Disabling StartUp Programs In Win 98/ME/XP
In the System Configuration Utility:
1. Click your Start button, then click Run. Type MSCONFIG and  click Ok.
2. Click the StartUp tab.
3. You will see a long list of programs with check boxes next to  them. Uncheck all the programs except the following:
Registry Scan
Systray
Explorer
4. Reboot your computer and see how it runs.
 
You can always go back to the MSCONFIG window and recheck items if  you find that you absolutely must have them launch at start up.
 
In Win.Ini File:
1. Click Start button, click Run, type SYSEDIT, click OK.
2. Click the C:\WINDOWS\WIN.INI tab.
3. Look near the top for a section called [Windows]. In that  section, look for the load= and run= lines. If those lines are empty, just close  the System Configuration window. If there is anything in those lines, put a  semi-colon in front of the line, so it would look like this:
;run=c:\etc
;load=c:\etc
 
This will prevent the programs reference here from loading at  startup; if you remove the semi-colon, the programs will again load at startup.
 
In the Windows Registry:
1. Click Start button, click Run, type RegEdit, click OK, to open  the Registry Editor.
2. Click HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, then SOFTWARE, then Microsoft, then  Windows\CurrentVersion, then RUN.
3. In the right window pane, you will find programs that load when  Win 95 starts. Right click your mouse on the one you wish to turn off at  startup, click Delete.
4. Close the Registry Editor.
 
Disabling StartUp programs in Win 95
To see what programs you have running, press CTRL + ALT + DEL one  time. This shows you a Close Program list. You want the Systray available, but  most of these programs can be disabled so they do not load when you start your  computer.
 
In the Startup Folder:
1. Right click your Start button, click Open.
2. Double click the Programs folder; double click the StartUp  folder.
3. Highlight each item in the folder and press the Delete key on  your keyboard. Do this for all items. Or, you can simply move the items to some  other temporary folder using Win95’s cut and paste. This does not remove the  programs from your computer; it just removes the shortcuts for those programs  from the StartUp Folder. These shortcuts can always be recreated and moved back  into the StartUp folder if you want.
4. Reboot your computer.
 
Press CTRL + ALT + DEL to check for any programs that are left. If  you still have programs listed, do the following:
 
In Win.Ini File:
1. Click Start button, click Run, type SYSEDIT, click OK.
2. Click the C:\WINDOWS\WIN.INI tab.
3. Look near the top for a section called [Windows]. In that  section, look for the load= and run= lines. If those lines are empty, just close  the System Configuration window. If there is anything in those lines, put a  semi-colon in front of the line, so it would look like this:
;run=c:\etc
;load=c:\etc
 
This will prevent the programs reference here from loading at  startup; if you remove the semi-colon, the programs will again load at startup.
 
In the Windows Registry:
1. Click Start button, click Run, type RegEdit, click OK, to open  the Registry Editor.
2. Click HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, then SOFTWARE, then Microsoft, then  Windows\CurrentVersion, then RUN.
3. In the right window pane, you will find programs that load when  Win 95 starts. Right click your mouse on the one you wish to turn off at  startup, click Delete.
4. Close the Registry Editor.