Why is Windows 7 boot time so long?

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On my HP dv6-2170us laptop the boot times are: 10s for the BIOS, then 37 more seconds until the desktop Icons appear but at this point the PC is not usable.

It takes another 48 seconds until the desktop flashes the Icons and it becomes usable. What’s it doing during this period? At what point does MS quote as boot time?

Thanks

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Microsoft (and most other vendors) measure boot time to when the desktop appears on a system that has NO additional software starting. As to what is going on after the desktop appears, the remaining programs that start at boot time are being loaded. Also, services designated as “deferred start” are being loaded.

If you want to track down what is happening at startup use a utility such as Autoruns for Windows or WhatInStartup – Disable/delete programs at Windows startup.

Joe

--Joe

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The biggest problem you have is that your system was created/configured by HP. HP loves to add a bunch of crap that loads at startup. I bet if you run the programs Joe suggested and disable all the HP junk thru msconfig you’ll see a vast improvement (you can always re-enable it later). If that isn’t the case then you also have to take into consideration the limits of the PC itself. If you have very little or slow RAM, a slow processor, small front side bus, etc you’re gonna have a slow starting PC.

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Believe me HP is not the only manufacturer that loads tons of crap. I think they all do. PC Decrapifiercan help to clean things up. (That really is the name)

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Hello CA.

I went to msconfig and I only have three items loading first, MSE, Word and Java. That is it, that is all. Quick as a bunny !

I am still trying to figure out the “Services” stuff. Easy does it. Jean.

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to control startups; I use the registry. I also dual boot Home Premium and Ultimate and use a boot manager. From pressing the start button until my boot manager asks for a choice of OS is 15 seconds. I have all the bloatware cleaned out of my Dell Inspiron 580 midtower.

My Ultimate installation is not standard. From the time I select Windows in the boot manager until the logon screen appears is 26 seconds, including a 5 second delay before Ultimate is chosen as the default. When I select a logon icon the password screen pops up immediately. After I type in the password, I start timing from clicking on the “Go” arrowhead. I can have Adobe Photoshop loaded and ready to open an image in 16 seconds.

For my standard Home Premium installation, the times are 30 seconds to logon screen (I use 5 seconds to switch from the default Ultimate so the times will be comparable) and 30 seconds for Photoshop to be ready to open an image.

These times do not include the time necessary to type in a password.

So subtracting the 5 second delay, machine time to boot and load Photoshop in Ultimate is 52 seconds. For Home Premium it is 70 seconds.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

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To control apps starting with Windows, check out What’s In Startup. You can easily disable or delete apps that do not have to start with Windows. This will speed the boot process.

27189-WhatsInStartup

The other thing I do is to look at the Boot tab in msconfig.exe. I shorten the time out to a more manageable 3 sec and choose no boot gui.

27547-msconfig

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Ted, hello.

I did the same as above in your last post. Thanks.

Now, I have ± 110 services loading at startup. What can I do with these ? If I uncheck them one at the time, will they stay listed and I could recheck them if it proves detrimental to the machine ?

A great day to you. Jean.

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Ted, hello.

I did the same as above in your last post. Thanks.

Now, I have ± 110 services loading at startup. What can I do with these ? If I uncheck them one at the time, will they stay listed and I could recheck them if it proves detrimental to the machine ?

You need to be very careful about disabling services. You may find you make your machine unbootable. If you insist on messing with individual services, I recommend you visit Black Viper’s Windows 7 SP-1 Service Configurations[/url].

Joe

--Joe

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Hello JoeP.
>>> You need to be very careful about disabling services.
I was. I asked you first, did I not ? And I have not disabled anything yet nor plan on doing some. I was trying to pick your mind and Ted’s as you both are quite knowledgable in this regard. None of your recommendation has burnt my fingers. Thanks to both and many others.

Now, what are these services doing ?

A great week to you, Jean.

NB: JoeP, I just had a peek at that URL, Viper’s, quite the reading to do. I will dump it to a printer and study closely. Again, mega thanks.

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Hello JoeP.
>>> You need to be very careful about disabling services.
I was. I asked you first, did I not ? And I have not disabled anything yet nor plan on doing some. I was trying to pick your mind and Ted’s as you both are quite knowledgable in this regard. None of your recommendation has burnt my fingers. Thanks to both and many others.

Now, what are these services doing ?

A great week to you, Jean.

NB: JoeP, I just had a peek at that URL, Viper’s, quite the reading to do. I will dump it to a printer and study closely. Again, mega thanks.

See Windows 7 services. Click on the service name for a description. Also, note that on the page to which I linked in the first post each service name is clickable which takes you to the same description page as this link.

Joe

--Joe

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Thanks again, JoeP.

That URL is quite exhaustive, it will need careful reading and studying.
Are these “Services” slowing down the OS, I have >130 of them and my Acer 64 is quite speedy. I then see no need to intervene but the eduction is a + for sure.
Be good. Jean.

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You also don’t have to disable services. For those that you are tempted to disable you can instead set it to
“manual.” I have also tweaked some services on my system so they don’t start automatically, but instead
are “automatic (delayed start.”

Dick

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Another way to do this quickly – BUT MAKE A SYSTEM RESTORE POINT FIRST – is the S.M.A.R.T. utility from Windows Club, which uses several of the Black Viper profiles.:

http://www.thewindowsclub.com/smart-a-utility-for-tweaking-windows-7-vista-xp-services

Zig

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Try the Windows Secrets recommended Soluto (download page). After rebooting following installation, Soluto will provide a list of every program. If my memory serves, it lists essential and “non” essential programs and time used during bootup. You can then see what may be the culprit or culprits causing the slow bootup.

It is possible that you may have a program that may not have installed properly. Hopefully, Soluto will help you spot a program that may not be booting in as timely a fashion as it should so you can uninstall and reinstall it.

