[kilowatt1]

HERE is an excellent article explaining the boot process and how to optimize it. What are your times? Mine went from 118 seconds to 83 seconds after applying the optimization techniques. I am refering to the amount of time it takes from the time you first push the power button until the OS fully loads and is ready for use.

[JoeD.]

found it, i'll read it andf see if i can do anything about it. thanks!!!!!!!!!!!

[oscar51]

killowatt1:

The ExtremeTech article you referenced about 'Optimizing Windows 9x/Me Startup' contains the following item (among many others):

"LoadPowerProfile: Imports power save settings. Necessary for laptops, but optional for desktop PCs. If you don't use power saving features, disable it."

I had always understood from advice repeatedly given in other TSG help forums that the two 'LoadPowerProfile' entries in Startup were always to be left in, not taken out. Could you elaborate on this issue? Thanks.

[kilowatt1]

Hello Oscar,

I give it a shot. The load power profiles settings really are user specific. That said, it depends on the actual usage of the computer. Most of the time they deal with optional power saving or convience features a user might need or want such as wake on LAN, modem, etc or power down\standby options for the processor, hard drive, monitor or other hardware. There is and always will be an ongoing debate on whether these "options" are beneficial or not. If you look at purely from an energy cost saving view, the savings are neglible unless of course you are running mulitple machines on a continual basis. On the other hand some will say that throttling back components will make them last longer. As I said, it really depends on how a person looks at it. My personal opinion is that if a person leaves their system on 24/7 then the power profiles are beneficial since they will allow the system to throttle back during extended periods of inactivity such as when the user goes to bed or does not plan on using the machine for a day or so.

Disabling the power profiles in startup will in no way harm your system but it will effect any of the "options". A notebook or laptop on the other hand require the profiles due to circuitry associated with using dual power sources. (battery vs house current).

Personally, I have mine unchecked and all APM functions disabled and I have not encountered any problems.

I hope this sheds a little light on the subject.

Kilowatt


I will be waiting for and expecting rebuttal since as I said this is a never ending debate.

[Rikku]

With Windows XP my boot time went to 25 seconds...

[kilowatt1]

Rikku,

Now I'm jealous!

Kilowatt

[oscar51]

killowatt1 -- and anyone else who cares to comment:

It takes 2-min, 15-sec give or take a second or two to boot my Win98SE system from a cold start. Deactivating the two 'LoadPowerProfiles' entries from my startup list has no noticable effect on that boot time, probably because some of the items processed before windows starts to load are real time hogs. The initial antivirus check by AVG takes about 15 seconds. Execution of my autoexec.bat file to delete various windows files and directories (temp, cookies, history, downloaded files, temporary internet files, swap files) takes about 7 seconds. And there must be a bunch of other stuff going on because it takes a good 1-min, 35-sec before the windows desktop starts to appear.

The last six lines in my boot log this morning were:

8:09:54 0.00 Init = TSRQuery (time estimated)
8:09:54 5.89 InitDone = TSRQuery (time estimated)
8:10:00 0.06 Enumerating Standard Floppy Disk Controller (BIOS\*PNP0700\0D)
8:10:00 0.00 Enumerated Standard Floppy Disk Controller (BIOS\*PNP0700\0D)
8:10:00 4.44 Enumerating TapeDetection (TAPECONTROLLER\TAPEDETECTION\0000)
8:10:04 0.00 Enumerated TapeDetection (TAPECONTROLLER\TAPEDETECTION\0000)

That's over 10 seconds of something I know nothing about. One unusual thing I observe is that about 5-6 seconds after my Win98SE boot is complete with all icons in place on the desktop and in the taskbar, the little hourglass next to the mouse pointer comes on and stays on for another 9-11 seconds or so. I would guess that might represent the last six lines in the above boot log but I really have no idea what it is. And the boot log accounts for only about 1-min, 4-sec of the total 2-min, 15-sec boot time anyway. So who knows what that means?

Anyway, according to msconfig, my current list of startup items are:

ScanRegistry
TaskMonitor
SystemTray
KensingtonScrollMouse
TweakUI
Avgcc32.exe [anitvirus]
SpyBlocker
TrueVector [ZoneAlarm]
MiniLog [ZoneAlarm]
Avgserv9.exe [antivirus]
ZoneAlarm.exe

That's about as short as I can make it.

[JoeD.]

Refering to the artical written by Joel Durham Jr. When and how do you get into the startup menu if you change to -0- time allowed to get there?

[Tech for Glory]

I just can't wait until 2004, the time they are expecting to have an instant-on system on the market. I can't think of the official terminology but it has something to do with magnets.

Push power button. Start clicking.

Life will be good.

[pcmentor]

code:--------------------------------------------------------------------------------8:09:54 0.00 Init = TSRQuery (time estimated)
8:09:54 5.89 InitDone = TSRQuery (time estimated)
8:10:00 0.06 Enumerating Standard Floppy Disk Controller (BIOS\*PNP0700\0D)
8:10:00 0.00 Enumerated Standard Floppy Disk Controller (BIOS\*PNP0700\0D)
8:10:00 4.44 Enumerating TapeDetection (TAPECONTROLLER\TAPEDETECTION\0000)
8:10:04 0.00 Enumerated TapeDetection (TAPECONTROLLER\TAPEDETECTION\0000)--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I got rid of tape detection by removing the Backup service from Windows add/remove progs in Win98SE. Take Care

[oscar51]

pcmentor:

Got your email but have not had a chance to try removing Backup. Since I use Win98SE Backup regularly, I'll have to get some other backup scheme working first before I remove it. Will try Iomega's...

[oscar51]

Removing Win98SE Backup does not remove Tape Detection for me. Maybe Iomeg's backup is looking for a tape -- I don't know. Whatever... Tired of fiddling... Will live with it... What else is new?

[pcmentor]

Be sure you rename the existing bootlog.txt before you generate a new fresh one. Maybe your registry is reverting to a previous copy because of another prob.
Do you have an entry for TSRQuery in bootlog? This takes(wastes) 20 sec on my bootup and noone knows what it is even! Take care. Pete

[AbvAvgUser]

If there's only a single user or if there are no privacy related problems, then "Suspend" or "Sleep" is also a good option for quick startup!!

I was just wondering, what is "Country Selection" -- look in the attachment, on the top?

And I was also wondering, what else can I disable in msconfig, in system.ini and win.ini?