Best ways to put Windows XP Pro on a diet? (reducing Windows bloated file size)

Discussion in 'other software & services' started by Devinco, Mar 11, 2006.

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  1. Franklin

    Franklin Registered Member

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  2. squash

    squash Registered Member

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    I hate to interrupt.
    But I think you shelled out of your $$$ to have a O/S as complete as possible.. wouldn't it just be an utter waste it, not to mention the problems that you may encounter later?
     
  3. WSFuser

    WSFuser Registered Member

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    well MS doesnt offer us a $$ or $ option to have a lean OS and i dont care for MS paint, movie maker, games, etc. and yes it can cause problems but its not intended for the average user in the first place. there are also forums and user that can help those of us who do choose to use nlite.
     
  4. Devinco

    Devinco Registered Member

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  5. lotuseclat79

    lotuseclat79 Registered Member

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    Hi Devinco,

    It loooks like the post has since been removed - sorry, I didn't save it. Yeah, Bold-Fortunes hard work seems to have paid off. I guess it takes a donation to get his batch files, however, like security templates, throwing in lots of changes without review as to how it will affect your local system is probably not a wise thing to do.

    Briefly, as I recall when I first saw the BV review, it looked credible in terms of how it tested BV's recommendations. It was a dissenting review.

    I always appreciate in-depth over blanket recommendations without an explanation.

    -- Tom
     
  6. Devinco

    Devinco Registered Member

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    Thanks Tom.
     
  7. topcat139

    topcat139 Registered Member

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    Ive used both xplite and nlite to create slimmed down distributions of xp. I have gotten xp down to close to 580 mb for a specialized application, and have a version that cuts most of theclutter out, using replacement apps etc, and it runs fine on most pc's with no loss of usability, this dist. is about 900 meg in size. After the setup I run X-teq to setup the tweaks, and set the page,restore, and recycle to use as little space as possible.
    This dist runs really quickly and reliably. You may also look into BartPE, for a really slim ver. of windows.

    For testing I would suggest using a virtula machine, somethins like VMware perhaps. I do all my setups in there so that if it crashes I just reload the vm and don't have the headache of constanlty rebooting windows.
    I setup my slim version, trim it to the max and let it run, test for stability. If it's cool then I could load it up on hardware for the final testing round. Truth is , now I just run the vm in the background, and don't bother with multy os'es and the like. I use a VM as my network firewall and proxy, I have tor/i2p and privoxy load automatically on it and then route everything through there. Keeps my hardware off the net, and keeps me private as well. I have a pretty heavily loaded machine with a gig of mem and terrabyte of storeage, I give the vm about 400 mb of mem and see very litle slow down on my machine with it in the background.
    The vm isn't complete yet, but it's really close to finished.

    Luck,

    topcat139
     
  8. Franklin

    Franklin Registered Member

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    If they work for you well and good.

    But did you learn anything along the way such as dependendcies if this or that are uninstalled or deleted.

    IMHO Bold Fortunes guide not only slims XP quite safely but gives a learning experience as to what depends on what and where.

    And I think that only click type people are either lazy or don't really care about their system operating properly without a full understanding of what they are deleting.

    Bold Fortune is the "EXPERT" at such an undertaking and will help people understand if you read his guide in depth instead of skimming through it.
    http://www.bold-fortune.com/forums/index.php?
     
  9. WSFuser

    WSFuser Registered Member

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    idk about topcat, but for me, i just visit the forums to report if something fails or to read up on the latest product dependencies.
    correct :D
     
  10. Bold_Fortune

    Bold_Fortune Registered Member

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    A friend of mine, Oneder, pointed out this thread to me.

    I don't you Franklin, but you sure say some nice things about me and my guide. And they make me feel really good. Thank you very much.

    The "EXPERT" thing makes me feel a bit uncomfortable, though...especially on a site were Tony Klein (one of my true heros in computing) resides.

    I have maybe two, true heros in computing, Rob Elder...and Tony Klein. These guys are "true" experts. But thank you very much for your kind words.

    Bold_Fortune
     
  11. Devinco

    Devinco Registered Member

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    Thank you Bold_Fortune for your excellent work!
    I have learned a lot from your guide, it is very thorough. :)
     
  12. kfc

    kfc Registered Member

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    I use have XP to about 1gb and I run Altiris SVS this allows me to virtualise all my applications and the good news is SVS is free for non comercial use. I have every one of my applications virtualised allowing me to keep a pristine image. The apps never ever interface with the base OS.
     
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