I have a laptop with a single core processor and 4 gigabytes of system Ram. It has no video card, but a video chip on the motherboard instead. This video chip has 336 MB of dedicated ram And uses up to 1.2 gigabytes of additional shared system ram for video memory.
My goal is to slim down the running processes so I only have a few critical processes and services running to make Windows 7 64 bit operate, as well as have video and sound support.
There are LOTS of apps that help with this like Iobit's GameBooster, or the popular Black Viper website which has configuration information. These two options are very bad because they only address turning off a few processes and services - both leave way to many things running in the background eating up your system resources.. even with Black Vipers advanced configuration.
I have made a list of processes and services that can be shut down to give your PC more resources for gaming. This works well but you can help me tweak this better by suggesting removing some of these that may not be needed.
My list so far:
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Windows Audio
Windows Audio Endpoint Builder
DHCP Client
COM+Event System
Windows Font Cache Service
Group policy Client
hpqwmiex (HP App specific to my PC)
Multimedia Class scheduler
Power
RPC Endpoint manager
task Scheduler
System Event Notification Service
Shell hardware Detection
Audio Service
UPnP device Host
Windows Management Instrumentation
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What I do is open MSConfig.exe and go to StartUp and disable everything (unless it's needed for either my sound card or video card.
Next I go to the Services Tab and disable Everything. Then I re-enable only those in the list above, apply and reboot. Now I can play my game with just the bare bones services Windows needs to run.
You can just go back to MSConfig and re-enable everything and reboot after your done playing your game.
You may have to leave some services running that are specific to your brand of PC. In the list above I have the service " hpqwmiex " listed. You may not have this service but I have it because its required for my laptop to function properly.
( I may be able to disable this if I don't need it's functions for gaming.. still tweaking the list) The point is pay attention to these types of apps that your PC manufacturer installs. If you mess up and disable something you really needed, no worries, just go to MSConfig and re-enable everything and reboot.
This only works for games installed on your PC, not for online games. I don't play online games.
Someone could also suggest the bare bones services to add to the list so online gaming would work.
I also think it would be cool to have an app that would make these changes and reboot in one click.
So far this seems to give me better framerate leaves more CPU power and memory left over for my game. With this laptop, I can play most games out today on at least medium settings. With these changes my 350 dollar Wal-Mart laptop plays anything I ask it to and plays it well.
I would appreciate it if someone would help me streamline this list more.
Thanks,
John