How to best tune a Windows development machine?

Question

How to best tune a Windows PC for development purposes?

Answer 1

• Disable the NTFS Last Access Time Stamp;
• Turn off indexing and speed up Windows XP; and
• Turn off unnecessary services.

Answer 2

Either don't install antivirus software or disable scan-on-access (and if not system-wide, then at least for your development directories). This can make a big difference in compile time.

See also this answer.

Answer 3

There are some utilites to change the ntfs behavior, instead of editing the registry.

fsutil behavior set disable8dot3 1

fsutil behavior set disablelastaccess 1

put a second disk in the machine, to avoid thrashing

Answer 4

Set 1600x1200 or 1960x1200 or whatever is appropriate -- some very high resolution screen, but then set big fonts so you don't need a magnifying glass to read. This allows you to have multiple windows up next to each other.