Slow boot-up time on XP

Clarifications

Here's a complete list of things to try:

1. Defrag the hard drive
2. Empty the C:\Windows\Prefetch folder
3. Remove entries from the Startup folder(s) on the Start menu
4. Remove entries from the Registry (HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion \Run)
5. Uninstall unwanted software.

Is your machine part of a Windows domain? If so, it could be a domain controller issue. If no, try booting in safe mode (press F8 at startup) and see if it still takes 3-4 minutes. If it boots faster, then there is some device driver or application slowing the boot process. Check the event log to see if there are any warnings or errors (right click My Computer, select manage, select event viewer) - check the application and system logs.

Use Spybot S&D, Ad-Aware, or one of the other free malware identifiers. Make sure your anti-virus software is up to date, even try a free on-line av scan like Trend Micro's Housecall.

Jim

/* Faster than the speed of Dark. */

Already lots of good advice and questions raised by others. Most important--is this computer on a network? A domain network? Roaming Profiles, folder redirection, too many policies and scripts at startup, and the possibility of issues on the DC itself. Also, if you're logging onto a computer for the first time, the Default User profile is used as the template to create yours. Upon the first logon, it could take 3-4 minutes--depending on how large the Default User profile is and where it is located (i.e. on a server or locally).

If this is just a stand-alone computer, when did the problem start? After new hardware or software were installed? After Windows updates? Can you boot to Last Known Good.? Make sure to set a restore point when you've got things back to normal, assuming things were at one point.

lots of good ideas- we had a strange problem where the profile was corrupt on the local box. removed it, logged back in, took a couple of minutes the first time like it should and then it worked well???

it depends on exactly where it is taking so long but if at the black screen i would check to see if my antivirus was set to scan all files or something at boot up. otherwise i'd be worrying i had spyware or a virus. does it boot fast into safe mode?

Especially since the Beast of Redmond bestowed his gifts back on that sad day in April.

I have sadly seen repetitive instances of the OS taking over while still to complete the boot process.

Here's a couple of things to try.

1. Disable Windows Bit-Defender and shutdown completely. Then do a cold boot.

2. You could do worse than also giving the same treatment (of utter contempt) to Windows Update [in terms of discontinuing the automatic process - invoking updates manually], but remembering to do updates each week manually.

Microsoft have been promising a fix for the 'update problem' for some months now but has sadly failed to live up to this promise.

Both of the above processes have, in recent months (due to an erroneous update), caused various and nefarious problems for users worldwide. The interesting thing is the problems are not common to all users but problems are common to all users.

Both processes can, and do, cause massive amounts of processor time to be diverted, thereby causing slowdowns both before and after boot is completed. Windows Update can run away with itself, checking and rechecking currently installed updates - it's not downloading ANYTHING - just checking what is already there.

If neither of the above make any difference just re-enable them - and count yourself as one of the few lucky ones.

Slow boot times yeah can be caused by all those things people say above bad drivers and so on. However the users generally screw themselves and they do not even know it. Usually it is the simple things, just look around on thier desktop.

First, they may have set some wallpaper like pictures of thier children or something. While yeah this is normally not a problem users are to stupid to realize that this 20 meg Hi Res JPG Image Directly from thier camera has to completely load then draw on the users desktop.

Huge Long Startup sounds. At some point the stupid user thought they would like this cute startup sound, while it may be 2 minute long freaking thing. However rather than go in and remove the startup sound, they just shut thier volume off.

All kinds of Animated Icons and mouse cursors, ok sure while they may be a football fan tell them to paint thier chest and go to the game leave the animated Icons off thier desktops.

Look in the system tray. a great many telling things can be in there. Weather bog, some stock price grabber, stupid things user think they need that cause slow startup.

If All Else Fails go to Start > Run then type in MSConfig and looks to see what all is starting up. Stupid ITunes and so on installed a bunch of crap it seems to think you need so look for like quicktime launcher and so on. You really do not need to start Itunes stuff ever single time you start your PC.

The first was on a stand-alone system, the user had changed the bios to boot from FD first then CD only problem there was no FD therefore it waited 2mins for it to time out add that to an overloaded startup list (fixed with msconfig) and it was almost 3mins.

The other was on a domain with roaming profiles; Temporary Internet folders was caching 500MB and the user outlook.pst was 2GB. My solution was to reduce the IE chache to 20MB and move the outlook.pst files out of the user profile to the users private folder on the network on the network this was mapped to drive U:.

Check the size of your profile by right clicking on "\Documents and Settings\%username%" and look at the properties if it is over 200MB then you are storing unnecessary data in it.

While there are a lot of reasons being given, the most common are relatively easy.

You did not state what kind of system you are running and whether or not the symptom came on suddenly or if it has slowly slowed to a snail's pace.

Like everyone else, I'd blame sneaky programs. One thing that was kind of mentioned but not fully discussed is your Antivirus programs. I've seen a few systems that have 4+ AV/spyware programs running at startup. Sure your safe, but each of these programs may have an "active monitor" component that checks everything the computer is doing for virus-like activity. I cut a computer's start-up time to about an 1/8th by disabling Norton AV alone. I can't tell you where to go from there, but it identifies the problem if that's happening.

It may also be that a device is not being recognized and the computer is trying to wait for the device to start up or to be recognized and have the proper driver installed. If you have recently changed any hardware, or have installed a printer/scanner or something else, this might be a problem as well. Try booting without any of the peripherals connected (cept the mouse and keyboard).

I'd also check on all the processes running by opening the task manager (ctrl-alt-Delete) and clicking on Processes. If you have more than 40 running and don't have 2GB of RAM, you will probably be feeling a decrease in speed.

Then open up your internet browser and go to processlibrary.com. In the search field, enter in any process (from the task manager) that you don't recognize as essential (eg. lsass.exe) This can help you recognize what is being opened when you start the computer. If you find things that are non-essential or plain ol wastes of space, use the techniques listed in other posts to go into the system startup configuration (msconfig) and keep these from starting up.

For kicks you could deselect all AV and spyware programs in the config file and restart the system to see how much of a difference it makes. You could also de-select all non essential programs and restart to see if it is possibly a hardware problem vs. a software problem.

Again, I agree that the other ideas are equally good as well: booting in safe mode and scanning the system for viruses and spies, removing items from Startup folder of start menu, etc.

Good luck.

1. Disable all the services which you do not need during startup.
2. Invoke the Windows Boot Loader file and set the Boot selection option to zero (in case you have multiboot)
3. Delete all the non-required startup programs. It will not help via programs-startup. Do it via/using the registry option under policies folder.
4. Locate the Win.ini file and remove start up program names (starting with Invoke/Open...)
5. Do not play with BIOS until its inevitable.

Here's a free TechRepublic download that can help:

How to fully degunk a PC to get rid of crapware
http://downloads.techrepublic.com.com/download.aspx?docid=301317

The author (George Ou) has used these techniques to get XP to boot in less than a minute, and I can verify the results.

Give it a try.