14 DAY TRIAL // Are you ready for a tweaking session? I hope you are, because this is what we're going to do next, and I am not going to tune my NFS Carbon car, especially because I don't play that game and I won't ever play it, because there's something much better to do, and that is to tune up my operating system in order to get even the last drop of performance out of it.
As usual, I will use a software to accomplish my goal or at least to ease my job (I am waiting for a future version of PSPad that's going to be able to write my thoughts about a program without my intervention, but I think I'll die before that happens, but since dreaming is not illegal, don't wake me up!), and the program I have found to help me tweak my system is called Mz Ultimate Tweaker.
The latest version of this freeware system optimizer is 3.2, comes inside a setup package that weighs only 653KB, and is very easy to install. Since we know all there is to know about this part, let's jump to the interface and features, as always.
It seems that most commercial system tweakers have excellent interfaces, while the freeware ones are on the opposite side of the wall. Mz Ultimate Tweaker's interface contains some excellent graphics, but unfortunately, it fails miserably, and the only reason is the completely uninspired color combination used and the lack of decent buttons in the main menu that uses text links instead. To finish the talk about the interface, I will add that these text links from the main menu use blue text on a light blue background, and not all of us have eagle eyes...
There are ten areas to explore using this program's menu, and the first one is called Hardware Tweaks. You can enjoy four settings areas here - hard drive, CPU, CD/DVD and other hardware tweaks. You can optimize the Master File Table for your NTFS drives, boost CPU priority of running programs, change CD/DVD cache size or optimize prefetch, and if you don't know about an option's purpose, just hold your mouse above it and you'll see details about it in the info area at the bottom of the main window.
Next, we have the System Tweaks area, and this time there are three tabs available - Windows, startup & shutdown, other system tweaks. Some of the useful options here enable you to clear the pagefile at system shutdown, enable faster reboot, change applications timeout periods or optimize memory.
The four System and Internet Services areas (two for each of these) available inside the Services Tweaks screen allow you to disable certain system services without much hassle, by simply selecting a check button.
The Display Tweaks screen has two areas that allow you to change start menu and desktop settings, such as start menu delay or icon sizes.
The next two screens handle the internet connection settings and Internet Explorer options, their names being Internet Booster and IE Tweaks. All things are fine, but it would be nice to have the chance to perform custom changes on the connection parameters, because I don't really trust these auto optimizers each time I get to see them.
The WMP Tweaks area has only one screen that enables you to change some of the Windows Media Player's settings, most of them concerning potential security issues - automatic license acquisition, automatic codec download, automatic updates or sending information to Microsoft.
The One-Click Tweaks area has four tweaks available, and they can be used to disable the Registration Wizard Control, Product Activation, ZIP Folders and, what a joy, completely remove MSN Messenger from your computer (I know that a lot of people would like to do that, and I am one of those).
The Clean Up tools area has only two options available, being able to clean temporary files and prefetch files, while the Information screen gives you some basic information on your computer - CPU, HDD, Memory(try to read that blue text on blue background and tell me how did you manage to do it, because I had to stare for a while), Windows info and the folder of the current Windows installation.
What a race! This is Mz Ultimate Tweaker, ladies and gentlemen, and now the time has finally come to check the conclusions and screenshots. Ready for the last act?
The Good
Mz Ultimate Tweaker is a freeware application that's very easy of use and has a lot of useful system tweaks. Despite the fact that you don't get a standalone Help file, the assistance provided by the program during its use can prove a real life saver!
The Bad
It's a pity to notice spelling mistakes in today's software, and this is not the worst part of this program, because its interface needs a lot of work until it becomes usable, because for the time being, some areas are nothing more than just examples of an "ouch, my eyes!" approach to graphical user interface design.
The Truth
Mz Ultimate Tweaker is a good tweaker, without any doubt. If you can handle a poor interface, than this program is a must have, because its features are worth the time spent using it!
