Windows 7 visual effects

Question

I have Windows 7 and I've been wondering what the best ways to enhance my performance are. I saw on an old forum topic that I should go to Control Panel > Performance Information and Tools > Adjust Visual Effects and uncheck certain effects. I've unchecked practically all of the effects apart from "Use visual styles on windows and buttons" as this seems to be reverting my UI to classic view. I'm fine with using classic view, but I've heard that because it doesn't use Aero which offloads a lot of processing on to the GPU, it may occupy the CPU more.

If anyone can clarify this one way or the other I'd appreciate it. Thanks!

Answer 1

The "best performance" selection on that dialog assumes that you don't have a video card for which to offload processing.  You'll actually get better performance if you leave Aero running.  You could still disable a few of the extra effects (fades, transparency and such) while keeping Aero, which will give you a bit of a speed improvement if your graphics card can't handle all the transparency.  No matter what though, even the most basic of Aero-capable graphics setups will be better performing than classic.

Answer 2

Ah cheers, that's all I wanted to know. :) Thanks for clearing that up for me.

Answer 3

No idea? ):

Answer 4

Yeah, that was the option I selected initially, but all that did was uncheck all of the effects and reverts me back to windows classic view, which as I say I'm fine with. I don't mind the windows classic design. I was just wondering whether I'd be better off leaving that last effect "Use visual styles on windows and buttons" checked, as I've heard if you do use the windows classic view it doesn't process the UI with the GPU as it does with Aero. I've read that it uses the CPU.

Answer 5

Try this, 

1. Start
2. In the search bar put "Adjust the appearance and performance of Windows"

3.Under the first tab, "visual effects" select the button that says "Adjust for best performance"

4. Click ok

I use this on my windows 7 machine at home and I can tell the difference between when you select the different modes. It won't hurt to just try it out and see if it does change, you can always change it back if the effect isn't what you want.

Hope this helps.