WhisperWhite
I wanted to strip out things I will not be using in XP and optimize system settings for running in a virtual machine. You may perform all or some of the below procedures if you are comfortable. I have tested these as working for my setup but you may want to back up your virtual machine beforehand just in case.
Open Control Panel.
Open Add or Remove Programs and click Add/Remove Windows Components on the side. Uncheck Internet Explorer, MSN Explorer, Outlook Express, Windows Media Player, and Windows Messenger. Click Next and Finish.
Open Display and select Windows Classic Theme.
On the Screen Saver tab, change Screen Saver to none. Click OK.
Open Power Options. Change Turn off monitor to never. On the Advanced tab, uncheck Prompt for password when computer resumes from standby. Click OK.
Open Sounds and Audio Devices. On the Sounds tab, select No Sounds (this will only disable the Windows sounds like the Startup music) and click No to not save the previous scheme. Click OK.
Open System. On the Advanced tab, click Error Reporting and Disable error reporting. Click OK.
Under Performance click Settings. Uncheck the following: Fade or slide menus into view, Fade or slide ToolTips into view, Fade out menu items after clicking, Show shadows under menus, Show shadows under mouse pointer, Smooth edges of screen fonts, Use visual styles on windows and buttons.
Under the Advanced tab, click Change in Virtual memory. Select No paging file then click Set. Click OK but do not restart the virtual machine yet. Click OK to close Performance Options.
On the System Restore tab, check Turn off system restore.
On the Remote tab, uncheck Allow Remote Assistance invitations to be sent from this computer and Allow users to connect remotely to this computer. Click OK. Confirm Yes you want to turn off system restore, and restart later.
Open Taskbar and Start Menu to customize how you prefer.
In Start menu, All Programs, Accessories, open Command Prompt. Type in the following then hit enter:
powercfg /HIBERNATE off
Open My Computer, right click on Local Disk (C:) and select Properties. Uncheck Allow Indexing Service to index this disk for fast file searching and click OK. Click OK on the window that pops up, then click Ignore All.
