Prefetch is Supposed to Be Super Important for Performance, Right?

Discussion in 'other software & services' started by HandsOff, Feb 9, 2007.

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  1. pugmug

    pugmug Registered Member

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    Posted to late,lol.
     
  2. Franklin

    Franklin Registered Member

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  3. Pedro

    Pedro Registered Member

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    :) Free software is different from freeware. Explanation: The Free Software Definition
    , a GNU concept. Free meaning you can do pretty much whatever you want with it.

     
  4. Franklin

    Franklin Registered Member

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    Don't forget to check "Old Prefetch Data"
    LOL:rolleyes:
     
  5. pugmug

    pugmug Registered Member

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    But,but,but free beer is the best!
     
  6. Franklin

    Franklin Registered Member

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    Agree with ya there!:D
     
  7. Pedro

    Pedro Registered Member

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    Can't argue with you there...
     
  8. HandsOff

    HandsOff Registered Member

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    Mastertech, I was attempting to acknowledge your factual input but you do little for your credibility with your, "I think my spaceship knows which way to go" mentality. If people wish to investigate whatever settings they see fit in order to achieve safer and more efficient computing then I say more power to them.

    Personally, I like to explore any idea that has the potential of reducing the number of black box processes that Microsoft is running on my machine. We do not know what they do. We only know what we are told they do. I continue to believe that there is far too much recording of computer user's surfing, music listening, and software running. It's invasive and exploitive!

    Yes, CCleaner is freeware. It is an excellent program IMHO.


    -HandsOff
     
  9. ThunderZ

    ThunderZ Registered Member

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    Agree 100% While I am sure there is some truth in the "Company line explanation" given by the MS spokes people for many of their services, other then prefetch as well. I do not believe nor trust it\them totally. Then again there are very few that I do. :cool: :shifty:
     
  10. Mastertech

    Mastertech Registered Member

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    Re: I'll Pass

    No you made this statement. I have as I have before clearly explained why ONE setting in it is useless. The benefit (which is not performance related BTW) is increased disk space. CCleaner does not improve performance in anyway.

    You mean "Uncheck" unless of course you want to reduce performance. CCleaner Cripples Application Load Times
     
  11. Mastertech

    Mastertech Registered Member

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    WGA is a concern

    I don't care what you do personally but you better do your research before stating your "findings" to anyone else. Making assumed inaccurate guesses as stated fact is misleading to those trying to understand how something works.

    First you need to prove that there are black box processes that Microsoft is running on your machine. Once you get over this hysteria you can move on to actual concerns like Windows Genuine Advantage. Being concerned about privacy and making assumptions about things that are not there are two different things.
     
    Last edited: Feb 24, 2007
  12. aigle

    aigle Registered Member

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    Re: Laptops Rarely Go Idle

    Were u able to test Zopzop?
     
  13. Mastertech

    Mastertech Registered Member

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    Re: Laptops Rarely Go Idle

    If you are waiting for the results to see if it works don't bother it does work. Either he had something disabled relating to prefetching, his system was never going idle or he was not timing it properly.
     
  14. aigle

    aigle Registered Member

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    Re: Laptops Rarely Go Idle

    Hi! I am watching this thread closely. Ourt of curiosity I downloaded so-called pefetch control tool.
    I actually used stop watch to measure my boot times and aplication launch times of IE, FF, Opera and OpenOffice writer.
    I tried it on my laptop with XP Home SP2, 1.73 Pentium M with 512 MB Ram. I measured all timings with default windows prefetch settings, then with prefetch set to monitor boot files only and the completely disabled. My observations,

    No decrease in boot time at all, rather completely disabling prefetch increased boot time by almost 10 or more seconds.

    Surprizingly no decrease in application launch time after disabling prefetch, irrespective of first lauch after cold rebot or 2nd or 3rd launch.( 2nd or 3rd launch were of course quick with default prefetch settings or even after disabling prefetch. Its, surprizing as I always thought that after first application launch prefetch is responsilble for subsequent quick appliaction launches).

    Anyway I see no gain in performance by playing with prefetch, so I will keep at default settings it as MS put it there. ATM I prefer not to play with these sort of things.
     
  15. Mastertech

    Mastertech Registered Member

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    Accurately Timing Application Prefetching

    I suggest then doing the following to make sure that prefetching is optimized for proper timing. You need an application that takes more than a few seconds to load however. I suggest whatever you have that is the slowest loading, the slower the better. OpenOffice is usually a good choice.


    Accurately Timing Application Prefetching:

    1. Confirm that the Task Scheduler is set to automatic and the EnablePrefetcher Registry Value is set to 3 or Run the Prefetcher Fix.

    2. Then REBOOT.

    3. Launch the application you are going to test 2 times (this is important). Afterward check the C:\Windows\Prefetch folder and make sure a Prefetch (.pf) file exists for the application you are testing with a modified date and time from today.

    4. Go to "Start", "Run", Type Rundll32.exe advapi32.dll,ProcessIdleTasks. This can take 10-15 minutes to run but no notification will be given when it is finished. You will notice increased Harddrive activity while it is running wait until this stops. When this is finished in the "Run" box Type defrag c: -b.

    5. Now using a stopwatch launch the application and time it, write that time down. You must accurate time the first launch. Any additional launches of the application without a reboot will give inaccurate prefetching enhancing performance timings.

    6. Disable Prefetching (set enableprefetcher to 0 in the registry) and delete that application's Prefetch (.pf) file from the c:\windows\prefetch folder.

    7. Then REBOOT

    8. Confirm no Prefetch (.pf) file for that application is in the c:\windows\prefetch folder. Then launch and time the application again with a stop watch and write that time down.

