Actual Boot Time

[SafeHex]

Can somebody set this straight please:

What is the "normal" time (if there is one standard) taken by a Windows XP
Pro PC to boot from a cold state to a totally usable state?

My 1.7GHz Intel P4 (old D850GB mobo, 768MB RDRAM) system takes around 95
seconds.

My AMD 64 3000+ (nForce 3 mobo, 1.5GB DDRAM) system takes around 55 seconds.

I feel left out of the conversation when some of my colleagues discuss their
new PCs (which I haven't seen) booting up in 30 seconds or less.

Regards and thanks for any insights.

SafeHex

 

[Wesley Vogel]

The more Windows Critical Updates that get installed the longer the boot
time.

It also depends on how many programs and services get loaded at boot.

--
Hope this helps. Let us know.

Wes
MS-MVP Windows Shell/User

In

 

[POP]

Can somebody set this straight please:

What is the "normal" time (if there is one standard) taken
by a Windows XP Pro PC to boot from a cold state to a
totally usable state?
My 1.7GHz Intel P4 (old D850GB mobo, 768MB RDRAM) system
takes around 95 seconds.

My AMD 64 3000+ (nForce 3 mobo, 1.5GB DDRAM) system takes
around 55 seconds.
I feel left out of the conversation when some of my
colleagues discuss their new PCs (which I haven't seen)
booting up in 30 seconds or less.
Regards and thanks for any insights.

SafeHex

That's a highly variable time and unique to most machines. In my
experience, on a fully updated machine, with a bunch of software,
the times on even one machine can vary from 60S to up to 3
Minutes and probably longer is possible and still OK. Right now
I'm running about a minute-38 at last check from POST completion
to "ready to run an app" points. Not the point where I can click
an app to run it, but the point where when I click it, it
instantly starts, and the cpu time was near 99% idle.
Personally I think either the numbers you/they gave are
suspect and subject to:
-- What constitutes start/stop of the boot up
-- Lies
-- Minimal installations or special-use installations
-- Fibs
-- Unupdated machines
-- White Lies
and many more.

e.g. is POST counted as part of the "boot"? Is program loading
post boot completion considered as part of the "boot"? There are
many opinions on what the "boot" activity is.

I personally know of one machine which is taking in excess of 5
minues to boot, and everything works fine once it's booted: no
sluggishness, etc.. I'll be working on it today; the user is
scared to do anything herself.

In general I've found BootWis to ahve the best record for
analyzing/improving very long boot times with its Optimize
feature. Ymmv of course, and I've had nary a problem with it but
again ymmv.

HTH
Pop`

 

[Mistoffolees]

Can somebody set this straight please:

What is the "normal" time (if there is one standard) taken by a Windows XP
Pro PC to boot from a cold state to a totally usable state?

My 1.7GHz Intel P4 (old D850GB mobo, 768MB RDRAM) system takes around 95
seconds.

My AMD 64 3000+ (nForce 3 mobo, 1.5GB DDRAM) system takes around 55 seconds.

I feel left out of the conversation when some of my colleagues discuss their
new PCs (which I haven't seen) booting up in 30 seconds or less.

Regards and thanks for any insights.

SafeHex

Boot time is going to vary, depending on a variety of things,
even for the same computer. Next time, to spice up the talk a
little bit, discuss how long it takes the computer to go from
power on to POST, going through POST (including the RAM count),
POST to the start the actual bootup, and the bootup to the
Windows log on dialog box or desktop (whichever happens first).

 

[Mistoffolees]

POP wrote:

I personally know of one machine which is taking in excess of 5
minues to boot, and everything works fine once it's booted: no
sluggishness, etc.. I'll be working on it today; the user is
scared to do anything herself.

I know about a few of these as well. If definitely not a virus,
adware or spyware, the reasons are typically an errant driver
file, a previously terminated service or even searching for a
network connection (esp. to a server that has been shut down).
A clue to tracking down the delay is to figure out how long it
is taking and what device, connection, etc., has a "time-out"
of approximately the same duration.

 

[JS]

Total time from a cold start:
1) Post to Windows logon prompt: 43 seconds
2) Enter password and load all background apps (AV, Firewall, Diskkeeper,
more AV stuff) loaded and cpu at idle: 3min 17 sec.

Total time: 4 minutes
933 Mhz P3, 512MB, 3 ATA 100 drives, DVD-RW, CD-RW, permanent pagefile on
second drive.
Note: some unnecessary services disabled.

JS

 

[FG]

It will boot veray fast if instead of shutding down your choose
hibernation -
which does shutdown the computer, after recording all your running programs
settings.
That is if your motherboard supports it.

Usually reboots in 30 seconds or less.

 

[SafeHex]

Thanks for the responses.

I too feel the boot times my colleaguse mentioned to be either
off-handed/casual mentions or small white lies.

Also, as suggested, could be that the new PCs do not really shut down but
goes into standby or hibernates. The wake up might give the appearance of a
very rapid boot to many a user, perhaps!

Okay, I don't think I am going to feel "left out" when the subject comes
up - possibly Monday!

Regards and thanks.



Cheers.

SafeHex

 

[Plato]

What is the "normal" time (if there is one standard) taken by a Windows XP
Pro PC to boot from a cold state to a totally usable state?

No such standard. It depends on how many apps/background processes have
to load up.