Repost: Reduce boot time on disk based XPE system; currently at 92 seconds

[Scott Kelly]

My original post on 9/24 never made it to this group - only showed up on
Google. So I am reposting here so maybe it will make it this time. -
Thanks - Scott

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I have what is essentially a laptop device (has hard disk, video, USB,
serial ports). I have what most in this group would probably consider to be
a big XPE install (WinLogin, Explorer Interface, etc). OS files take 301
mb.

Currenty it takes XPE about 92 seconds to boot and start calling my batch
file located in the StartUp group.

I realize that I can get faster hardware (controller, HDD, etc) and probably
speed up boot times. And I also realize I could go through my XPE load in
target designer and remove things that I may not need that may take a while
to load...but I am not sure what components are slowest that I should focus
on.

So - if anyone knows of certain components that have the greatest impact on
the boot time of XPE, please let me know.

The PC is a 266Mhz system running a laptop style HDD (formatted with NTFS).
It's got 128mb of RAM.

Oh yes - I am using DISK based EWF that is enabled by default.

Looking over my project, here are the macro items I have included:
Basic TCP/IP BEtworking
Direct X 8 (I probably don't need this)
Generic USB Input Device Support
Information Appliance
Internet Explorer Technologies
Kernel Audio Support
Legacy Plug and Play Audio Support
TCP/IP Network with Client for MS Networks
Terminal Services
Windows Media Player (Light)
Windows Media Player 8.0 Technologies
Windows XP Explorer USer Interface

I guess I should also review what processes are running and what services
are starting. Any other suggestions -- let me know.

Thanks,
Scott

 

[Slobodan Brcin]

Hi Scott,

Like you said 301mb is really huge image.
And if you are planning to remove components it could
take you great deal ot time.

Try to decide what functionality you need. Then add all
components that you think they will be needed.
Let XPE resolve all dependencies and guide it with some
basic choices when you have multiple choices.

Look in TAP results and manually add components(drivers)
that you must have. Resolve all dependencies.
Disable autoresolve.

Add your app. And try build. If it does not work, keep
adding what is needed, don't resolve dependencies that
are not needed.

This way you will get probably minimal image that is
possible for you.

If it is slow, then you can't go faster. Exception is
that there are some components that if they can't start
slow down XPE boot.


I don't know if this will help you, but.

Slobodan

 

[Scott Kelly]

Slobodan, Thanks for the response. You didn't provide that "majic bullet" I
was hoping for. It looks like the only thing that is going to help me is a
lot of time and patience working with Target Designer.

Thanks,
Scott

 

[Slobodan Brcin]

Slobodan, Thanks for the response. You didn't provide

that "majic bullet" I was hoping for.

Use BootVis tool from MS. It is very good and will give
you timings for all drivers and programs. I have used it
long time ago, and it is good place to start.

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hwdev/platform/performance/f
astboot/BootVis.mspx

Tell me does this looks like "magic bullet" to you? It
will tell you what is slow is your build, but you will
need to eliminate too many things.

Best regards,
Slobodan

-----Original Message-----

It looks like the only thing that is going to help me is a

 

[Scott Kelly]

Thanks Slobodan - you are the man.

Hey - that kinda rhymes (depending on how you pronounce your name).

Thanks,
Scott

 

[Scott Kelly]

Oops....BootVis appears to be no longer available (as of 9/23/2003) from
Microsoft.

 

[Scott Kelly]

Following links, I found the following page:

http://www.tweakhound.com/xp/bootvis/

That page has a link to BootVis.msi from another source.