1) Start > Control Panel > System > Advanced > under Performance click 
   Settings, select "Visual Effects", select "Adjust for best performance". 
      
2) HARD DRIVE MAINTAINENCE
   Run Scandisk and Defragment the hard drive as often as possible for
   improved disk performance.  If you can, put all of your audio files on a 
   separate hard drive (for instance, D:).  If you record .WAV files to the 
   same drive as your operating system and applications (usually on C:), 
   audio performance will be degraded. 

3) BACKGROUND APPLICATIONS
   Programs such as system monitors, task scheduling, anti-virus programs, 
   screen savers, power management, etc. should be disabled while recording.  
   It is possible that such programs can cause a conflict or slow down 
   the system. Hit CTRL-ALT-DEL to check the task list and shut down all 
   background programs except Explorer.  

4) WINDOWS TEMP DIRECTORY
   Periodically empty the Windows temp directory (usually "c:\windows\temp"). 
   Installation "wizards" and other programs use the same temp directory 
   and over time it can get filled with files, which can cause slow downs and
   other problems.  It is a good idea to periodically remove the temp files 
   located here.  Do this after you have closed out of all applications, then 
   restart the system. 

5) VIDEO SETTINGS
   If you have trouble making audio files, try setting the video color depth 
   to 256 colors.  16-bit, 24-bit, 32-bit hi-color and true-color will tax 
   system resources.  Setting the number of colors to 256 will minimize the 
   effects of the video card on digital audio performance.  
   
   Make sure you are using the latest drivers for your video card. Using an
   AGP video card usually helps, as the AGP bus is faster than the PCI bus.  
   
   If your soundcard uses Upper Memory resources (like the Turtle Beach 
   Multisound series of soundcards), try setting the Graphics Aperture size 
   in your motherboard's BIOS to match the amount of video RAM installed on 
   the video card. 

6) SOUND CARD DRIVERS
   Make sure you are using the latest drivers for your sound card.  
   Multimedia applications work intimately with the sound card - using the 
   latest drivers will insure the best performance.  

7) DOS REAL MODE DRIVERS
   Check "config.sys" or "autoexec.bat" for any programs loading before 
   Windows, as these could be taking precious resources.  To view them, 
   simply click Start -> Run 'sysedit'.  For best Windows 95 or 98 operation,
   the "config.sys" and "autoexec.bat" should be nearly empty.  
     
     Note: 
     If there is system hardware that requires drivers to be loaded in these 
     files, leave the entries there.  For instance, the Turtle Beach Montego 
     series of soundcards have a Sound Blaster emulation that runs from
     AUTOEXEC.BAT.   

8) COMPRESSED DRIVES
   Make sure you are not writing the audio to a compressed drive.  
   Compressed drives increase the available disk space, but decrease 
   performance significantly, as the disk compression and decompression must 
   be performed by the central processor (i.e. your Pentium chip) in real
   time.  It is nearly impossible for even the fastest computers to both 
   compress/decompress data 'on the fly' and record/playback digital audio 
   at the same time. 


9)  HARD DRIVE TRANSFER RATE
    Your hard drive must be able to provide an actual, sustained transfer rate
    of at least 5 MB per second.  To test this, you can use a free 3rd party 
    program called "WinTune" (search for "WinTune" at "www.shareware.com") or 
    "DskBench" (http://www.sesa.es/). 

10) LARGE DRIVE SUPPORT
    If you are using the FAT16 file system and your hard drive's partition 
    is larger than 1 GB, it's a good idea to convert to FAT32 or re-partition
    your hard drive to partitions smaller than 1 GB.  Otherwise you might
    experience erratic digital audio performance (pops, clicks, audio 
    drop-outs). 
    
      Note: 
      Please consult your computer manufacturer or Microsoft for this, 
      as attempting to do this can permanently erase your hard drive and may 
      void your computer's warranty.

11) MS-DOS COMPATIBILITY MODE
    Click Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> System -> Performance. 
    "File System" and "Virtual Memory" should both say 32-bit.  If there is 
    a mention of "MS-DOS Compatibility Mode", there a serious problem with 
    your system configuration.  As a result of this, your system is reading
    and writing data very s l o w l y. 
  
    Below are some URLs with information on correcting this. 
    Go to these sites and follow links regarding "MS-DOS Compatibility Mode". 

      WINDOWS 98 
      http://www.microsoft.com/windows98/support/faq/supfaqusing.asp

      WINDOWS 95
      http://www.microsoft.com/windows95/support/faq/sup95faqusing.asp

      If these links are no longer active: 
      http://www.microsoft.com (search for: "MS-DOS Compatibility Mode")

12) WINDOWS NT 4.0
    For Windows NT 4.0, make sure you have installed the latest Service Pack. 
    Service Packs 3, 4, 5 and 6 come with an updated ATAPI.SYS bus mastering 
    IDE driver. 


13) HARD DISK TWEAK for Win 9x (not Win 95a).

    Device Manager > Disk Drives > Generic IDE 
    (then Disk type 48 or whatever...NOT floppy)

    Go to the Settings tab for the hard drive.  In Win 95b and 98, there will
    be a check box for DMA.  Checking it will keep disc reads from having to
    go through the CPU.

    If nothing else, this will free up the CPU for more processing of real 
    time DirectX effects but may also help a little with stuttering audio.

14) AUTO-INSERT NOTIFICATION
    This is the Windows feature that 'senses' if a CD has been inserted 
    into the system's CD-ROM drive. If you have multiple CD drives, 
    it is recommended that you keep Auto-Insert Notification disabled 
    while Recording / Ripping.

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