Drivers Impact on RAM/Process Count?

NoTRite

NoTRite

Member
Hey guys,

Just a general question... Does removing drivers give any sort of performance boost? Or is decreasing final install size the only benefit?

I'm asking because I noticed some services related to these drivers are set to start at Boot, according to the Extra Services page. So I'm concerned leaving in the drivers I don't use might have an impact on RAM, if they are indeed loaded somehow at boot.

Edit: Just realized I've asked for a lot of help in this forum, sorry about the spam... :)
 
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Read my thoughts about services. You can apply the same thought to drivers. Peoples opinions will vary as towhat is best. Best is relative.
 
Well, a 50% reduction in RAM usage is expected with services, especially automatic ones.

But drivers should be different. There's everything from POS Barcode to holographic display drivers in there! I can't believe M$ is that incompetent. A little bit, maybe, but not that incompetent. Unless it's some nefarious planned obsolescence plot.

I'm sure the difference in your RAM usage was really because some of the services you disabled were actually automatic in the vanilla system. However, all the usb-powered-rock drivers would be the equivalent of "manual" in the services world. So these drivers take up disk space, but not RAM or CPU... Right??? :D

Someone please confirm this. I really hope it's not true... :eek:
 
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A driver will only be loaded and running if x hardware is connected. Oh you have a lot to learn. XP was stuffed with 3rd party drivers most people didnt use. Windows 7 is stuffed to the gills with 3rd party drivers. They are also stuffed with fonts languages and keyboards you wont need.

Just because stuff is there doesnt mean it is actually doing anything. Its just sitting there "in case".

Windows XP Professional SP3 32bit can run with only 4, FOUR, services enabled. Not a lot of people know that.
 
Ok phew, so they don't use up RAM or CPU then? I'm ok with it if they just take up space on my hard drive and nothing else.

Who knows, I might really want to attach a pdp-11 to it one day....
 
Exactly. My presets are primarily for beginners. Nothing worse than being up crap creek with a yellow bang because of a missing driver. Why do you think i keep em? Not for the fun of it thats for sure. BEGINNERS. There are Beginners and people who know. People who know know how to back up drivers, what drivers they will need so they can tune the configuration to Host Hardware only. There will be people who know that prefer to keep just the MS drivers(me). It is all down to taste.
 
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OK sorry to revive this, but just an update...

Some drivers actually DO impact process count. You'll find their associated services under the "Extra Services" tab.

The following services in the Extra Services tab deal with 3rd-party drivers, and can be safely set to "Manual" so long as you're not using the hardware:

3ware.inf
arcsas.inf
adp80xx.inf
cht4isx64.inf
HpSAMD
iastorav.inf
iastorv.inf
ItSas35i.inf
lsi_sas.inf
lsi_sas2i.inf
lsi_sas3i.inf
lsi_sss.inf
megasas.inf
megasas2i.inf
megasas35i.inf
megasr.inf
mvumis.inf
nvraid
nvstor
percsas2i.inf
percsas3i.inf
netevbda.inf
netbvbda.inf
RasAcd
sisraid2.inf
sisraid4.inf
SmartSAMD
stexstor
vstxraid.inf
vsmraid.inf
 
NoTRite said:
OK sorry to revive this, but just an update...

Some drivers actually DO impact process count. You'll find their associated services under the "Extra Services" tab.

The following services in the Extra Services tab deal with 3rd-party drivers, and can be safely set to "Manual" so long as you're not using the hardware:

3ware.inf
arcsas.inf
adp80xx.inf
cht4isx64.inf
HpSAMD
iastorav.inf
iastorv.inf
ItSas35i.inf
lsi_sas.inf
lsi_sas2i.inf
lsi_sas3i.inf
lsi_sss.inf
megasas.inf
megasas2i.inf
megasas35i.inf
megasr.inf
mvumis.inf
nvraid
nvstor
percsas2i.inf
percsas3i.inf
netevbda.inf
netbvbda.inf
RasAcd
sisraid2.inf
sisraid4.inf
SmartSAMD
stexstor
vstxraid.inf
vsmraid.inf
Click to expand...

Do you know what "Beep" in the Extra Services tab does and if I can disable it with no problems?
 
Clanger said:
Windows XP Professional SP3 32bit can run with only 4, FOUR, services enabled. Not a lot of people know that.
Click to expand...
Hi,
Could you name those services? I want to try that out.

EDIT: Actually, do you have nLite XP barebone preset?
 
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I'm surprised no one has noticed all these devices are server-class RAID controllers. They're rarely found on any desktop system, since they're only shipped with enterprise servers. We're not talking about your ASUS onboard RAID...

The same result can be made by removing non-MS & non-Intel Storage controllers.
Capture.PNG
Code: 
                <c>driver_3ware.inf</c>
                <c>driver_adp80xx.inf</c>
                <c>driver_amdsbs.inf</c>
                <c>driver_applessd.inf</c>
                <c>driver_arcsas.inf</c>
                <c>driver_cht4sx64.inf</c>
                <c>driver_hpsamd.inf</c>
                <c>driver_itsas35i.inf</c>
                <c>driver_lsi_sas.inf</c>
                <c>driver_lsi_sas2i.inf</c>
                <c>driver_lsi_sas3i.inf</c>
                <c>driver_megasas2i.inf</c>
                <c>driver_megasas35i.inf</c>
                <c>driver_megasr.inf</c>
                <c>driver_mpi3drvi.inf</c>
                <c>driver_mvumis.inf</c>
                <c>driver_nvraid.inf</c>
                <c>driver_percsas2i.inf</c>
                <c>driver_percsas3i.inf</c>
                <c>driver_sisraid2.inf</c>
                <c>driver_sisraid4.inf</c>
                <c>driver_smartsamd.inf</c>
                <c>driver_stexstor.inf</c>
                <c>driver_vsmraid.inf</c>
                <c>driver_vstxraid.inf</c>
 
Windows 10 User said:
Do you know what "Beep" in the Extra Services tab does and if I can disable it with no problems?
Click to expand...
I believe beep is a diagnostic beep sound. For example gpu not installed correctly creates a certain amount of beeps to tell you that.

Don't take my word for it however. It's disabled on mine and no issues
 
Clanger said:
A driver will only be loaded and running if x hardware is connected. Oh you have a lot to learn. XP was stuffed with 3rd party drivers most people didnt use. Windows 7 is stuffed to the gills with 3rd party drivers. They are also stuffed with fonts languages and keyboards you wont need.

Just because stuff is there doesnt mean it is actually doing anything. Its just sitting there "in case".

Windows XP Professional SP3 32bit can run with only 4, FOUR, services enabled. Not a lot of people know that.
Click to expand...
This.

The only real concern is, storage space?, and most drivers take very little anyway, so having thousands of drivers 'readily' available to use, does nothing to the OS itself, apart from increased said storage space, on drive, and at ISO level, but it will make not a jot removing them regardless, unless you have the required hardware to use them.
 
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