What is considered a normal boot time?

[Gig-O-Ram]

In other words, is there a standard amount of time a computer should take to boot up and have windows (or X OS) ready to go? I know some machines might vary depending on what OS is running and what drivers or background software loads on startup. My rig seems to take a bit longer than it used to since I reinstalled XP, but I have a few more things on startup as well. It used to take about 1 minute from power on to Windows, but it's up to about 1:30 or 2:00 now. I do have Windows Defender and AOL Safety/Security on startup, so maybe that's adding time.

How long do you guys take to boot up?

[Jokerswild]

Start-up depends on how many programs your starting and it seems that when you do a fresh install it's always a little faster.

[polobunny]

45 second to a minute.
Windows is just... crappy. No matter what you do, at some point it will just take a while to boot, and that all of a sudden.

For example I remember my clean install. I install the drivers... goes fine. I reboot it takes around 20-25 seconds.
I start Windows Update and do the first 3 updates (needed before the big batch of other updates)
2 of them are Windows Installer 3.1 and Windows Genuine Advantage thingamajig. The third one if I remember correctly is only a security update, though im honestly not sure.
I reboot, it takes 45 seconds now. :S
I reboot another time... still 45 seconds. Great, what use is my RAID0 now? :P Well done Windows!

Edit: OH also I think it should be noted that in my booting process, while Windows is loading, there's around 5 seconds it looks like nothing is going on. The bar goes left to right but there's no disk activity. It's not the first time I see that though, I always wondered what's going on at this point. Can't Windows try to push more data or something? Geez...

[screwballl]

for a computer that has all the updates and has been used some, you can figure anything 1-2 minutes is a good startup time (for XP, double that for Vista), anything longer and there is something wrong or windows startup needs to be cleaned up

[Zambini]

Windows startup always needs to be cleaned up.

It probably takes me 1-3 minutes. Sometimes it takes less, sometimes it takes more.

No consistency anywhere, but hey. Its windows =/

[Quakindude]

Hmmm, I keep my startup programs trimmed down. There's not many that do start up when my computer is turned on. Mine takes less than 50 seconds and is the same everytime I reboot. When I get home from work today, I'll link you guys to a very good little program I've used for years to help kill those start up apps.

[Hitman]

Originally Posted by polobunny

45 second to a minute.
Windows is just... crappy. No matter what you do, at some point it will just take a while to boot, and that all of a sudden.

Linux doesn't start any faster, in fact it takes longer most of the time.

[screwballl]

msconfig and Bootvis are your friends

[Quakindude]

I've always used StartUp. Been using it since Win95 IIRC. Small app that does a great job and isn't from MS.

[Gig-O-Ram]

Originally Posted by Quakindude

I've always used StartUp. Been using it since Win95 IIRC. Small app that does a great job and isn't from MS.

So, even though it looks like it's designed with an earlier version of Windows in mind, it still gets the job done in XP, I take it.

Yeah, I remember before I started putting in drivers and updates, it loaded in about 5 seconds! But I did see a noticeable increase after putting in Windows Defender. My startup load bar will move good at first, and a lot of times will sit for a few seconds or not come back into view right away, making me wonder if something's up, but then it starts again. A few times lately, the welcome screen has stayed on a bit longer than I thought it should, and I've seen my taskbar come in not fully loaded, so maybe something's getting in the way.