when I dowwnloaded programs or burned discs in Windows 98 I closed all
running application except Explorer & systray. How do I do this in
Windows XP or is it not necessary?

It is not necessary to close everything. If you have a powerful new
computer with at least 512mbs of RAM it is not necessary to turn
anything off at all in fact you can surf to web pages. If you have an
older machine and are afraid of a crash just make sure you dont run
any intensive apps while burning.

I agree in partial with nerdboy... But, even with a loaded system and
lots of processor power, many of these dumb little applications that
run in the background on your system can really slow things down and
in some cases pose a security issue. There is an easy fix, but you
need some basic knowledge of XP operating files that should not be
shut off depending on the 3rd party software you are running. Go to
Start-> Run-> and type "msconfig" (Without the quotes) A window will
pop-up... choose the far right tab at the top that says "Startup". Now
just unclick anything that you don't want to run when the computer
starts. You may find the list is shockingly long depending on how much
software you have loaded. Now click "apply" and "OK" and let the
computer reboot. There is also a "Services" tab that you can also mess
around with, but if you don't know what you're doing, don't mess with
it!
Good Luck!


DCS_TECH
www.dcs.741.com

this usually isn't necessary anymore. If some programs in particular
are rather hoggy of your system resources, or stand to interrupt the
system at a critical moment, you could close those, but closing
everything is certainly not necessary. An example of such a program
would be any 3d game, sometimes instant messaging programs (on slower
computers), photo editing or video editing programs, and the like.
Even then it is not necessary to close all these programs to download
files, and with burning cd's, most modern burners made in the last 2-3
years have a feature called "burn proof" "smart burn" or some other
similar name. this provides buffer underrun protection so that while
you are burning a cd, the cd will not be ruined even if the burner
does not get a steady stream of data to write. This makes it
unnecessary to turn off all programs before burning, except of course
if your burner does not support this feature.

i lightly scaned the above comments...
msconfig is a good way to disable startup programs.
another way to close running programs is to
"right click on the task bar" then select "task manager"
you can then end task that are running in the background (processes
tab) as well as programs that you can 'see' running (applocations
tab). THis also shows the performance of ur system as well as network
performance.

i also i have a small program that makes the "msconfig" idea much
easier. this atucally makes it user friendly (with icons and program
names, so u dont have to guess on what you are disabling). let me know
if u have any further question, here is the link to the mini msconfig
program http://www.mlin.net/

http://www.mlin.net/StartupCPL.shtml
this is the actually link to the application i am refering too,,

Grab Nero instead of Roxio/Adaptec for writing. Nero has good buffer
management. I can chat/surf or even play a game while writing a CD
most of the time.

http://www.nero.com

You can close applications by pressing [control]+[alt]+[delete], then
there are two items important: Applications and Processes. You can
shut down al the applications by pressing [end task]. By processes it
is not recommend to shut every thing down, but you can normally shut
down every process that is not started by the users SYSTEM or NETWORK
or LOCAL.

please note, that I don't run the English version of WindowsXP so, the
buttons may be a little bit difference.

Just remember that if you do use msconfig make sure you do not stop
your antivirus software stuff from starting up that could be bad.