC” in the Start Menu search field and click the result. We find that setting just above “Never notify” gives a comfortable balance between mindful security and incessant nagging.

The primary reason for releasing the Windows 7 Beta was for Microsoft’s developers to get feedback from users. (Notice the glaring Send Feedback link at the top of every window?) In addition, the devs have built in a diagnostic tool called Problem Steps Recorder that combines screen captures with mouse tracking to record your actions. You can launch this program from the Start Menu by typing “psr.exe” in the search field. Hit the Record button and Problem Steps Recorder starts tracking your mouse and keyboard input while taking screenshots that correspond with each new action. Stop recording and your session is saved to an HTML slide show recreating your steps, in which you can add comments and annotations. It’s particularly useful if you need to create a tutorial for a computer-illiterate relative.

Answer 3

I did absolutely nothing as Windows 7 is more stable and performant than Vista and XP (at least I think so).

Just do the normal steps after installing a new OS like havine updated drivers and installing all the patches.

Answer 4

if you don't mind customizing your own installation discs, use vLite to strip windows 7 of the bloat. plenty of preset tweaks that greatly improve the performance. also saves disk space.

note: tools like nLite and vLite are rather unforgiving (if it doesn't work out, it's 'back to the drawing board'), unexperienced users should take a rather conservative approach. tests with virtual machines are recommended before applying on a large scale.

Answer 5

While this may not be exactly what you mean, I feel like a win7 installation is not complete without the windows live suite (moviemaker, photo gallery, mail etc...) You get several free good programs out of the box, most geared at the average computer user.

You may be able to find better apps individually to suit your needs, but for your mom, it's great.