I was reading in a book someone gave me about hacking windows that if you add /prefetch:1 it will load faster. You are also suppose to be able to put 0-3 where the 1 goes.

0=prefetching disable
1=application preftch only
2=boot preftch only
3=prefetch both(defaut value)

I'm currently trying out 3 on firefox, and it does seem to load a bit faster. I was hoping that other people could try it and post there results.

Example:

Under the shortcut properties in Target:

"C:\\Program Files\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe" /prefetch:3

For Firefox since it is an application why not just try the /prefetch:1
And yes it does make it load a bit faster. I had once done this for a little bit until it became an annoyance. Though it is a tid bit quicker its not that great of a deal. Get more faster ram and you will see a quicker load on applications and the applications themselves will be faster.

No noticeable affect. Possibly a tiny bit faster, but that could be my imagination.

Explain prefetch a little more. Big apps such as my main 3D design app 3DS Max 8 takes forever to load w/ its many plugins. So by prefetch, when does it do the loading, a boot, after windows loads... and where is the info stored? On RAM, on virtual memory on HD?

Its been a while, and I'm not sure where the book is that I got it from, but from what I remember it was found in XP on windows media player's shortcut. I remember the book said that no one knew exactly how it worked, but that it did help to speed up the opening of some application. But it varies, it will work with some, and not with others. So you just have to try it and see if it works or not.

Prefetch is a part of windows that "pre-loads" parts of regularly used applications into memory. In essence its trying to anticipate what you will want to do so it can do it "quicker". But having programs load into ram on startup slows down your boot up.

So its up to you... either you can have a fast boot and your programs take a tiny bit longer to load up or you can have a slow boot but with quicker access to your commonly used programs.

If you want to test the difference then go to "C:\\WINDOWS\\Prefetch" and delete everything in there. The next time you boot windows it should be a lot quicker. From that point on Windows will add commonly used programs back into that folder (unless you disable it). You will also find that less RAM is used by windows after a boot.

Its just another one of those things that Microsoft figure than can stick into their OS without really telling the end-user about it. Therefore taking away the choice to use it or not.

Doesnt work for me