17 ms·

Delivering fast boot times in Windows 8

138 points by ghurlman 15y ago

gks 15y ago
That's actually pretty slick. Not sure if other operating systems do something similar already. I know my Macs "sleep" rather than hibernate and are nearly ready immediately upon hitting the power button or flipping the lid open. While that isn't the same as what Microsoft is doing here it is a pretty clever way to achieve faster boot times. Microsoft does have some intelligent people working there. It's such a bummer it can't get some real work done outside of Office and Windows. I'd say their games unit is pretty solid too but everything else seems to be a real hit or miss scenario. Neat reading these things though.
- dangrossman 15y ago
  Windows sleeps too, ya know, just the same. Waking is near instant, all you're doing is turning hardware devices back on.
  - RyanKearney 15y ago
    Except you can bet on getting about 24 hours of sleep time on a Windows machine (my HP laptop lasted a little over 24 hours on a full charge) compared to the ~4 weeks of standby you get on a MacBook.
    - ak217 15y ago
      This is completely dependent on the hardware and how well the OEM (in your case, Apple) optimized it. My Thinkpad used to get 2 weeks on standby (nowadays it just wakes up and hibernates after a while).
    - tbob22 15y ago
      My Vaio Z got about a week of standby on a battery with about 30% charge left. I guess it really depends on the machine.
    - polshaw 15y ago
      As others have noted this is perhaps more a hardware issue than software, but it does highlight the real advantage at the core of apple's business; a tight synergy of hardware and software. Seen elsewhere with improved battery life of the iPhone vs android phones, for example.
- lloeki 15y ago
  > I know my Macs "sleep" rather than hibernate More precisely they do both. Close the lid and they save RAM to disk, then sleep. Open the lid and they resume instantly from sleep and discard the hibernation content, but wait long enough to drain the battery (or pop off the battery e.g for a swap on older Macs) and they will resume from disk. IIRC Win 7 knows how to do that, though it might not be default.
  - Mavrik 15y ago
    It is the default on battery powered systems. The system goes to hibernation if sleeping for several hours or if battery level is low.
    - lloeki 15y ago
      I wonder why not on desktops? My work transparently survived a nightly power outage on my sleeping iMac.
  - pointyhat 15y ago
    My Acer TimelineX does that as well. I think all laptops with Windows 7 do it by default.
- vital101 15y ago
  To be fair, the people working on the Windows Phone 7 OS seem to be competent as well. (Although you may have lumped those people in the Windows category)
  - gks 15y ago
    Oh sorry, I didn't even really consider that part of the deal. Call it a habit I guess for being so unhappy with their mobile division. That said, Windows Phone 7 is much more interesting to me than Android. Honestly, if I had the choice between Android and a WP7 device, I'd pick the WP7 device. I am a Mac guy so it makes the most sense to be on the iPhone. But if things change I am quite glad that Microsoft rethought their mobile strategy. My only hope is that they don't get bypassed by other consumers so much that they can't maintain keeping the OS moving forward. I truly honestly believe that WP7 is a better choice than Android in the long run. From what I've seen it is a really interesting experience. I've seen enough videos to see how it functions from a user standpoint and I have to say it is a really unique way of thinking things. I see features on it that I wish the iPhone had. So while I dismissed the mobile unit from my original comment, I should ammend it to state that I really do like the way the mobile unit in Microsoft is going.
recoiledsnake 15y ago
That looks like an insanely fast boot, under 10 seconds, must've been an SSD. Hope Windows 8 leads HDD manufacturers to make Hybrid hard drives, say a 3TB disk with 16GB SSD embedded inside. The OS can decide what files to keep on there based on usage (boot files and frequently used programs are an obvious choice).
- 0x0x0x 15y ago
  Not disparaging them, but on my MBP/SSD Lion boots to login screen in about 2 seconds and boots to desktop w/ auto-login turned on in ~5.
  - zzleeper 15y ago
    Are you talking about cold boots, or resumes from sleep/hibernate?
    - 0x0x0x 15y ago
