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Issue #161: Aug 22, 2010

Q: I saw your last weeks column on checking/unchecking boxes in the Start-Up menu.  My question is, there are so many different boxes under this column, how do I know what I need and don’t need at start-up.  In other words, what can I uncheck or not uncheck in order to make my system run faster on start-up? Thank you. 

– Adrian W.
Crestview, Fla

A: Adrian, I presume you are referring to using the Startup Tab in the MSCONFIG utility.  The “Startup menu”, located at Start->All Programs->Startup also contains links for programs that run automatically when the system starts.  In fact, there are even more ways for programs to automatically launch on system start, but they are way too deeply embedded in the bowels of Windows for any practical discussion within this limited space.  They also require an intimate understanding of the workings of the Windows Registry, which is a dangerous place to play if you aren’t sure what you’re doing.

But back to the Startup tab.  For the most part, unchecking (and therefore disabling) items in MSCONFIG is harmless, and the worst that will happen is that something will stop working (a special printer driver, or a chat program for example).  When that happens, you can simply go back into MSCONFIG and re-enable the item.  Now, before everyone goes crazy disabling everything under the sun, let me give you some tips on how to go about this properly!  First, it is generally a bad idea to go in and disable a whole bunch of stuff all at once.  After all, if you do that, how will you know which one to re-enable if something you want quits working?  I recommend that you disable one thing, and then reboot to test the effect.  Only proceed to disabling something else after you are sure that what you disabled isn’t something you want to keep.  Repeat until you’re disabled everything you don’t want to run automatically.

There are a number of ways you can tell which items are candidates to be disabled.  First and most important, examine the name of the item, and the path and filename that gets executed for the item.  Many of them will contain the name of the software in the “Startup Item” or the name of the publisher in the “Command”.  Remember how I’m always harping on knowing what’s installed on your computer?  Here is a perfect opportunity to put that information to use, as you should see familiar names and paths.  For other items, a simple Google search can be very useful.  For example, the computer upon which I’m writing this article has something called “ctfmon” in the list, and its Command is simply “C:\Windows\system32\ctfmon.exe”.  Now, I could just assume it’s part of Windows, but what if it’s not?  It could be malware that got placed in the Windows subdirectory.  Or even if it is part of Windows, is it something that I need to waste CPU time running every time my system starts?  A quick Google search on CTFMON leads directly to a Microsoft Knowledgebase article with an FAQ about it, allowing you to make an informed decision on whether you want to disable it.  I can guarantee you, pretty much anything that you find on your Startup tab will have information that you can find through Google.  Reading up on these things might just give you some new info on how your computer works too. 


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