Extra network adapters

[jdhurst]

Over time, in a Windows 2000 or Windows XP machine, addition and deletion of printers and network adapters can leave extra drives and registry entries to sort through. That can slow down a machine. I learned that when installing and uninstalling VMware.

With Windows 2000 and Windows XP, it is reasonable to delete printer drivers (Server tab in Printers) and to delete unused network adapters in the registry. I usually rename real adapters to something obvious and delete the rest. I never had any problems from these actions.

Now with Windows Vista (and after researching a "ghosted network adapter" post), I find there are nearly two dozen network adapters in my T61p, all of which have descriptive names when when you show Hidden Devices in Device Manager.

I am reluctant to delete these because my Vista build is quite new (about a week old), I have not installed any other network devices, and I have not yet installed VMware.

Does anyone here know what these additional devices are?

Thanks, ... JDH

[Harryc]

JD, don't know the answer to your question, but I'd like to know an easy way to do it in XP. Seems that every time I clone a drive, and I do this a lot, I get an additional numbered set of network adapters in XP.

[jdhurst]

Harry - there is no easy way I know of (which is why I stumbled on it in Vista).

In the Registry, Local Machine -> System -> Current Control Set -> Control -> Network are a bunch of keys. Expand the first one, and there are a bunch more keys. Look in each key under Connection. If it points to a NIC long gone, then you can delete that key. That has worked for me in Windows 2000 and in Windows XP. Always take care editing the registry.

My issue is that there are bunch of these in Vista that do not appear to be related to previously uninstalled NIC's. So I don't know what to make of them.

If my networking and file sharing worked smoothly and reliably in Vista, I wouldn't be messing around here, but networking and file sharing is not smooth and not reliable in Vista 64-bit so far.

... JDH