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Having to sit through the entire Windows boot process can give even the best of us a headache. Why must we wait – and wait – and WAIT? Matthew has discovered a way to bypass some of the usual rigamarole, and he’s sharing it with all of you in his screencast this week.

All you need to do is click into your Start menu, and type in msconfig. After you hit the Enter key to bring up the proper window, click on the Boot tab. Place a checkmark in the box that says No GUI Boot. This simply disables the Windows splash screen that comes up – saving you a little bit of time and heartache.

This works in Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7. From this screen, you can also change several other settings on your computer. You can change the timeout length from when you select your hard disk or operating disk on boot.

On the msconfig startup and services tabs, you can choose to deselect unnecessary items. Do NOT make any changes to these areas if you aren’t sure of what you’re doing, or of what an item is. Always do some research on Google to put a meaning to each item listed before deciding whether or not you need it.

Thanks, Matt, for an excellent screencast full of tips for our community!

How to Speed Up Windows Startup

Dude. I just can’t stay off the juice! Last night, I was compelled to write about my experiences with the Tassimo machine (a wedding gift from Andru and Monica Edwards). Ponzi put it on our wish list – but I really wish the machine did more. Judging from the comments we’re getting, others do as well. Consider Pastor Scott Holder’s note to me a few minutes ago:

I consider myself somewhat of a coffee aficionado, and can fully relate to your comments on either automatic or perfect coffee brewers. Like you, I graduated from the Mr. Coffee era many years ago. I have brewed it, perked it, boiled, nuked it, steamed it, etc. Currently we have a professional espresso machine (it still makes the best espresso), 3 Senseo machines (1 for each: home, work, church), 2 regular brewing systems, and our recently added Tassimo Ultra. I wasn’t really interested in this machine, but my wife has become a kitchen-gadget person of sorts so we bought it. With our local SAMS Club having two on display it was too good a deal to pass up (less than half price).

I must say that the limit on coffee varieties is still somewhat perplexing. Surely there will be more forthcoming. However, I have found that Seattle’s Best does offer a couple of varieties that are worth mentioning. I like dark roast coffee so I have settled on Henry’s Blend as a good choice. Surprisingly, the Maxwell House French Roast is fairly nice, considering I can’t stand Maxwell House coffee. The Gevalia Signature Crema Coffee has a good flavor, but not as well-rounded as the Seattle’s Best. I have also tried the Mastro Lorenzo Crema and found it to be acceptable in taste.

I’m more of an espresso drinker and do like both the Gevalia Espresso and the Mastro Lorenzo Espresso. Both put a nice crema on top and have a rich, bold, almost citrus flavor to them. I’m venturing into the teas as I write this and have found Earl Grey, Green Tea (late in the day), and Tazo Awake Black Tea to all be nice options. Each has a very distinct flavor all its own. I do hope that more flavors and/or varieties will become available in the near future. I follow trends through SingleServeCoffee and also SingleServeEspresso. Both offer a wealth of information about coffee/espresso brewing and news. At singleservecoffee.com, I see non-USA sites with other options for the Tassimo and will probably try some – especially the latte and espresso offerings from Kenco. There are also a couple of different tea varieties not available in the USA that I want to try.

On the flip side, I do know that the Yuban Rain Forest Alliance Coffee is the nastiest-tasting coffee I’ve ever tried. I don’t want another cup of that stuff ever. While writing this email I noticed that Keurig is suing Tassimo over the piercing technology. It’s crazy that this kind of thing is going on. I really hope we don’t lose out after making this investment.

By the way (and this is just a pet peeve of mine): it’s pronounced “espresso” – not “eXpresso.”

Coffee Snobs

To add to my lengthy list of Windows Vista annoyances: what’s up with the abnormally bland boot screen?! I’m all for decreasing clutter and all, but a simple progress bar seems so incomplete (then again, so does the rest of Vista). Brandon showed me a quick trick the other night when he was helping me with one of my AMD desktops. I’ve been told that this trick should only be used on newer / faster machines. You’ll need to have administrative privileges to get ‘er working right. Either use the Run command or a CMD prompt to enter:

bcdedit /set quietboot 1

Should make your Windows Vista startup animation a bit more… animated? Dunno. I’m all for abolishing the boot process altogether. When my home office furniture arrives this weekend, I’ll finally be able to start playing with the Mac Mini that Ponzi gave me for Christmas. I’ve already set up the Parallels beta that allows me to access my Boot Camp Windows installation from within OS X (and “Coherence” is beyond astounding).

A Better Vista Boot Screen