A new warning about foreground boosting snake-oil

Every so many months I issue a new warning about these programs out there that claim to boost performance by increasing the priority class of the foreground application (though they usually just say 'Increase PC performance by 100%' or whatever absurd claim they feel like).

Windows already does foreground boosting. At Bitsum we have extensively studied the Windows scheduler, and foreground boosting. Although Process Lasso offers optional foreground boosting, when you turn it on you get a warning about all this. The ProBalanace algorithm makes no use of it at all. Why not?

As I say elsewhere, foreground boosting can cause real problems. First, it has no effect of boosting the performance of anything since Windows already does a form of foreground boosting (longer time slices and slight elevation in priority). Second, many programs simply 'don't play nice with it'. Third, poor implementations of it are even worse, as they can interefere with application self-set priorities and such.

Although ProBalance does NOT use foreground boosting, also let me say that  it took me considerable time and user feedback to get Process Lasso's ProBalance 'right', even continuing to tweak it to this day! Hardware and software environments change, so it has to adapt with them. It takes true dedication. Process priorities aren't something that should be messed with irresponsibly.

Stay far away from any of these programs. They are continually renamed, re-branded, and coming out of some newly founded company. When one company's reputation sinks, they start another. The most recent one I saw permanently disables UAC when you install it, if you can believe that!! (with no notification, nor reversion/undo on uninstall).

Be careful when you are trying ANY new software, make sure you trust the company FIRST. Don't install their software to 'find out'. First, check them out. Read. Use your intuition. Do they seem good? Check multiple rating sites using places like URLVoid.com. While sometimes these rating sites make mistakes, you can see the reason for the rating and determine if it is a valid rating or not.

I don't want to mention the violators because it will attract them. My days as a crime fighter are over, I will leave that up to end users ;). I know you are smarter than this, make sure they know too!