Methods of decreasing boot time

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#1 Post by **K. Eng** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 9:33 pm

I usuallly hibernate my system since coming out of hibernation only takes about 10 seconds or so.

However, if I need to restart my system or cold boot it, I notice that it can take almost 2 minutes to go from hitting the power switch to a usuable Windows desktop. Is there any way I can speed this up?

It seems that Windows itself doesn't take to long to boot, but other programs take awhile to load. Between Symantec Antivirus 8, IBM Access Connections, and IBM Battery Maximizer, it takes awhile before I can do anything with the computer after logging in.

What do you folks to reduce boot time?

slagmi · #2 Post by **slagmi** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 10:41 pm

remove spyware (free at www.spybot.info )
clean un-needed at startup (Start>Run> msconfig)
optimize disk with Perfect Disk (free demo available)

there's plenty more that can be done, but those 3 things should cut your startup time in 1/2. without spending hours on it (because that's not saving any time)

Leon · #3 Post by **Leon** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 10:51 pm

and run Bootvis.....

Kenn · #4 Post by **Kenn** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 2:24 am

As Leon said, google Microsoft Bootvis and Optimize Boottime with it.

Also, check out the "Driver Delay" graph after running a trace and see if it takes a long time because of "network delay." If so you can search the forums here for the cause/fix.

Norton Antivirus is a HUGE resource hog, it slows down boot + regular access severely. I switched to AVAST Antivirus (free) and it's much faster. IBM Access Connections and Battery Maximiser are not a problem for boottimes, they each load up in less than a second.

slagmi · #5 Post by **slagmi** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 9:17 am

PerfectDisk beats the stuff out of bootvis, and ditto on the Norton comments.
Not that Norton is bad but yes there is a tradeoff as far as startup time
There's always 'hibernate'...

Leon · #6 Post by **Leon** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 9:27 am

slagmi wrote:PerfectDisk beats the stuff out of bootvis,

Haven't tried it, but isn't it Different (rather than better)? It is a defragger, whereas Bootvis changes the actual order of the startup programs....

ibmuser · #7 Post by **ibmuser** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 10:32 am

Perfectdisk runs boot defrag code. Just run it in offline mode and reboot.

slagmi · #8 Post by **slagmi** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 10:41 am

nothing wrong with doing both!

Leon · #9 Post by **Leon** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 12:22 pm

does Perfectdisk really do that much more than the built in XP derfag?

#10 Post by **jdhurst** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 2:10 pm

Leon wrote:does Perfectdisk really do that much more than the built in XP derfag?

Perfect Disk uses less resource (by a lot) than XP Defrag, so it can run while you are working. It can be run in local mode and scheduled, which means that an ordinary worker bee with a restricted machine can still have Perfect Disk running. XP Defrag needs to be administrator. Perfect disk runs a service, so the machine only needs be on, not logged on. XP Defrag runs interactively with the machine logged on.

I got Perfect Disk in response to client requirements, and I was sufficiently impressed to license my own copy. I run it every day at noon on my laptop and every night at midnight on my Desktop.
... JD Hurst

Leon · #11 Post by **Leon** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 2:22 pm

Thanks! Convinced/sold. Just bought a copy.

Kenn · #12 Post by **Kenn** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 6:17 pm

I use bootvis for boot optimization, Sysinternal.com's pagedefrag for registry/pagefile defragging, but plain old MS Disk Defrag for the rest of the disk. Anything is better than what most people do, which is say, "What's defragment?"

#13 Post by **K. Eng** » Wed Feb 23, 2005 9:21 pm

Well, with Norton disabled my system still takes about 1:30 from pushing the power button to a useable desktop. Loading the wireless driver seems to take a few seconds but Battery Maximizer and Access Connections do load up pretty quick.

If I have time I might try some of the boot optimization software.

Maybe the 4200RPM disk is just too [censored] slow!

lutami · #14 Post by **lutami** » Fri Feb 25, 2005 5:00 pm

Hi all, been searching for an IBM forum for days, just found this one and now feel that I wont be on my own.

