The recommended way to manage which applications load on start in Windows 7 is of course to trawl through each application’s settings or options pages and control them from there. However, another more efficient way to do it (if you are a little computer literate) is to simply make use of the standard Windows System Configuration tool.
Launch the Microsoft utility by hitting the start button and entering ‘msconfig’ (without the quotes) into the search/run bar. Launch the msconfig.exe executable and navigate to the Startup tab.
There you’ll have a nice listing of all commands currently set to launch on start (registry entries basically), and can then manually trawl through the listing and deselect all the crapware and unnecessary loaders lurking there. (Make use of the Manufacturer and Command items to make sure you’re correctly identifying things before disabling them). Hit apply and then OK to prompt a machine restart.
(Of course, it is also worth your while to see what Services are running, because more often than not, unnecessary lurkers and loaders may very well be running a service to say for instance, ensure that the application command does in fact get launched. As suggested, the Services tab is managed exactly in the same way as the Startup tab, i.e. do exactly the same thing you just did to disable unwanted services!).
