Disk Thrashing

[gsl007]

Each time I boot my system my disk thrashes for about 15 minutes. The process causing this is c:\volume information (followed by registry entries). What is this and how do I stop it running?

Thanks, Gary

[Harryc]

Do a forum search on 'vista indexing' and 'superfetch'.

[gsl007]

I disabled indexing and superfetch when I first got the machine. Not sure about prefetch. How do I turn this off? Thanks.

[lbreuss]

Open the Task Scheduler (run taskschd.msc) and disable the daily System Restore Point creation at first startup.

[mulambo187]

heh, could be just initial indexing? my copy of vista did this for about the first week and finally chilled out on the thrashing.

[Marin85]

Indexing actually runs when there is something to index, and that is not necessarily upon every windows startup (maybe only the first one). As for prefetch and superfetch, there are two things that needed to be done in order to disable it:
1) Disable the corresponding service in the services console;
2) Open regedit and navigate to Computer\HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management\PrefetchParameters. Put values 0 to both keys 'EnablePrefetcher' and 'EnableSuperfetch' (note, per default both keys bear values 3);

The advantages and disadvantages of disabling prefetch and superfetch are disputable and seem to vary from system to system. In my experience disabling them ultimately eliminates the disk thrashing in Vista upon startup and doesn´t lead to any performance decrease or other disadvantages. But then again, that´s only me.