Don't think much of the IBM support, all they did for me was to point me in the direction of 'self help' not much good for a novice like me who need things explained in simple terms.

Was beginning to think I had made a mistake buying an IBM laptop, over two minutes to load, I've been used to a HP desktop that loads from cold boot in 45 sec.

I've managed to reduce the boot to under a minute by running services.msc and following Black Vipers guide.

I'm running XP but the Home guide is also covered.

I'm trying to get my head around the IBM preloaded stuff at the moment, so I'm really happy to have found this forum.

Take a look and see what you think, it may help

http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/service ... #Messenger

#15 Post by **K. Eng** » Sat Feb 26, 2005 9:08 am

Comparing desktop to notebook is not exactly fair, given that desktop hard drives are much much faster than notebook ones.

lutami wrote: Was beginning to think I had made a mistake buying an IBM laptop, over two minutes to load, I've been used to a HP desktop that loads from cold boot in 45 sec.

lutami · #16 Post by **lutami** » Sat Feb 26, 2005 10:13 am

Sorry

wasn't comparing my desktop to this new laptop, I think it's wonderful, a lot more powerful than I expected. Just so different, AND I think better in a lot of ways once you get used to it. (still keep reaching for the mouse)

Haven't even looked at the desktop since I bought this, wondering why I didn't change years ago.

What I actually meant was that I had tweaked the desktop to load from cold boot in 45 secs, I was used to being online virtually straight after pressing the 'on button', having to wait for over 2mins for this to load when I first got it was a bit of an annoyance, IBM wasn't any help and I'd been searching for days until I came across this forum.

Spent a couple of days reading as much as possible here before registering so I've been educated a little on the Thinkpads, found a few tweaks that work very well and I've learnt something new every time I've been back here, sorted the wireless connection after searching a few posts

thankyou to whoever posted them.

Anyway I've managed to cut the boot time in half, just need to find out what IBM preloaded stuff I don't need to load at boot, so I'm off to search.

Leon · #17 Post by **Leon** » Sat Feb 26, 2005 12:01 pm

also, try Bootvis... it DOES help in spite of information contrary....

Welcome to our Forum!

Kenn · #18 Post by **Kenn** » Sat Feb 26, 2005 3:23 pm

lutami wrote: What I actually meant was that I had tweaked the desktop to load from cold boot in 45 secs, I was used to being online virtually straight after pressing the 'on button', having to wait for over 2mins for this to load when I first got it was a bit of an annoyance, IBM wasn't any help and I'd been searching for days until I came across this forum.

Depending on what you have installed and what starts up on boot, you can dramatically decrease your thinkpad's boot time even more. I'm online from cold boot in under 30 seconds here, but before reformatting, it had crept up to 45-50 seconds. Desktops are no different, though they do have the advantage of much faster components.

selvan777 · #19 Post by **selvan777** » Sun Feb 27, 2005 11:57 am

2.5 minutes isn't bad at all if you keep in mind how long previous Windows versions took...

lutami · #20 Post by **lutami** » Sun Feb 27, 2005 12:42 pm

Down to 95 sec...I'm happy with that...need still to find what IBM stuff loads at boot that I can either disable or set to manual...trial and error...

Never loved a machine so much

Oh by the way...tried the Bootvis...dont even pretend to understand the graphs but it was that that decreased the boot time from 1.30...

Kenn · #21 Post by **Kenn** » Mon Feb 28, 2005 5:39 pm

Isn't 95 seconds longer than 1:30?

Spending a little time with the graphs is VERY useful - those things tell you exactly how long every program and process takes to load on bootup, so it essentially spells out what you should be nuking for a faster bootup. It is unfortunate how un-user-friendly it is, but that's because it's an unsupported app made for system integrators...

dcloud · #22 Post by **dcloud** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 10:31 am

I hope no one minds me jumping in here. I know this is an old thread, but I've been researching how to decrease my boot time for about a week now. I can microwave a cup of coffee for a minute and a half at the same time I reboot the computer and the coffee will be done before the boot is.

