Performance Increase Through My Computer

1: Start > Right Click on My Computer and select properties.

2: Click on the "Advanced" tab

3: See the "Perfomance" section? Click "Settings"

4: Disable all or some of the following:

Fade or slide menus into view

Fade or slide ToolTips into view

Fade out menu items after clicking

Show Shadows under menus

Slide open combo boxes

Slide taskbar buttons

Use a background image for each folder type
Use common tasks in folders

There, now Windows will still look nice and perform faster