Good luck.

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I’m with WildcatRay and vandamme – try Soluto. Nice user interface. May slow things up (just a little) during boot up while it analyzes your system set-up, but it brings everything you need to know or research right to the forefront in a very graphical manner. It also shows (in detail) the time interval for each start-up process so you will know how much time you will save by disabling whichever item(s) you choose. Once you get your start-up lean and mean, you can always uninstall it. I also use (and recommend) the tried and true AutoRuns from SysInternals.

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I have to agree regarding Soluto. It makes it very clear what is starting, how long each takes and gives options to remove or delay until idle for each item. It also offers some guidance about each item and what others have done. Excellent utility and its free.

What I don’t understand is why my boot time can vary from day to day?????

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For technicians, like myself, who set up Many PC’s for their customers, it helps to get as many tweaks as possible into batch files, registry scripts or VB-Scripts. It greatly speeds up the process and eliminates a lot of mistakes.
I’ve shared my setup (Tune-Up) scripts with other tech’s who tell me it works wonders on their own customer’s PC’s.

After studying the Black Viper’s list of “Services to disable” (first for Windows XP and later for Windows 7) I came up with a list of services that no-one in their right mind would ever want or need running and I wrote those into a batch file. Instead of having to go through Services.msc and manually disable a whole pot full of services on every setup, I just run the batch file, which takes only a few seconds to disable the desired services. Yes, some services are better put into Manual Mode, than disabled all together.

The same with registry tweaks….it’s much faster and safer to just run a .reg script to tweak the registry than to do it manually and take the risk of making a mistake.

On that tweak formerly mentioned to go into MSCONFIG, the boot tab and set the startup delay to just 3 seconds and set it to NO-GUI, it may also help to go into Advanced and set the number of ‘CPU Cores’ if you already know that you have more than one. It’s just one more thing I check on every setup. Apparently, Windows relies on YOU to tell it how many cores you want it to use. Some “experts” say that setting the number of cores is not necessary, but MS put that ability in there for a reason…. so I use it. Works for me!

If a customer asks me what kind of laptop to buy, I give them my best advise and then I tell them to get the maximum RAM that the unit will take.
RAM is super critical on laptops, due to the reduced speed of the little hard drives. In the past year, I’ve added RAM to more than a dozen laptops.
With ample RAM, one registry tweak to upload the Kernel into ram on boot up, greatly speeds up the PC. That’s one more tweak I do on every setup, unless there is less than 1 gig of RAM on the PC.
*this thread is not specifically on ‘Tweaks’ so I won’t list them here. That’s food for another thread.

I noticed the OP said that Word and Java are starting, from the Startup folder. Neither are required, and I would normally shut those off. I also shut off any Schedulers, Updaters or Reminders.
I’ve seen peoples systray with ten to fifteen icons in it….. That’s ridiculous! NOTHING should start from bootup that’s not absolutely needed for the operation of the PC. Things that will only be used “sometimes” should be run from either the Programs menu or from a desktop shortcut icon.

Sorry that ran so long. Old tech’s have a tendency to ramble. But in thirty years, we have picked up a lot of stuff that we’d like to pass along, before we just Pass ON.

Y’all have a great day now, Y’hear?

The Doctor

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I ran across this software a few months ago that lets you configure your boot apps such that boot times are faster: http://www.soluto.com/
I ran it for a while and it did seem to make the boot times faster (it even tells you exactly how long it takes to boot). The only issue I ran into is that quite often some of the apps I told it to delay running I actually needed sooner than when Soluto started them up. For example, I needed to capture the screen but SnagIt was not yet running. So I finally uninstalled it an just stuck with autoruns form sysinternals. But Soluto might work for you – give it a try.

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Saluto: Interesting little program but it comes with some caveats.
1. You cannot turn it off, it boots evey time with Windows.
2. It adds 2 seconds to each boot.
3. If you try to uninstall it, all of the changes made to your startups are reversed, it insists.

I think I will try something else.

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Saluto: Interesting little program but it comes with some caveats.
1. You cannot turn it off, it boots evey time with Windows.
2. It adds 2 seconds to each boot.
3. If you try to uninstall it, all of the changes made to your startups are reversed, it insists.

I think I will try something else.

As long as it reports what it has done you should be able to replicate that with one of the programs mentioned earlier.

Joe

--Joe

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As long as it reports what it has done you should be able to replicate that with one of the programs mentioned earlier.

Joe

That was my plan after I have documented what it/I did.

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I used Soluto for a while and eventually removed it. Having the ability to delay apps from starting seems like a good idea, until I realized that just about everything I had delayed I needed almost immediately at one time or another (though not every time). So I am back to using autoruns which seems to work the best for me. Though I do have to say that having Soluto time each of the apps that was starting was a definite eye opener.

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I’m staggered that people complain about what appears to be a sub 2 minute boot period.

Those of us still runny trusty old P4 desktops are quite happy to wait 4 mins 5 secs for everything to load at start time.

I had a 3 min start up with just W7 installed, all the other bits take the time.

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I installed Soluto on W7 x64. Every time I tried to run it I got a screen saying installation Complete with a Close button.
I couldn’t get any other response from it so I uninstalled it.

Not impressed!

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A1ex,

You’re supposed to reboot after Soluto has installed. Then, watch the screen.

Zig

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Thanks, Zig.

I tried again and did as you said, which worked OK.

I was somewhat disappointed with the results. Starting with a boot time of 2min 50secs all I could reduce it by was less than 10secs, hardly worth the trouble!

I expect some PC’s benefit more than others.

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A1ex,

Don’t complain about THAT boot time. It’s when it’s well over 3 mins. that you see more effect.

Zig

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