I stumbled across this forum searching Google for some answers. I have tried using Bootvis, but I keep running into an odd problem. When I try doing Trace > Optimize System the computer boots, then I get back to the desktop and the thing is optimizing, but then I wait and wait ... until finally I get an error message saying "Timed out. Failed to defrag the system. Please defrag the disc manually before starting tracing."

I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions for me on this? I did the step where you get a graph but I can't make heads or tails of what those graphs mean so it's kind of useless to me.

Thanks.

- dc

sugo · #23 Post by **sugo** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 1:14 pm

dcloud wrote: until finally I get an error message saying "Timed out. Failed to defrag the system. Please defrag the disc manually before starting tracing."

I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions for me on this?

Make sure the Task Scheduler windows service is running.

dcloud · #24 Post by **dcloud** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 2:22 pm

sugo, thanks! that was it. i had turned that service off while following a "tune up xp" guide. now if I could just figure out that graph...

- dc

yossarian · #25 Post by **yossarian** » Sat Oct 01, 2005 6:43 pm

Wow.. that's weird. Didn't realise it took so long on some people's machines to boot. My T43 boots into XP relatively quickly. About 30 seconds from cold will dump me into the CSS login interface, then a swipe of the finger and another 15-20 seconds will fully load all my programs. That's not quite as quick as my linux machines, but still very good for windows I thought.

This is with all vanilla windows services and preinstalled software loading still, as well as the css password manager, openoffice quickloader, skype, google talk and also a download manager.

Turning HDD password has not seemed to slow performance down either[which leads me to question whether they even implement encryption with it].

Those tools people mention sound very promising though. Maybe I can get my machine booting even quicker

ibmuser · #26 Post by **ibmuser** » Sun Oct 02, 2005 2:28 am

Not sure you even need bootvis really. Run a Command window and type defrag c: -b

dcloud · #27 Post by **dcloud** » Thu Oct 06, 2005 3:54 pm

I defrag regularly. I also ran Bootvis. It helped a little bit. It doesn't take two minutes or more to boot now. I usually reformat every two months, but now I'm going to leave it alone for a while and see if it makes any difference.

- dc

marvel · #28 Post by **marvel** » Mon Oct 10, 2005 3:41 am

Hi there!

I´m VERY curious about how some of you can claim that IBMs Access Connections can load fast. For mew, it takes about one minute or more before access is done. Maybe I´ve overlooked some settings or so?

/Michal

#29 Post by **GomJabbar** » Mon Oct 10, 2005 6:05 am

marvel wrote:I´m VERY curious about how some of you can claim that IBMs Access Connections can load fast. For mew, it takes about one minute or more before access is done. Maybe I´ve overlooked some settings or so?

/Michal

Try this. Go to: Start > Conrol Panel > Administrative Tools > Services. Go to near the bottom of the list to 'Wireless Zero Configuration' service. On some installations it seems this service needs to be set to Automatic and Started. If this is not the case in your situation, try setting it to the above and see if it makes a difference. You double-click on the service to make changes.

turbo · #30 Post by **turbo** » Sat Dec 10, 2005 8:32 pm

Ladies and Gents.

Just read this thread, did everything you said and reduced boot time from a painful

4.00 minutes
To a reasonable 2:10 seconds on a Cleron 550mhz I1300

Not exactly faster than a speeding bullet, but its moving faster than the sloth it used to be

One little tidbit that appears to work (at least for me) is when using Perfect Disk (free trial) run it completely then reboot and run it again. Not sure why but the first time took about 4 hours, second time even after saying it was completed, it ran again and ran for about an hour defragging even more effectively??

Gads never realized what a pig Norton was for boot time...amazing! Thanks again.

Methods of decreasing boot time

Methods of decreasing boot time

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