Windows tips site IntelliAdmin suggests some ways to speed up Windows startup. Alongside the usual defrag and spyware-cleaning suspects, there’s an interesting section on disabling Windows’ prefetch folder.

Windows XP has this feature that loads commonly used programs – at boot time. Here is how it works: Yesterday you used MS Word, and Duke Nukem 3D. Today you boot your system to check e-mail. It sees parts of these two programs in the prefetch folder and loads them into memory before windows completes the boot process. The benefit is faster application launch times. If you really wanted to use MS Word, it would pop up really quick when you double clicked on it.

The prefetch folder’s a new one on me – and IntelliAdmin notes that there was some controversy about it – but O’Reilly’s Windows XP Annoyances book mentions it, and I trust that guy Tim, so I’m thinking it’s legit. The article has notes on how you can edit your registry (VERY carefully after a BACKUP) to minimize prefetch lagginess, among other tacts to reduce PC boot time. — Gina Trapani