Below you will find a few tips for optimizing your Windows 8.1 PC, sorted according to importance. The first set of suggested measures is appropriate in most cases, the second category just helpful, whereas the settings at the end of the list are for experts who are setting up computers used only for presentations.
The modifications suggested
below deviate considerably from the standard and security settings and
serve for optimal and trouble free presentation only. Before making these
modifications create a restore point, that allows you to change back to
the old configuration, if necessary. For computers that are also used
for other purposes it may be useful to create a new user, e.g. "Presentation",
which lets you start the computer with this user profile for presentations.
Recommended measures
Starting Windows 8.1 directly with the classic desktop
Installing additional software
Settings for visual effects, driver updates and remote desktop
Configuring screen savers, sounds and user interface
Disabling automatic hard disk defragmentation
Activating high-performance notebook graphics chips
Useful measures
Disabling messages from the Action Center
Measures for mere presentation computers without Internet connection
Avoiding the login dialog when starting up the computer
Adjusting firewall, defender and windows updates
Turning the user account control off
Searching for interfering tasks
By introducing Windows 8, Microsoft introduced the tiles design which allows better handling via touch display although this development is questionable when it comes to working on a normal PC. This is why we are not going to into the details of the tile interface and refer exclusively to the classic desktop design which is customarily used on PCs.
But even when you are working on the desktop it may happen that Windows changes over to tiles view. To avoid this we recommend linking up all files with a normal program with windows design so that no tiles program starts when a file is double-clicked.
For multidisplay applications we recommend refraining from using Windows 8.1 as the demands in terms of synchronization to the graphics output cannot sufficiently be met.
Start your PC and click the tile Desktop in the bottom left corner for the classic desktop to appear.
Right-click the task bar and select Properties following which the Taskbar and Navigation properties window appears.
Click tab Navigation and check box When I sign in or close all apps on a screen, go to the desktop instead of Start under Start screen.
Close the dialog by clicking OK.
When the PC is started the next time tiles view should no longer appear. However, the Windows 8 desktop still misses some of the familiar icons, like the Start menu. Using the Classic Shell software you can adjust the functions and displays to match your familiar Windows version. See http://www.classicshell.net/
For certain functions, Wings Vioso RX requires installation of additional software that should be on any presentation PC.
DirectX 9.0c of June 2010 for execution of the program. This DirectX version must be installed in addition to DirectX 10 or 11. If you should have problems, we advise you to get the latest DirectX 9 update which can be downloaded from the Microsoft website.
ASIO4ALL enables usage of standard WDM sound cards for multi-channel playback, provided they have a 5.1-output. This tool can be found at www.asio4all.de. Note: If you are using a real ASIO sound card with separate ASIO driver you should not install ASIO4ALL as this may cause conflicts.
Although Acrobat Reader is not necessary for Wings Vioso RX it allows display of any information available in PDF format. It can be found on the Wings Vioso RX USB-stick or on the Adobe website.
The settings listed below are useful and are mostly made in the Control Panel. You'd better leave this dialog open and select Display and Large icons or Small icons, as the following explanations refer to this type of display.
Visual effects
Right-click on the
Windows icon 
and select Control
Panel.
Click System and Advanced System Settings.
On tab Advanced under Performance click on Settings.
Click Adjust for best performance. Close the dialog by clicking OK.
If
you should find out that important functions have been turned you can
turn them on again individually in the above dialog box. In our experience
semi-transparent windows and font smoothing, etc. use up less performance
than many people may think.
Hardware
Click tab Hardware and Device installation settings.
Enable No, let me choose what to do and Never install driver software from Windows Update. Close the dialog by clicking OK.
Now
that the automatic search function for drivers has been disabled, you
may have to perform a search manually.
Remote
Select tab Remote and clear the check box Allow Remote Assistance connections to this computer.
Click OK and close this System dialog box, too.
Screen saver and energy saving measures may seriously affect the presentation run on a presentation PC. It may also be useful to have a black desktop, in order to prevent some Windows desktop images to show in case of problems.
Right-click the Windows
icon and select Control
Panel.
Click Appearance and Personalization and select a semi-transparent design. Info: Such designs are better suited for playback of single-display shows than high-contrast designs.
Click on Desktop background and under Picture location choose Solid colors. Click the black pattern followed by Save changes.
At the bottom click on Sounds and from the Sound schemes list select No sounds. Clear check box Play Windows startup sound and click OK.
At the right bottom click Screensaver. Under Screensaver click Non and clear check box On resume display logon screen. Close the dialog by clicking OK.
The follow steps allow you make numerous settings for energy management:
Right-click the Windows
icon and select Control
Panel.
Click Power Options, followed by clicking Show additional plans and select High performance.
On the right click Change plan settings and select Never for Turn off the display and Put the computer to sleep.