      Machine off, cold start to login screen: 6.7s At desktop clicking restart to login screen: 5.9s. Wake from sleep to login screen: 3.2s Lift lid to login screen: 2.8s. Those are single run YMMV, etc.
      - cliftonk 15y ago
        Same numbers here on my macbook pro. Another important stat is that when our laptops wake up, we re-establish wifi connections in ~100 ms, compared to the average of 10 seconds on PCs.
        recoiledsnake 15y ago
        >average of 10 seconds on PCs Got a citation for that? My PC seems to connect instantly.
        sjs 15y ago
celalo 15y ago
This one of rarest stories about Microsoft on HN. It is easy to forget about Microsoft all together. Good to notice Win8 could really add up to the previous versions.
- wmf 15y ago
  All of the B8 posts have gotten good HN coverage because they're written in our language.
  - Luyt 15y ago
    Plus, they publish their videos in the MP4 format so you don't have to install Silverlight crapware first (or are even unable to watch it at all if you're not on Windows).
glhaynes 15y ago
"we want to start with boot time – no feature gets talked about and measured more." What? I've never understood why I should care since it's something I do once a week or less for a few seconds.
- jackvalentine 15y ago
  Agreed. Just discourage people from turning the PC off instead of putting it to sleep.
  - slewis 15y ago
    You guys don't care but they're reporting that the majority of users do. They're not saying its rational.
    - Splines 15y ago
      It's not rational to turn my PC off? Why would I want my home PC turned on at 3AM, exactly?
      - neworbit 15y ago
        Probably because you're awake playing Starcraft or doing an all night coding session. Ok, maybe that's just me, but I suspect I can't be the only HN reader who uses his home PC at 3 AM more than he does at 3 PM.
      - justanotheratom 15y ago
        You shouldn't have to turn it off because atleast on Windows 7 - by default it will go to sleep after certain inactivity. And then wake up after a few hours and go to hibernate. Since hibernate is 0 power state, it is as good as turn off. Additionally, you don't lose any of your in-memory data.
  - rhplus 15y ago
    No. The right response is to have two modes: on or off. A user shouldn't have to understand the difference between blank screen, sleep, hibernate and shut down. The iPad can do it, smartphones can do it. A user just wants to turn it 'off' when not in use and only very occasionally should have to turn it /off/ off.
mikeknoop 15y ago
From all the MSDN posts I've seen thus far, it looks like MS is going to kick their "every-other-os-is-great" trend with Windows 8.
- serge2k 15y ago
  Now they just have to enforce a rule on OEMs that every windows 8 PC must meet requirements that allow it not only to work, but actually make it work well. Especially in regards to ram requirements. I like what they did with WP7 in that regard.
  - chime 15y ago
    None of this matters unless they can stop Dell from installing Roxio DVD LaserScribe that run on startup.
  - kevin_morrill 15y ago
    Thanks to the antitrust trial in the late 1990s, they've mostly been neutered in this regard.
    - sid0 15y ago
      The agreement has expired, right?
      - kevin_morrill 15y ago
        Very much alive in the European Union still. If you just lost billions of dollars in legal entanglements, I doubt you're going to do it again. No matter how valuable it might be to customers.
- yardie 15y ago
  Which OSes were these? XP, Vista, 7 is too small a sample size to see a pattern. 95 and NT were too different platforms entirely that weren't merged until XP. And until XP they had a nasty habit of not doing updates on the consumer OS. ie. 95 and 95B, 98 and 98SE.
blinkingled 15y ago
On my X220 the Windows 7 boot is already fast even without a SSD (pre-desktop authentication and some Lenovo sauce helps) but watching the video FTA - that's mind bogglingly fast - it's more like the Mac's sleep/resume than a cold boot! The key change seems to be a clever kernel session hibernation. They discard user sessions as those involve writing a lot of data (full hibernation) but save kernel session which can be written out and read back fairly quickly. Then there is multicore enabled resume - doesn't help with disk io but with decompression of hibernated data.
- justanotheratom 15y ago
  curious why you think multicore enabled resume would not help with disk io? Atleast on an SSD, I would think it should.
  - Gonsalu 15y ago
    If hibernation didn't use compression, there was no need for CPU involvement due to DMA. Since there would be no CPU involvement, being multi-core enabled wouldn't be of help.
