Applies to Windows.

A ‘clean boot’ will start your computer with a minimal set of apps, drivers, and services running. This can help you to determine if any app, driver, or service is contributing to any issues you are experiencing.

Before troubleshooting with a clean boot, please complete the optimisation steps in this article:

Optimising Windows for Audio

Create a system restore point

Before carrying out the clean boot, you should create a system restore point so you can revert to your current settings should there be any issues resulting from the clean boot:

1. Click Start, type ‘Create a restore point’ and open Create a restore point.
2. Go to the System Protection tab and click Create….
3. Type a description of the restore point, and then click Create.

Disable services

If your computer is connected to a network, network policies might prevent you from following these steps. Seek guidance from a Microsoft support engineer if you are uncertain.  Otherwise, using the System Configuration utility might make your computer unusable.

4. Click Start, type ‘System Configuration’ and open System Configuration.
5. Go to the Services tab in System Configuration, and tick Hide all Microsoft services.
6. Click Disable all to untick all services.
7. Scroll down the entire list and tick any services relating to Focusrite and your audio interface — Focusrite Audio Engineering Ltd. may be listed as the manufacturer for some but not all of these.

Disable Startup apps

8. Go to the Startup tab and click Open Task Manager.
9. In the Startup apps tab of Task Manager, click Status to sort the apps by Enabled or Disabled — make a note of which apps are currently enabled.
10. Set all apps not relating to Focusrite or your audio interface to Disable. Any Startup apps you wish to use after completing the clean boot troubleshooting will need to be re-enabled here again later.
11. Close Task Manager.

Restart and test

12. Return to System Configuration and click OK.
13. When prompted, restart your computer.

When you restart your computer, it will be in a ‘clean boot environment’. Your computer might temporarily lose some functionality while in a clean boot environment.

After the restart, try to recreate the situation in which you were experiencing problems — testing the apps or features that were having the issue. If the problem still occurs despite the clean boot, non-Windows startup apps and services can be ruled out as the cause. However, if the problem no longer occurs, you can repeat the clean boot process, enabling one app or service each time until the issue returns. This will indicate which app or service may be causing the issue.

Restarting the computer after a clean boot will re-enable all the services under the Services tab in System Configuration. However, you will need to manually re-enable the apps in Task Manager > Startup apps.

If the steps above do not resolve the issue you are attempting to troubleshoot, please return to the main troubleshooting article:

Troubleshooting glitchy audio on Windows