Now click Change advanced power settings. In this dialog choose High performance [Active] and make the following changes below:
Hard
disk - Turn off hard disk
Never
Sleep
- Sleep after Never
Sleep
- Allow Hybrid Sleep Off
Sleep
- Hibernate after Never
Power
buttons and lid - Power
button action
Shut down
PCI
Express - Link State Off
Display
- Turn off display after Never
Multimedia
Settings - When Sharing
Media Prevent
idling to sleep
Close the dialog by clicking OK.
On the Control Panel click AutoPlay.
For all media change the settings to Take no action and click Save.
Windows 8.1 automatically creates an index for the contents of certain folders and updates it regularly. Since these hard disk accesses are superfluous for presentation computers you should disable indexing.
On the Control Panel click Indexing Options.
Click Modify followed by clicking Show all locations.
Clear check box Change selected locations and there will be no more entries below.
Close the dialogs by clicking OK or Close.
After a pause of approx. 30 minutes Windows 8.1 automatically starts hard disk defragmentation. This might lead to problems during a presentation. The defragmentation result achieved such is also anything but good. This is how you can turn off automatic defragmentation:
On the Control Panel click Administrative Tools followed by clicking Task Scheduler.
In the dialog on the left open the following tree structure: Task Scheduler (Local) - Task Scheduler Library - Microsoft - Windows and highlight Defrag.
In the window at the top you will find a Scheduler entry which you delete by right-clicking it.
Now close the Task Scheduler dialog.
It's a good idea to use a good defragmentation program, e.g. O&O Defrag and defragment the hard disk after playing all media but before actually starting the presentation.
For smooth playback of high-resolution HDAV shows a high-quality, fast 3 D graphics card with a lot of graphics memory and an up-to-date driver are highly important. Color rendering must be set to a minimum color depth of 24 or even better 32 bits. For fluent movements and panning, the refresh rate should match the display and the frame rate of the video. See also Media integration.
Right-click some free space on the Windows desktop and select Screen resolution.
In order to adjust the Refresh rate click on Advanced Settings and tab Monitor. For Screen refresh rate choose 60 Hz for usage with projectors or LCD displays or 50 Hz for usage with PAL videos (always choose a multiple of the frame rate of the videos used). See also Media integration.
Below it you can select the color depth. The best choice is 32 bits. Some graphics cards to not allow selection of the color depth, e.g. Intel graphics chips. If a more powerful graphics card is available you should enable it. See Activating Nvidia Optimus graphics chip.
Properties and graphics card type, as well as driver version and date can be determined via the Microsoft system info. See System info...
Tip
for Nvidia graphics cards: Nvidia graphic cards, by default,
will display all your videos in dull colors. This is something you
should correct in the Nvidia control panel. 
Adjusting
the tonal value range in the Nvidia Control Panel...
Modern notebooks are slim and economic and usually feature main processors with integrated graphics capability and a graphics chip by Nvidia or AMD Radeon. You need to make sure that always the better graphics chip is used for Wings Vioso since the integrated graphics processor offers less performance. The procedure is similar for Nvidia and AMD Radeon. For the details on both systems see below:
Right-click a free area on the Windows Desktop and select Nvidia Control Panel.
In the dialog on the left under 3D Settings click Manage 3D settings.
On tab Global Settings under Preferred graphics processor choose setting NVIDIA high performance processor.
On tab Program Settings click Add and select Wings5.exe which can be found at C:\Programme (x86)\AV Stumpfl\Wings 5.
Some notebooks may show a drop
in performance some seconds after playback start due to faulty power management.
In such a case open the Nvidia Control Panel and go to Manage
3D Settings on tab Global Settings
and change the Power Management Mode
in the list from the default setting Adaptive
to Prefer maximum performance.
Show Setting.
Right-click an empty space on the Windows Desktop and select Configure switchable graphics.
Select
Global Application Settings
for Battery and Plugged
In to Maximum Performance.
Show settings.
In the dialog below click on Switchable graphics - Application Settings. In the dialog box that has opened up click on Add Application and select Wings5.exe, which can be found at “C:\Programs (x86)\AV Stumpfl\Wings 5”.
In
the list highlight Wings5.exe
and select High performance
in column Graphics settings.
Show settings.
To finish, click on Apply and close the dialog.
If you want
to output your show as an EXE presentation you need to add every EXE presentation
at Application Settings as described
above.
Here you will find a few recommendations that are not absolutely necessary but that may facilitate working with media and Wings Vioso.
Click on the Windows
icon and select Control
Panel.
Click Folder Options and click the View tab.
Clear the check box next to Hide extensions for known file types.
Under Hidden files and folders click option Show hidden files, folders and drives.
Click OK.
It is a good idea to adjust the folder views for different contents to meet your requirements.
For this purpose, adjust the folder view (e.g. for files, images or videos) as desired.
Then click Organize
and select Folder
and Search Options.
Click the View tab, click Apply to Folders.