- msftguy 15y ago
  Multicore does nothing for raw io rate, but they're using compression, and the claim seems to be that they can use higher compression levels and still be faster than an SSD (so that decompression throughput won't be a bottleneck).
KeyBoardG 15y ago
Another great point hidden in there is the sleep+hibernate feature in which when sleeping, if power is lost the system's state is not. You would simply boot from hybernation from the sleep point.
- justanotheratom 15y ago
  I believe that has been the case since Vista.
brainless 15y ago
>>> Qualitatively, people say they prefer to shut down because they want to have their PC completely “off” so that it uses no power – either to preserve battery life or to reduce their energy use. Hibernate is also a good option for this since it similarly has no power draw, and many people really like it. However, it’s clearly not for everyone, since one of the other things we’ve heard is that many people want to turn their PCs on and have it be a “fresh start” rather than running all of the stuff from their previous session. Really so? It is not that people want to "start fresh", it is because the boot times from hibernate have been pathetic. Now I am on a MacBook and I never almost shutdown, just sleep. Yes sleep consumes power, but what I mean is that I would not want to "start fresh" each time. No way. How many people here want to "fresh start" at each boot?
- drivebyacct2 15y ago
  >How many people here want to "fresh start" at each boot? For Windows? I only restart because I need a fresh start.
  - brainless 15y ago
    I completely agree with needing a fresh start. I do not know why others would need it on Windows. But I do that so that the PC lags a little less. Windows, I feel from daily use, gets slower the more you keep it open. I do not use Windows in recent times, either Ubuntu or Mac. But still want to see a better Windows 8 so I can use that too.
  - xtracto 15y ago
    >For Windows? I only restart because I need a fresh start. And that is why in the article they state that the "RESTART" option will still give you a "fresh start". It is only when you "turn off" the computer when you get this kernel hibernation mode.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
rhplus 15y ago
Here's a flashback to a similar post in 2008 about the fundamentals work done for Windows 7 boot performance: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/e7/archive/2008/08/29/boot-performance.aspx http://blogs.msdn.com/b/e7/archive/2008/08/29/boot-performan...
xpose2000 15y ago
I will buy Windows 8 for these improved boot/hibernation times alone. It's painful to watch my computer wake up from hibernation in 15 to 30 seconds. (That's with SSD)
defdac 15y ago
"Of course, there are times where you may want to perform a complete shutdown – for example, if you’re opening the system to add or change some hardware. We have an option in the UI to revert back to the Windows 7 shutdown/cold boot behavior, or since that’s likely a fairly infrequent thing, you can use the new /full switch on shutdown.exe. From a cmd prompt, run: shutdown /s /full / t 0 to invoke an immediate full shutdown. Also, choosing Restart from the UI will do a full shutdown, followed by a cold boot."
- lloeki 15y ago
  I was wondering how this would impact multi-boot systems, as mixing hibernation and multi-boot is an extremely bad idea (unless you know what you're doing, and even then there a are so many ways to shoot yourself in the foot).
nabaraj 15y ago
Are you kidding me? Hibernating kernel is like saving all the malicious script to save so it can re-run again on next startup.
- rbanffy 15y ago
  You have a point. If you shut down this way, you won't have a clean boot the next time and will be carrying over some context from previous sessions. I am not sure I like the idea.
pointyhat 15y ago
My Windows 7 hasn't been rebooted for the last 22 days. I'm not sure I'm that impressed with fast booting.
- smiler 15y ago
  Did you look at the article? Microsoft has data that says roughly 50% of people shutdown their PCs. So clearly, a lot of people do care about fast booting
  - pointyhat 15y ago
    Yes but that's just an education issue. You don't need to shut them down all the time. Perhaps they should make the whole shutdown/sleep/hibernate thing more intuitive.
    - cryptoz 15y ago
