Good ways of reducing the Vista install ?

Dark_Angel · 13 May 2008 at 14:31

Apart from the obvious remove windows components, is there anything else I can do to shave a little space off of a Vista install ?

I don't really want to use Vlite, but just wondering if there is a way of reducing the bloat quickly an easily from an already installed OS ?

Thanks a lot

bledd · 13 May 2008 at 14:42

disable system restore
disable hibernation, then run cleanmgr
in a cmd window type 'vsp1cln' after you've installed SP1

run ccleaner, often

LeperousDust · 13 May 2008 at 15:15

Follow te above, limit recycle bin size to something more sensible than 10%, and clean out the driverstore, and if you're very daring, i emphasise *very*, do a lot of research first, winsxs can be trimmed a fair bit too.

bledd · 13 May 2008 at 15:49

chances are that would break certain aspects of windows update (unless you get it spot on) it's not something i'll be doing on my main machine

uv · 13 May 2008 at 16:23

Dark_Angel said:
I don't really want to use Vlite

Mind if I ask why?

n/v/lite have been the best apps I've used, one of these days I should give a donation to nuhi

Dolph · 13 May 2008 at 16:58

uvmain said:
Mind if I ask why?

n/v/lite have been the best apps I've used, one of these days I should give a donation to nuhi

Vlite can cause issues if you remove the wrong things, as well as issues with windows update (one of the reasons many people couldn't download SP1 was due to vliting their installation).

uv · 13 May 2008 at 17:00

Dolph said:
Vlite can cause issues if you remove the wrong things, as well as issues with windows update (one of the reasons many people couldn't download SP1 was due to vliting their installation).

Then don't remove the wrong things

marc2003 · 13 May 2008 at 18:09

i've given up on the whole stripping/tweaking windows thing. it just doesn't make any difference at all. sure i disable a few things i don't use like hibernation, system restore and windows defender. but i don't tinker with services or use 3rd party software anymore.

when vista first came out, i vlite'd it and got the dvd iso down to 900mb (i'm sure bledd. can fit his on a floppy disk

). it installed fine and used less than 5gb disk space...... but since then i've tried a normal install and i really can't see any benefit. with all the testing you have to do with your software/installing it in vmware to check your iso etc, it just isn't worth the time and effort to save a few gb disk space - imho.

LeperousDust · 13 May 2008 at 21:09

bledd. said:
chances are that would break certain aspects of windows update (unless you get it spot on) it's not something i'll be doing on my main machine

Winsxs yes, as i said be careful.

Drivestore, no, its superfluous, and useless.... When was the last time you used built in vista drivers, and didn't download the manufacturers own latest ones?

bitterSTAR · 14 May 2008 at 02:08

Do not compress the whole drive partition that you have windows installed on! That's if you're thinking about doing that. When i did it, Vista refused to boot lol, unlike XP which didn't mind the whole drive being compressed.

Barrybear · 14 May 2008 at 08:25

not suer what pc spec you have but i found a quicker install with 2GB ram instead of my 4..

bledd · 14 May 2008 at 09:09

bitterSTAR said:
Do not compress the whole drive partition that you have windows installed on! That's if you're thinking about doing that. When i did it, Vista refused to boot lol, unlike XP which didn't mind the whole drive being compressed.

compressing the whole OS drive is a terrible idea, certain folders, sure, but the whole drive!?

huge slowdown!

barnettgs · 14 May 2008 at 09:21

bledd. said:
disable system restore
disable hibernation, then run cleanmgr
in a cmd window type 'vsp1cln' after you've installed SP1

run ccleaner, often

Is this good idea to disable system restore in Vista? I know XP's system restore doesn't do the recovery job well so I disabled it, is Vista's SR any different to that?

bledd · 14 May 2008 at 09:45

well i've never used it, or needed to use it, so it's just clogging up the machine for me

i never install anything 'by accident' that i won't need, and i keep an acronis image of my fresh install

the only thing i have to install on a re-image is firefox, winamp & steam are on another drive for me

Ethics · 14 May 2008 at 09:50

I stay away from system restore. Always a bit dubious whether it will restore properly, and put EVERYTHING back as it was.

Not to mention XP used to have the problem where any infected files were caught up in the restore point too always made it seem a bit of a silly idea to me.

An image is a much nicer way of doing it

barnettgs · 14 May 2008 at 10:31

Thanks. Just what I thought but just to make sure.

bitterSTAR · 14 May 2008 at 12:29

bledd. said:
compressing the whole OS drive is a terrible idea, certain folders, sure, but the whole drive!?

huge slowdown!

Not really. I used to run a laptop with a compressed drive (only because it was a small drive). There was little difference in performance between a non-compressed and a compressed drive, probably because the CPU can uncompress faster than the speed that the drive can actually read at.

bledd · 14 May 2008 at 12:43

yes, really! having compressed os files really isn't a good idea, just shooting yourself in the foot tbh

bitterSTAR · 14 May 2008 at 12:55

bledd. said:
yes, really! having compressed os files really isn't a good idea, just shooting yourself in the foot tbh

That's why I have advised not to do it. I was just saying that on an old laptop I had (which had a small os drive), compressing the os drive made no difference to performance.

bledd · 14 May 2008 at 13:11

of course it does, it has to, it's impossible for it not to effect the performance, it's uncompressing & compressing files on the fly

this is going way off topic now mind