    9. Compare times.
     
    Last edited: Feb 26, 2007
  16. Cochise

    Cochise A missed friend

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    Just got back to reading some of this 'Prefetch' debacle....:D :D :D As far as I'm concerned only Posts 5-8-9-10-11-14-15-18-20-22 make any sense...:D :D

    Dear old Mastertech, if you check back, nowhere did I say that Prefetch had ANYTHING to do with Indexing.....and my Bootup takes 50 seconds...:thumb:

    Your slightly hysterical, very elongated declarations, as far as I can see, have really only added to Global Warming, so to speak.....:D :D :D

    Who mentioned BEER??.........:-*



    Best Regards, Cochise...
     
  17. Mastertech

    Mastertech Registered Member

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    Helping the helpless

    I realize some people cannot be helped. At least aigle took the time to try and test it himself. Cochise the reason they don't make sense is because you do not understand how it works and refuse to try and learn. :rolleyes:

    Yes ThunderZ made that exact statement.

    If your bootup takes 50 seconds and Prefetching is disabled then they means it should really take 25-30 seconds. Your Windows bootup is only one thing being crippled, with prefetching disabled all your applications are loading slower as well. It is your computer, if you want everything to load slower no one is stopping you, go for it! :thumb:
     
  18. ThunderZ

    ThunderZ Registered Member

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    Re: Helping the helpless


    Guilty(?) as charged. I have a reasonable idea how Indexing & Prefetch work. IMO, Prefetch is "selective" indexing on steroids. IMO, not a lot of difference then a bunch of shortcuts in your startup folder. I will stand by my original statement that additional services running in the background and causing fragmentation are, and for the foreseeable future will continue to be, counter productive to fast boot times and overall performance. As a slight concession however, as we know, no 2 PC`s perform the same so your mileage may vary.
     
  19. Cochise

    Cochise A missed friend

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    Just done another Bootup speed check using NASA Space-TimeContinium Count-down Stopwatch Mastertech......It's now down to FOURTEEN POINT THREE SECONDS....:D :D :D...

    I rest my case.....:-*


    Cochise....Tongue in Cheek in Tulsa....
     
  20. Mastertech

    Mastertech Registered Member

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    Huh?

    Prefetching has nothing to do with indexing and is nothing like shortcuts in your startup folder. Prefetching optimizes how Windows and applications are loaded into memory it does not preload them before the load is initiated. Prefetching is not a service and does not cause fragmentation. ALL PCs regardless of performance or age benefit from prefetching so long as they have a mechanical HD in them.
     
  21. lu_chin

    lu_chin Registered Member

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    I read through this thread and I think as somone says, each PC is different in terms of performance and the applications running on it. And if a user does not run _big_ applications that take a long time to load, the performance gain from using prefetch is minimal, as Aigle's tests show. Most people don't use stopwatches to measure their PC's speed all the time, so even if something takes 3 seconds instead of 1.5 seconds will not be a real issue to the average user. So I think prefetch may be important to some people but may not be super important to many. And how about if someone uses hibernation on his/her laptop PC? Will using prefetch help significantly in this case?
     
  22. Mastertech

    Mastertech Registered Member

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    Prefetching improves performance on EVERY machine that has a mechanical HD in it. This is irrefutable to anyone who knows how to properly test it. Aigle did not test prefetch application load times correctly. I posted the procedure to properly test this and they must be followed to the letter. You must also use an application that takes more than 5-10 seconds to load. If something loads in 3 seconds, it is very difficult to time the performance improvement even with a stopwatch. This does not mean load times are not being improved.

    Aigle did test boot times correctly which is why he stated:

    What is that supposed to mean? Because people don't use stopwatches they would want their applications to load slower? I think applications loading as fast as possible would be of concern to ANYONE who uses a computer. Windows XP by default is optimized for prefetching, you don't have to do anything yet everyone is insistent on breaking it. I have never in my life seen more people before argue about slowing down their system simply because they want to do some useless tweak to their computer. I call that insanity. Hybernation only relates to Windows Boot not individual application loads. Hibernation has also been optimized on XP.

    I have a test system here, a Dell Dimension 4600:

    Windows XP Boot Times without Prefetching = 55 seconds
    Windows XP Boot Times with Prefetching = 35 seconds
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 27, 2007
  23. lu_chin

    lu_chin Registered Member

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    My point is not to argue as I have no vested interests in this one way or another. To some people squeezing every ounce of power out of their PCs (or cars to some) maybe their goal. Most users just don't pay much attention to it one way or another. Some users may have notebook PCs and use hibernation to resume their XP without rebooting often. Whether they use big applications or not depend on their own needs and preferences. I think most users just go on with their own business whether it takes 10 seconds or 5 seconds to load an application.

     
  24. pugmug

    pugmug Registered Member

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    Seems this whole thread is about writing a book on sharping a pencil.I digress to post #11 and #54 of this subject.I will add this.Who cares?Use it or not.
     
  25. Mastertech

    Mastertech Registered Member

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    WHY WOULD YOU WANT YOUR APPLICATIONS TO LOAD SLOWER?

    This thread is specifically about prefetching, notice the title. By default Windows XP is already configured optimally for prefetching. Thus the average user if they leave their computer alone will by default get the most performance out of their system. That is the point. Here we have people trying to "tweak" this in some way and in return are making their systems slower. Now whether or not notebook users use Hibernate is irrelevant to how fast their application loads. Windows XP Boot acceleration is only one enhancement of prefetching. Obviously people will use the application no matter how slow it loads. People still use their machines heavily infected with malware too. The point is WHY WOULD YOU WANT YOUR APPLICATIONS TO LOAD SLOWER?
     
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