      Standby modes still use electricity that drains battery life and draws unnecessary power from the grid. It may be faster for the user, but it's not necessarily better for them. Also, I haven't used Windows laptops in a while, but the Sleep mode on XP was really terrible - if I selected Start -> Shutdown and then closed the lid, when I came back and opened the lid I would find Windows resuming the shutdown procedure due to automatic sleep mode. Fast boot times are very important because there are lots of people who do need to turn their machines off. Maybe Microsoft have fixed various usability problems, but the electricity ones still stand. Why have running electronics that you're not using?
      - goblin89 15y ago
        Doesn't turning machine off and on each time shorten life of various its components? That way, a user would need to buy a new one sooner, which is definitely not better for them and the environment. I'd agree with grandparent in that most people normally do not need to turn their machines off completely and are better using sleep mode / hibernate, and this is the thing that needs optimization in the first place.
ojosilva 15y ago
I find it a bit suspicious that the video has been spliced at 0:33. Maybe the boot hadn't really finished and a "Still loading" window popped-up.
artursapek 15y ago
I don't really care as much about the boot time as the time between my desktop showing up and any of my commands being recognized. On my old Thinkpad as soon as the desktop and Start menubar showed up I got the same two laggy warnings about incompatible drivers every single time I would boot, and for 20 seconds or so icons wouldn't even respond to me hovering over them. Then I would have to wait another 20-45 seconds for anything to open while all the little icons and their respective programs were loading in the bottom right part, among with other background activity. Granted the computer was a couple years older than average users' these days, but psychologically it was just infuriating to think the computer is ready for me, and then having to sit through the "second boot." Instead of a super-fast boot they should focus on a super-simple boot which isn't torture to watch. I can walk away from my machine and do something else for a minute while it's booting, just like anyone does when they're popping popcorn. But the popcorn should be easy to open once it's "done."
- upthedale 15y ago
  That's likely all the installed stuff you have accumulated over time with components set to run at startup - not the OS itself. Think programs like iTunes, Flash, Skype, Java, to name just a few common things people install which is guilty of this (annoyingly even Microsoft's own programs like Messenger can contribute to the problem too). All of them do stuff at startup, be it checking for updates or kicking off background services. Have a look at Autoruns[1], which is a great SysInternals tool to show you what is set to run at startup, and lets you selectively disable them. [1] http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.aspx http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.asp...
  - artursapek 15y ago
    I hear you, but I have to say it's mostly stuff that Lenovo packed into the box for me. There was a little bit of the 3rd party programs; Adobe; Skype; but mostly not. See my reply here http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2978973 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2978973
- NolF 15y ago
  typing msconfig in the search box and goign to the startup tab will allow you to disable most programs that automatically startup at boot. Just leave essentials such as software for laptop mouse or sound, and you should be gold. Soluto is also a pretty good program to help you with the process, but you don't really need that one.
ck2 15y ago
Of course in the real world you'll need to add anti-virus, anti-rootkit, anti-spyware, keyboard scrambler and personal firewall to windows so you need to add about 5-10 seconds to their sterile boot times.
- demetris 15y ago
  Of these five I only have the firewall enabled on my Windows 7 desktop. And that only because I can’t be bothered to look into some issues with interdependencies when you disable the Windows firewall. (Can’t recall what exactly now.) I don’t think the firewall adds anything significant to the startup time; it is just one of the dozens of services that start automatically. Then, for many people an antivirus program may also be useful. Would that add 5 to 10 seconds to the startup time of a modern machine? For the other 3—anti-rootkit, anti-spyware, keyboard scrambler— why do you think they are necessary for every user of Windows?
