Ever wonder what Microsoft Windows XP is doing while you're using your word processor or browsing on the Internet? Windows XP actually uses a whole suite of applications to provide its rich levels of functionality, and virtually everything you take for granted is controlled by one of the individually configurable components of your operating system, all know as Services.
These system services include network connectivity, system security, automatic updates and even the ability to log in.
Service Management Computers are no different from people when it comes to performing more than one task at a time: the more plates you try to spin, the more each plate will slow until a critical point when the entire system overloads and crashes to the floor.
The difference, however, is that Windows XP relies on processor performance, RAM and available disk space to cope with this multi-tasking problem. As long as it doesn't run out of resources, things should tick over nicely.
Unfortunately, problems do start to appear when your resources run low; your applications, such as Microsoft Word, then begin to suffer as a result of these higher priority services sapping the strength of Windows XP. There are over 100 built-in system services installed by default with Windows XP Professional Edition and Service Pack 2 (a few less with Windows XP Home Edition) and this is before you load any additional applications that might also create their own services.
Anti-virus products, for example, install at least one extra service, and some install up to three. With all these services using up your system's ability to run your applications, how can you do any work without upgrading? The answer is simple: disable any unnecessary services, thus freeing up the resources they were using.
Wheat from the chaff
The complete list of services supplied with Windows XP will undoubtedly benefit you if you're a business user and have used Windows XP in a domain environment where the Net Logon service is actually used by the operating system to authenticate users to a domain controller. There are many services such as this in Windows XP that can actually be disabled to stop them from booting automatically when the system starts up, thereby freeing valuable system resources that could otherwise be used by a faltering program.
The trick to streamlining your system is in deciding which of the system services are critical to your level of operation and which you can live without. You can experiment by disabling services and finding out in greater detail what each one does and how it affects your performance, but it's best to start by looking at the safer options that could make a difference - it's not worth taking risks with your PC.
First principles
Services can be set to one of three modes: automatic, manual or disabled. If a service is set to start automatically then it starts with your system. If it's set to Manual, you can go into the Service Management Console and simply right click on it, then choose start.
Technically, services set to Manual can also be started by Windows XP if it needs them, but this is rarely the case. To completely stop a service from running it can be set to Disabled. The only way to reverse this is to go into the Service Manager and change the setting back to manual or automatic again.
You should familiarize yourself with the interface before proceeding. Click on Start> Control Panel, then select Administrative Tools, and double-click on Services. You'll quickly get an idea of which services
are running and whether they are set to start automatically, manually or if I they're disabled. Click the name of the service listed as I being the Computer Browser. If you are using a stand alone system or even a network of systems, only one of those needs to be a
computer browser. You could: switch off the Computer Browser service by setting it to disabled, only re-enabling it if you really need to.
Experiment with the following services: Error Reporting, Help and Support, Indexing Service, Logical Disk Manager, Net
Logon, NetMeeting, Remote Desktop Sharing, Network provisioning Service, Performance Logs and Alerts, Portable Media Serial Number Service, QoS RSVP, Remote Desktop Help Session Manager, Secondary Logon, Server, Smart Card and TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper Service.
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