Repeat these steps for all types of folders (files, images, videos, etc..)
Windows Action Center, via popups, automatically informs about problems and incidents that may not altogether be so important and which may disturb during a presentation. These popups can be disabled although this means that in the future you will have to look for this information yourself.
Right-click the Windows
icon , click Control
Panel. and click Notification
Area Icons.
Click Action Center and select Hide icons and notifications.
You can also change the settings for any other icons if they should get in the way of your presentation.
Finish by clicking OK.
The following steps should only be performed by experts for computers that are not connected to the Internet and are exclusively used for presentation purposes.
The modifications suggested below deviate considerably from the standard
and security settings and serve for optimal and trouble free presentation
only. Before making these modifications create a restore point, that allows
you to change back to the old configuration, if necessary. For computers
that are also used for other purposes the steps described below should
not be performed.
For permanent installations, which are activated in the morning via timer control and run automatically, the logon dialog may be a nuisance. There is a way around this.
Please note that avoiding the logon dialog
and the password query may allow unauthorized access to your data!
Call dialog Execute by pressing the Windows-key and R.
Enter netplwiz and click OK, and the User accounts dialog will pop up. Confirm any messages that may come up with Continue.
In the field, highlight the user account that is to log in automatically in the future.
Clear check box Users must enter a user name and password to use this computer and click OK.
In the following dialog enter the password twice for the specified user account and click OK.
Next time Windows starts up the user is logged in automatically.
See also Automatic computer startup and show start
Changing these setting also affects the Help suggestions by Windows and should only be made by experienced users.
In the Control Panel click Problem Reports and Solutions and Change settings on the left.
Under Choose how to check solutions to computer problems select Off.
Close the dialog by clicking OK.
Important note: These settings should only be changed, if your computer is not connected to the Internet and is run within a network controlled by you. Otherwise there is a security risk!
Right-click the Windows
icon and select Control
Panel.
Click Windows Firewall and on Turn Windows Firewall on or off.
Confirm any messages that may come up with Continue.
Enable Turn off Windows Firewall, click OK and close the Firewall dialog.
Now disable the Defender functions.
In the Control Panel click Windows Defender.
At the top click Tools followed by Options.
Disable the following items (you may have to scroll further down):
Automatic scanning - Automatically scan my computer
Real-time protection - Use real-time protection
Advanced - Scan archive files
Advanced - Use heuristics
Advanced - Create restore point
Administrator - Use this program
Click Save to accept the changes.
It is not useful to have the presentation computer automatically search for updates. This feature should be disabled.
In the Security Center click Windows Update and Change settings on the left.
Click Never check for updates, click OK and close the Update dialog box.
Following this click Java (32 bits) in the Control Panel. Click tab Update and remove the checkmark next to Automatic search for updates. Close the dialog by clicking OK.
Disable automatic update for all programs
(e.g. Adobe Photoshop CS). If your computer runs an anti-virus program,
disable it before you start the presentation.
These steps prevent continual prompting for permission for tasks requiring administrative rights. Important note: Important note: Since turning the user account control disables some Windows security functions, only experienced PC users should do so.
Right-click the Windows icon and select Control
Panel.
Click on User Accounts and click Change user account control settings.
Move the slider to the very bottom to Never notify me and click OK. Answer the following warning with Yes.
If no sufficient performance could be achieved, despite heeding the tips above, the reason may be difficult to find. Usually, it's some programs that are still active in the background that you need to track and deactivate. In order to prevent the installation from becoming inoperative by deactivating any "essential" programs, you should create restore points for Windows. How this is done, is explained in the Windows Help. Otherwise a defective installation may never be repaired again.
Following the tips for PC optimization is at your own risk. We cannot accept any liability for any damage that may be caused. If necessary, ask a computer expert to perform these measures for you to rule out any damage.
The paragraph above contains some information for optimizing tasks. If your program still does not run without any problems, you can have a look at the Task Manager and see which tasks and processes are being performed. The next step is to find out if any of the tasks performed interferes with Wings Platinum.
Right-click a free area in the task bar and select Task Manager.
Click on tab Processes for a list with the currently running processes to be displayed. To find out what the abbreviations stand for, have a look at the Windows Help or the Internet, e.g. at http://frankn.com (German).
Terminate one process after the other and keep checking whether the malfunction has been eliminated, e.g. jerky playback for HDAV shows. Start with user-specific processes and make a note of the process you have just terminated. Windows will refuse to terminate "essential" system tasks, but some crashes may be caused by terminating tasks.
Once you have found out about the interfering task, uninstall the corresponding program or disable it as explained above at the example of Messenger or Task Scheduler. Otherwise this task will be reactivated when the computer starts up the next time.
If this does not help to eliminate the problem, it may be due to the devices or drivers. Update all drivers and test disabling those devices in the device control system which are not really necessary.
See also