  - seabee 15y ago
    > I don’t think the firewall adds anything significant to the startup time Think how long iptables takes to load, plus installing a couple of system hooks to detect unknown programs and a GUI window to warn about them. This stuff only takes a long time to load if you're loading in a huge framework and JIT at startup - startup times are very quick for C++ programs using Win32 API calls or WTL. I'd say anti-virus and anti-spyware are mostly treated as one these days (anti-malware) - with things like Microsoft Security Essentials, Norton Internet Security, etc. I use MSE and it sure as hell doesn't add 5 seconds to startup. It doesn't even add 1. But perhaps it's because I'm running a 'post-modern' machine with an SSD...
- joenathan 15y ago
  Or just add anti-braindead and you wont need all that.
- acdha 15y ago
  At least 10 seconds, although in fairness I've used Windows since 3.0 without any of the above and have yet to experience a problem because of it. It's just not a suitable configuration for the average user.
BonoboBoner 15y ago
Fast boot no longer matters. Fast sleep/wakeup is important. I love that ipad-like instant possible usage of my macbook air. I open it and it is just there.
- sid0 15y ago
  It's as if you haven't even read the article. Despite fast sleep/wakeup existing in Windows, lots of people tend to not use it.
- AndrewDucker 15y ago
  Same is true on Windows. It takes less than the time it takes for me to open the lid of my laptop for it to be ready to use.
olaf 15y ago
fast? faster!
exithrowaway 15y ago
I have a feeling the reason more folks shut their whole computer down in windows is because sleep / resume is "untrustworthy". I've tried using sleep/resume over multiple windows laptops , and half the time it either didn't turn the display on, or worse, the wifi wouldn't enable which caused me to reboot anyways. I haven't had the same problems since I switched to mac, aside from occasionally having the screen not come up immediately. This lets me run many things and not feel fearful about it all getting lost when I resume. * that said, I did watch a non-techie guy always shut down his imac when he didn't use it, seemed awkward to me but eh.
- epochwolf 15y ago
  I've had Windows XP/Vista crash on resume or fail to sleep at all more than often than not.
mkup 15y ago
And what if I turn off my computer with Windows 8 and add/remove/swap PCI cards? HDDs? It will crash when booting and corrupt my data, isn't it? In Windows 95 I had two options: reboot and poweroff. In Windows 2000 I had three options: reboot, poweroff and sleep. In Windows XP/Vista I have four options: reboot, poweroff, sleep and hibernate. Finally, in Windows 8 I will have five options: reboot, poweroff-which-is-not-really-a-poweroff, poweroff-which-is-really-a-poweroff, sleep, sleep-and-then-hibernate-if-battery-is-low. True Microsoft Way. It remembers me funny examples from Alan Cooper book 'The Inmates Are Running the Asylum'.
- polshaw 15y ago
  > It will crash when booting and corrupt my data I'm sorry but i have to call you out here; i would be suprised if MS hasn't thought of this in some way; whether detecting changes and initating a more complete boot or dealing with it in the GUI.. but even if it required you to select a 'full' shutdown/boot, i would say it was completely worth it for a 7s boot time. Further, i find your imagination regarding the practical handling of these power states rather lacking. The way i see it there will simply be 'reboot', 'power off' (which hibernates the kernel as described in the article, reloading it where checks show necessary), and 'standby' (which also writes ram to disk allowing resuming from hibernate with power loss -- i would imagine this could be turned off with a setting). So, contrary to your rant, i am going to bet that there will be one less standard option. But i guess things were better in the w95 days?.
  - mkup 15y ago
    > whether detecting changes and initating a more complete boot or dealing with it in the GUI. Sure, they can detect hw changes and make full cold boot, therefore losing all RAM data which was saved to the disk at the point of hibernation. (It would be like a quick dirty reset.) Or they can restore that data back to RAM and crash the kernel instantly. In either case, RAM contents are lost. So each time I turn off the PC, I have to plan ahead, "do I want to use poweroff-type-I or poweroff-type-II option?" If I won't guess right, then I lose my data.
    - 15y ago

