Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Windows 8.1 with SSD: Optimal settings for SSDs

A new SSD and the optimal settings on the operating system are the best tuning measures you can buy your PC with Windows 8.1, but also with Windows 7 or Windows Vista. Flash memory cells need to be treated with care because they can only perform a certain number of deletions.


Tip 1: Turn off defragmentation under Windows 7, not under Windows 8


Use the possibility to limit the "write-in" of Windows. Configure the operating system to store as little information as possible on the disk, so the disk will last longer, and performance will remain high for a long time. So you should take a few of our window tips.


Tip 2: Prefetch, Superfetch and ReadyBoost you no longer need
with an SSD


In addition, you should pay attention to correct alignment of the memory blocks before installing the SSD in a new PC system. The simplest way to format your new SSD properly so that the alignment is correct will provide you with a Windows 7 or 8 PC. All you need to do is connect the SSD as a second or third disk to one of the SATA ports and format the drive. You may need to do this with the disk management utility, as long as the SSD is unformatted, as is often the case. But now to our configuration tips.


Also interesting is


If Windows 8 detected the SSD correctly, which is usually the case when you set the AHCI mode in the BIOS, then Windows 8 sends the "Please clean up" command (trim) whenever you trigger the defragmentation SSDs. HDDs are still defragmented. This service is not available with Windows 7. For Windows 8, you should not disable the defragmentation. The situation is different for Windows 7 and Windows Visa. Windows Vista and Windows 7 have an automatic defragmentation of the hard disks, which is timed. The defragmenter turns off Windows 7 as opposed to Vista if the SSD is correctly recognized for it. However, make sure that the service is turned off. For SSD disks, a defragmentation is completely unnecessary, the constant switching of the data only shortens the life of the data carrier.


Tip 3: If you do not need it urgently, turn off the Windows Search service


The easiest way to get to the defragment tool is via start, search field input: defragmentation. In the dialog box, select Schedule Schedule ..., Select Disk. If Windows 7 has correctly recognized the SSD, it will not be listed in this list. If the flash memory is still displayed in the list, this may be caused by the fact that you have not switched to the AHCI mode in the BIOS.


You can now either turn off the defragmentation completely by clearing the Select all disk checkmark, or you can set the scheduler so that the mechanical hard disks are regularly defragmented. Normal HDDs run faster when they are defragmented, so we recommend the combination solution for Windows 7: leave SSDs at rest, optimize HDDs. A complete shutdown of the Windows defragmenter is useful only if you use an external defragmenter, such as O & O.


Prefetch was introduced with Windows XP and consists of two functions. The service monitors the user behavior. If a user starts up the browser and the e-mail program very often after switching on the PC, Prefetch will remember this and will load these programs into the working memory before they are started. A fine thing, because that brings speed. Prefetch also arranges the programs on the hard disk so that they start as quickly as possible. This is useful for mechanical hard drives, but for SSDs it is not only unnecessary but destructive. The read access to SSDs is so high that it is possible to do without the minimum speed advantage if redundant write operations on the SSD are avoided. We therefore recommend to disable Prefetch.


Superfetch is an extension of the prefetch idea. This service not only monitors the startup behavior of the PC, it monitors the work behavior of the user nonstop. For example, if a user has opened two programs, and one of them has been written to the disk, Superfetch stores the main memory space and reads the second program back into the memory before the user returns to the program. This is unfortunate for the SSD when the user starts another, third program, and there is not enough space in the main memory, so the swap file is written to the hard drive. Unnecessary description of the SSD shortens the service life and should be avoided. With Superfetch, Microsoft has also added the ReadyBoost feature to the storage management.


USB memory sticks and memory cards can expand the main memory with ReadyBoost and should speed up a system with it. In practice, however, this is only true for PC systems, which are already moving at a lower power range and have relatively slow system hard disks with a Windows performance index below 4.0. For SSDs, however, this is certainly not the case, and with a USB stick memory expansion one would only slow down its fast system.


Disable Prefetch and Superfetch in the registry file, and do not use USB sticks or memory cards in the ReadyBoost. Open the Registry Editor via Start, Search Field Input: Registry Editor, confirm the user account prompt, navigate to the registry entry: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SYSTEM \ CurrentControlSet \ Control \ Session Manager \ Memory Management \ Prefetch Parameters, double-click To Enable Prefetcher, and EnableSupberfetch, and change their DWORD values ​​to 0 (zero) in the dialog box. As an alternative to changing the registry entry, Superfetch can also be disabled in the utility.


If you do not use the Windows Search service frequently, you can disable it. This saves your SSD unnecessary data generation, and you can still search.


However, it is recommended to disable the index service in the service program, since it can be reactivated in a simple way if you need it. Go to: Start, Search Field Input: Services, right click on Windows Search, Properties, Start Type: Disabled. In the properties of the hard disk, the tick for the indexing of the SSD should be deselected. Check this and correct it if necessary. Windows may ask permission to make changes to file attributes. Select the lower option to include the sub-nodes as well. This unselect will only work if you are an administrator.


Since Windows Vista, the restore function has been linked to a convenient file backup. In the so-called shadow copy, the system saves older file versions. In itself, this is a fine thing. There is only one problem: auto-recovery is constantly writing data to the disk. In the case of Windows 7, Microsoft - unlike the server variant - has decided not to transfer these files to another drive. Unfortunately, system restoration works only when you enable it for the system hard drive.


Tip 4: Windows has a sophisticated recovery that writes lots of data


For Windows 7, we recommend that you completely shut down system recovery. The quickest way to get to the system restore is via the keyboard shortcut: Windowstop + Pause, Computer Protection. Select the SSD, and then click Configure. In the dialog box, activate the third radio button Disable Computer Protection. The restoration function is now disabled.

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