Just as with any other advanced system configuration, you need to understand how the system works and what each part does before you make any changes. Some services are required for others to start correctly, and either disabling or SloStarting some services can make your system unbootable.

If you don't know what you're doing when you change a service to SloStart, automatic, manual, or disabled, then read up on the service in question first, or discuss it with someone who does know.

Keep in mind, too, that some services, if set to manual, may start anyway. For example, the IIS Admin service will start when the FTP Publishing service starts (if it isn't already running), because the FTP Publishing service is dependent on the IIS Admin service. Continuing the example, if the IIS Admin service is set to disabled, then you won't be able to start the FTP Publishing service at all. SloStart can't protect you from these inter-service dependencies, and can't prevent you from setting a critical service to disabled.

As of version 1.1.b.20030226, SloStart will examine the dependency chain for the services you've selected to SloStart. If a service you've selected is dependent on another, and that other is disabled, SloStart will set both services to manual start. Then, when SloStart tries to start your selected service, the other one will start automatically at the same time.

The SloStart Control Panel Applet is restricted to Administrators for a reason! Please be careful when configuring your system.

If SloStart is already installed, the Install button will not be present. Instead, setup will present an Upgrade button. If older versions of any of the distribution files already exist on your machine, the program will upgrade them automatically when you select Upgrade. In some cases, it may be necessary for you to reboot your machine to complete installation or an upgrade. If so, you will be prompted to restart.

SloStart installs to the system directory (usually c:\windows\system32 or c:\winnt\system32).

Removal
Run setup.exe again, and click the Remove button on the setup dialog. You may also run slostart.exe /remove from the system directory. The Remove button will only be enabled if setup determines that the service is already installed.

Upgrading
To upgrade to a new version, download and unzip the new version to a temporary directory. Double-click the new setup.exe and click the Upgrade button. The Upgrade button will only be visible if setup determines that an older version of the service is already installed. Otherwise, only the Install and Remove buttons will be shown.

Command-line Options
Although not generally needed, you may specify the following command-line options when running setup.exe or slostart.exe. You may use a dash or a forward slash before the option. Slashes are shown below for clarity. Options may also be specified by just the first letter.

• slostart.exe /version or setup.exe /version -- displays the program's version and copyright information.
• setup.exe /install -- forces installation.
• slostart.exe /remove or setup.exe /remove-- forces removal.
• slostart.exe /foreground -- (only if supported) runs the program in the foreground.
• setup.exe /upgrade -- upgrade to newer version without removing and reinstalling.

To assist with automated installations, the program also supports the /quiet command-line switch. You may use the /quiet switch in conjunction with /remove, /install, or /upgrade. When the /quiet switch is specified, the program only displays dialog boxes if errors are encountered; otherwise, the program performs the requested function and exits immediately. This feature makes it easy to handle installations or upgrades network-wide with a simple batch file.

Administrative Options and Remote Installation

• Remote Install or Removal
  The setup program, setup.exe allows you to specify parameters on the command line for remote installation or removal:

      setup [ -install | -remove | -upgrade ] [ -quiet ] [\\targetmachine]
          

  Examples
  

  • setup -upgrade \\fred would install the service (upgrading if necessary) onto the machine named \\fred
  • setup -remove \\barney would remove the service from the machine \\barney
  • setup -install -quiet would install the service onto the local machine without any prompts
  • setup -remove -quiet would remove the service from the local machine without any prompts

  Note: For remote installation or removal to work (i.e., specifing a target machine name as in the above two examples using \\fred and \\barney), both the machine you are working on and the target machine must be Windows NT4/2K/XP/2003/Vista/2008, and you must be logged on under an account that has administrative privileges on the target machine.

Control Panel Applet

Select the service you want to SloStart, choose a delay, and click the Add button. It doesn't matter how the service is currently set to start. SloStart will change it to manual start when you exit the Control Panel Applet, and then start it for you at the next boot.

To remove a service from the SloStart list, highlight it in the lower listbox and click the Remove button. SloStart will prompt you to choose Automatic, Manual, or Disabled, and set the service to that startup type for you automatically.

You can edit the delay for an item in the SloStart list either by removing it and then readding it, or by double-clicking the item (same as clicking the Edit button) and changing the delay.

If you click the Cancel button, no changes are saved, either to SloStart's configuration or to any of the services you have examined or moved from one list to the other. Changes are committed only when you click the OK button.

If no services are set to be SloStarted, SloStart sets itself to manual start, otherwise it sets the services you've selected to manual start and sets itself to automatic start.

After the SloStart service has finished starting any services, it turns itself off to save CPU and memory.

You may get detailed information on any service by clicking one of the question mark buttons (there is one beside the list of available services and one beside the list of SloStart services). The screenshot below shows the information available on the Microsoft DNS Client service:

Detailed Service Information