138 points by ghurlman 15y ago

gks 15y ago

That's actually pretty slick. Not sure if other operating systems do something similar already. I know my Macs "sleep" rather than hibernate and are nearly ready immediately upon hitting the power button or flipping the lid open. While that isn't the same as what Microsoft is doing here it is a pretty clever way to achieve faster boot times. Microsoft does have some intelligent people working there. It's such a bummer it can't get some real work done outside of Office and Windows. I'd say their games unit is pretty solid too but everything else seems to be a real hit or miss scenario. Neat reading these things though.

dangrossman 15y ago
Windows sleeps too, ya know, just the same. Waking is near instant, all you're doing is turning hardware devices back on.
- RyanKearney 15y ago
  Except you can bet on getting about 24 hours of sleep time on a Windows machine (my HP laptop lasted a little over 24 hours on a full charge) compared to the ~4 weeks of standby you get on a MacBook.
  - ak217 15y ago
    This is completely dependent on the hardware and how well the OEM (in your case, Apple) optimized it. My Thinkpad used to get 2 weeks on standby (nowadays it just wakes up and hibernates after a while).
  - tbob22 15y ago
    My Vaio Z got about a week of standby on a battery with about 30% charge left. I guess it really depends on the machine.
  - polshaw 15y ago
    As others have noted this is perhaps more a hardware issue than software, but it does highlight the real advantage at the core of apple's business; a tight synergy of hardware and software. Seen elsewhere with improved battery life of the iPhone vs android phones, for example.
lloeki 15y ago
> I know my Macs "sleep" rather than hibernate More precisely they do both. Close the lid and they save RAM to disk, then sleep. Open the lid and they resume instantly from sleep and discard the hibernation content, but wait long enough to drain the battery (or pop off the battery e.g for a swap on older Macs) and they will resume from disk. IIRC Win 7 knows how to do that, though it might not be default.
- Mavrik 15y ago
  It is the default on battery powered systems. The system goes to hibernation if sleeping for several hours or if battery level is low.
  - lloeki 15y ago
    I wonder why not on desktops? My work transparently survived a nightly power outage on my sleeping iMac.
- pointyhat 15y ago
  My Acer TimelineX does that as well. I think all laptops with Windows 7 do it by default.
vital101 15y ago
To be fair, the people working on the Windows Phone 7 OS seem to be competent as well. (Although you may have lumped those people in the Windows category)
- gks 15y ago
  Oh sorry, I didn't even really consider that part of the deal. Call it a habit I guess for being so unhappy with their mobile division. That said, Windows Phone 7 is much more interesting to me than Android. Honestly, if I had the choice between Android and a WP7 device, I'd pick the WP7 device. I am a Mac guy so it makes the most sense to be on the iPhone. But if things change I am quite glad that Microsoft rethought their mobile strategy. My only hope is that they don't get bypassed by other consumers so much that they can't maintain keeping the OS moving forward. I truly honestly believe that WP7 is a better choice than Android in the long run. From what I've seen it is a really interesting experience. I've seen enough videos to see how it functions from a user standpoint and I have to say it is a really unique way of thinking things. I see features on it that I wish the iPhone had. So while I dismissed the mobile unit from my original comment, I should ammend it to state that I really do like the way the mobile unit in Microsoft is going.

recoiledsnake 15y ago

That looks like an insanely fast boot, under 10 seconds, must've been an SSD. Hope Windows 8 leads HDD manufacturers to make Hybrid hard drives, say a 3TB disk with 16GB SSD embedded inside. The OS can decide what files to keep on there based on usage (boot files and frequently used programs are an obvious choice).

0x0x0x 15y ago
Not disparaging them, but on my MBP/SSD Lion boots to login screen in about 2 seconds and boots to desktop w/ auto-login turned on in ~5.
- zzleeper 15y ago
  Are you talking about cold boots, or resumes from sleep/hibernate?
  - 0x0x0x 15y ago
    Machine off, cold start to login screen: 6.7s At desktop clicking restart to login screen: 5.9s. Wake from sleep to login screen: 3.2s Lift lid to login screen: 2.8s. Those are single run YMMV, etc.
    - cliftonk 15y ago
      Same numbers here on my macbook pro. Another important stat is that when our laptops wake up, we re-establish wifi connections in ~100 ms, compared to the average of 10 seconds on PCs.
      - recoiledsnake 15y ago
        >average of 10 seconds on PCs Got a citation for that? My PC seems to connect instantly.
        sjs 15y ago

celalo 15y ago

This one of rarest stories about Microsoft on HN. It is easy to forget about Microsoft all together. Good to notice Win8 could really add up to the previous versions.

