make xp services leaner, cleaner!

I decided to write this and explain to people that not everything running as default on your xp box is necessary. Quite a few services are not necessary but you need to check whether the machine you run requires them or not. If anyone has any more that could be added I would really like to know which services you close down and under what circumstances

the sequence for turning off a service is always the same
control panel - administrative tools - services - right click the service
select properties - stop - then set startup to disabled

For a start, suppose you run a fixed ip address with your isp or you operate behind a hardware firewall where you can allocate a fixed private ip address
then switch off dhcp client

A good one to switch off if you dont use a printer is the print spooler
that can eat up huge amounts of processing time and causes a lot of problems

To increase security, as long as you know your username and password then switch off fast user switching

To stop windows asking if you want to send error reports back to microsoft
switch off alerter

If you dont use a wireless internet connection switch off wireless zero

if you are running no remote services (where people log into your computer) switch off telnet

If you dont use hot buttons switch off human interface device access

switch off dns client access very few people need it and its a legacy device

unless you operate a legacy network with dynamic data exchange components switch off network DDE and network dde ddsm

if you dont operate a nat server from your xp box and dont rely on windows firewall then switch off firewall/internet connection sharing

if you are on broadband and dont run VOIP or other telecoms software
switch off telephony

switch off routing and remote access unless you have remote clients dialling in via a modem

To turn off DCOM but read this first (dont stop the dcom service)
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=825750



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From what I've read, the benefits of disabling these things is negligible.

In the worst case scenario if you REALLY need the RAM, you pretty much need to buy an upgrade anyway because it is such a small amount saved.

There are a lot of statistics but I don't feel like digging forever to find them...

 

well if you think the benifits of disabling telnet are negligable - let me have your ip address - I could use another computer in my network
Its not really about ram even in the case of the spooler which is un necessary
thats about processor time
you think what you want but most people who run efficient machinery do so on the same premise that programmers work on - small is beautiful. optimisation is a benifit
Who said anything about saving ram?
this is about security, conflicts, and processor time, I never even mentioned memory