Looking for Vista Boot Optimization

    The time required to load the operating system is a critical factor for many users, especially for laptop owners. The normal time from BIOS to loading the desktop in Windows Vista is on average 25-90 seconds, depending on the configuration of the equipment, drivers, and the operation of the services. Sometimes users are faced with a situation where the system boot time is stretched to unacceptable 5-10 minutes, which signals a problem that needs to be solved in order to avoid possible troubles with stability and probable data loss.

    While I boot, you can walk your dog

    In this short article, we’ll try to consider solving such troubles using the built-in monitoring tools in Vista. In Russian, for some reason, no one had done this before.

    It was possible to track the launch of Windows XP using the Microsoft Bootvis utility, which clearly reflected all the subtleties of the boot process, such as driver delays, I / O times, CPU load, and many other useful data. Unfortunately, in Windows Vista we do not have such a program, but we were not left without tools.

    Each time at boot, the system collects information about the speed of loading the kernel, initialization of drivers and hardware, as well as the work of the super-reformer. The fact that these data can be viewed, many forget, but in vain.

    There is a special Diagnostics-Performance log , which can be opened in Administration -> Event Viewer orControl Panel -> Counters and Performance Tools -> Additional Tools -> View performance information in the event log .

    View performance information in the event log

    Information is collected in the log not only on downloading, but also on shutting down Vista. Events are assigned a specific code by which their essence can be determined:
    • Code 100 - boot time, total
    • Codes 101-199 - problem loading of devices, services, applications, etc.
    • Code 200 - Total Shutdown Time
    • Codes 201-299 - problem termination of processes, etc.

    Data on system boot does not go to the log immediately, but some time after the start, so do not be surprised that there is no information about the newly loaded Vista in the log. Wait a few minutes.

    By looking at the properties of the most recent event with code 100, you can find out the download details. On the General tab you can see the time generally spent on starting. Our log data is indicated in milliseconds, i.e. to convert to seconds you need to remove the last three digits. The screenshot shows that the system booted up for 138 seconds - almost two and a half minutes. Long!

    Event 100

    We ’ll go to the Details tab :

    Event 100 detail

    In addition to taking information on the general load from the first tab in the BootTime parameter , we may be interested in the following:
    • MainPathBootTime - total time for the appearance of the desktop, including all critical services and drivers necessary for the main operation of the system
    • BootKernelInitTime - kernel initialization
    • BootDriverInitTime - driver initialization
    • BootDevicesInitTime - hardware initialization
    • BootPrefetchInitTime - Super - Repeater Runtime
    • BootSmssInitTime - Session Manager Initialization
    • BootPostBootTime - startup time for all non-critical services already at the ready desktop

    All data on this tab can be uploaded to XML, for example, to collect statistics on multiple runs.

    You can immediately see that (for my laptop) the drivers and the session manager were initialized for too long, so you should go back to Event Viewer and look at other events with codes 101-199 in an attempt to identify the inhibitory factor. Carefully looking at the log, we find the event under code 110:

    Event 110

    For some reason, the session manager was initialized six times longer than usual. Extra 20 seconds found, looking further. Searches detect event 109 - slowly loading IDE channels:

    What is it with him?

    The given example had to be created artificially for publication on Habré, but using the information from the Diagnostics-Performance journal in practice, I was able to identify many times the problem places for loading the system, such as the case with a three-minute load of the totrec.sys driver belonging to the Total Recorder program.

    I hope this information will be useful to you. Continued Windows Vista boot optimization follows ...

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