wmf 15y ago
All of the B8 posts have gotten good HN coverage because they're written in our language.
- Luyt 15y ago
  Plus, they publish their videos in the MP4 format so you don't have to install Silverlight crapware first (or are even unable to watch it at all if you're not on Windows).

glhaynes 15y ago

"we want to start with boot time – no feature gets talked about and measured more." What? I've never understood why I should care since it's something I do once a week or less for a few seconds.

jackvalentine 15y ago
Agreed. Just discourage people from turning the PC off instead of putting it to sleep.
- slewis 15y ago
  You guys don't care but they're reporting that the majority of users do. They're not saying its rational.
  - Splines 15y ago
    It's not rational to turn my PC off? Why would I want my home PC turned on at 3AM, exactly?
    - neworbit 15y ago
      Probably because you're awake playing Starcraft or doing an all night coding session. Ok, maybe that's just me, but I suspect I can't be the only HN reader who uses his home PC at 3 AM more than he does at 3 PM.
    - justanotheratom 15y ago
      You shouldn't have to turn it off because atleast on Windows 7 - by default it will go to sleep after certain inactivity. And then wake up after a few hours and go to hibernate. Since hibernate is 0 power state, it is as good as turn off. Additionally, you don't lose any of your in-memory data.
- rhplus 15y ago
  No. The right response is to have two modes: on or off. A user shouldn't have to understand the difference between blank screen, sleep, hibernate and shut down. The iPad can do it, smartphones can do it. A user just wants to turn it 'off' when not in use and only very occasionally should have to turn it /off/ off.

mikeknoop 15y ago

From all the MSDN posts I've seen thus far, it looks like MS is going to kick their "every-other-os-is-great" trend with Windows 8.

serge2k 15y ago
Now they just have to enforce a rule on OEMs that every windows 8 PC must meet requirements that allow it not only to work, but actually make it work well. Especially in regards to ram requirements. I like what they did with WP7 in that regard.
- chime 15y ago
  None of this matters unless they can stop Dell from installing Roxio DVD LaserScribe that run on startup.
- kevin_morrill 15y ago
  Thanks to the antitrust trial in the late 1990s, they've mostly been neutered in this regard.
  - sid0 15y ago
    The agreement has expired, right?
    - kevin_morrill 15y ago
      Very much alive in the European Union still. If you just lost billions of dollars in legal entanglements, I doubt you're going to do it again. No matter how valuable it might be to customers.
yardie 15y ago
Which OSes were these? XP, Vista, 7 is too small a sample size to see a pattern. 95 and NT were too different platforms entirely that weren't merged until XP. And until XP they had a nasty habit of not doing updates on the consumer OS. ie. 95 and 95B, 98 and 98SE.

blinkingled 15y ago

On my X220 the Windows 7 boot is already fast even without a SSD (pre-desktop authentication and some Lenovo sauce helps) but watching the video FTA - that's mind bogglingly fast - it's more like the Mac's sleep/resume than a cold boot! The key change seems to be a clever kernel session hibernation. They discard user sessions as those involve writing a lot of data (full hibernation) but save kernel session which can be written out and read back fairly quickly. Then there is multicore enabled resume - doesn't help with disk io but with decompression of hibernated data.

justanotheratom 15y ago
curious why you think multicore enabled resume would not help with disk io? Atleast on an SSD, I would think it should.
- Gonsalu 15y ago
  If hibernation didn't use compression, there was no need for CPU involvement due to DMA. Since there would be no CPU involvement, being multi-core enabled wouldn't be of help.
msftguy 15y ago
Multicore does nothing for raw io rate, but they're using compression, and the claim seems to be that they can use higher compression levels and still be faster than an SSD (so that decompression throughput won't be a bottleneck).

