Services to disable on a newly installed CentOS 5.3 machine?

I'd disable all the services I don't normally use like anacron and netfs. If the server doesn't need firewall rules, iptables and ip6tables would be candidates to disable.

The only things I'd be inclined to disable are yum-updatesd (since I'll run yum update manually when I need it, and probably scripted in cron), autofs, kudzu (since I assume you're hardware is unlikely to change), and netfs (assuming you're not using NFS or the like). If performance is a big issue, it may be worth disabling auditd. Most of the others can be disabled, but in the intersts of making admins lives easier, I'd generally leave them running.

Realistically, nothing on that list is likely to cause you performance problems, and if you turn it off, you're liable to try to enable something down the road and get bit because it was off. The general suggestion of "research them all and turn on only what you need" is a good one, but not exactly cost effective.

If you are concerned simply about performance and/or security, there are far more effective places to look.