Mz StartUp Manager

CNET Editors' review

by: CNET staff on January 31, 2011

Mz StartUp Manager makes it easy enough for beginners to tell Windows which programs to load on boot, which isn't quite the same thing as pinning and unpinning programs to the Start Menu. These are programs that the system loads when booting up, sometimes unnecessarily. This free tool not only removes unneeded startup entries but also adds new ones, such as apps you use every day and are just plain tired of launching. It also helps users learn about their programs.

Mz StartUp Manager's simple, efficient interface offers numerous optional skins. The program's left-hand Tasks panel replicates most of the basic Windows controls for enabling, disabling, deleting, and running selected entries, plus a few extras, such as Refresh and File Properties controls and one labeled Google it! Clicking this opened a Google search on the selected entry, a great idea for inexperienced users since you should always have a good idea of what you're doing when adding or removing programs from the boot sequence. The program's main display listed the programs in our startup file. We believe in a healthy PC that boots as quickly as possible, so our test machine had a mere seven entries. However, one was ripe for plucking, so we deselected its checkbox to show it who was boss. Nothing happened, and nothing was supposed to happen, really; the action would come when we rebooted. Then, the program wouldn't start automatically and run in the background, consuming system resources and compromising performance and possibly even security. Adding items to the startup menu was just as easy; we clicked Add New Entry, browsed to a program file, and added it with a click.

The process we removed had little individual effect, but add in a whole mess of autoupdaters, compatibility modules, and worse offenders, and you've got performance issues. Mz StartUp Manager handles them easily. Of course, we don't recommend just adding and removing programs at a whim; use the Google it! and File Properties buttons to learn about unfamiliar entries. Used properly, though, Mz StartUp Manager can dramatically boost your boot-up speed by giving Windows less to start up.