KeyBoardG 15y ago

Another great point hidden in there is the sleep+hibernate feature in which when sleeping, if power is lost the system's state is not. You would simply boot from hybernation from the sleep point.

justanotheratom 15y ago
I believe that has been the case since Vista.

brainless 15y ago

>>> Qualitatively, people say they prefer to shut down because they want to have their PC completely “off” so that it uses no power – either to preserve battery life or to reduce their energy use. Hibernate is also a good option for this since it similarly has no power draw, and many people really like it. However, it’s clearly not for everyone, since one of the other things we’ve heard is that many people want to turn their PCs on and have it be a “fresh start” rather than running all of the stuff from their previous session. Really so? It is not that people want to "start fresh", it is because the boot times from hibernate have been pathetic. Now I am on a MacBook and I never almost shutdown, just sleep. Yes sleep consumes power, but what I mean is that I would not want to "start fresh" each time. No way. How many people here want to "fresh start" at each boot?

drivebyacct2 15y ago
>How many people here want to "fresh start" at each boot? For Windows? I only restart because I need a fresh start.
- brainless 15y ago
  I completely agree with needing a fresh start. I do not know why others would need it on Windows. But I do that so that the PC lags a little less. Windows, I feel from daily use, gets slower the more you keep it open. I do not use Windows in recent times, either Ubuntu or Mac. But still want to see a better Windows 8 so I can use that too.
- xtracto 15y ago
  >For Windows? I only restart because I need a fresh start. And that is why in the article they state that the "RESTART" option will still give you a "fresh start". It is only when you "turn off" the computer when you get this kernel hibernation mode.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]

rhplus 15y ago

Here's a flashback to a similar post in 2008 about the fundamentals work done for Windows 7 boot performance: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/e7/archive/2008/08/29/boot-performance.aspx http://blogs.msdn.com/b/e7/archive/2008/08/29/boot-performan...

xpose2000 15y ago

I will buy Windows 8 for these improved boot/hibernation times alone. It's painful to watch my computer wake up from hibernation in 15 to 30 seconds. (That's with SSD)

defdac 15y ago

"Of course, there are times where you may want to perform a complete shutdown – for example, if you’re opening the system to add or change some hardware. We have an option in the UI to revert back to the Windows 7 shutdown/cold boot behavior, or since that’s likely a fairly infrequent thing, you can use the new /full switch on shutdown.exe. From a cmd prompt, run: shutdown /s /full / t 0 to invoke an immediate full shutdown. Also, choosing Restart from the UI will do a full shutdown, followed by a cold boot."

lloeki 15y ago
I was wondering how this would impact multi-boot systems, as mixing hibernation and multi-boot is an extremely bad idea (unless you know what you're doing, and even then there a are so many ways to shoot yourself in the foot).

nabaraj 15y ago

Are you kidding me? Hibernating kernel is like saving all the malicious script to save so it can re-run again on next startup.

rbanffy 15y ago
You have a point. If you shut down this way, you won't have a clean boot the next time and will be carrying over some context from previous sessions. I am not sure I like the idea.

pointyhat 15y ago

My Windows 7 hasn't been rebooted for the last 22 days. I'm not sure I'm that impressed with fast booting.

smiler 15y ago
Did you look at the article? Microsoft has data that says roughly 50% of people shutdown their PCs. So clearly, a lot of people do care about fast booting
- pointyhat 15y ago
  Yes but that's just an education issue. You don't need to shut them down all the time. Perhaps they should make the whole shutdown/sleep/hibernate thing more intuitive.
  - cryptoz 15y ago
    Standby modes still use electricity that drains battery life and draws unnecessary power from the grid. It may be faster for the user, but it's not necessarily better for them. Also, I haven't used Windows laptops in a while, but the Sleep mode on XP was really terrible - if I selected Start -> Shutdown and then closed the lid, when I came back and opened the lid I would find Windows resuming the shutdown procedure due to automatic sleep mode. Fast boot times are very important because there are lots of people who do need to turn their machines off. Maybe Microsoft have fixed various usability problems, but the electricity ones still stand. Why have running electronics that you're not using?
    - goblin89 15y ago
      Doesn't turning machine off and on each time shorten life of various its components? That way, a user would need to buy a new one sooner, which is definitely not better for them and the environment. I'd agree with grandparent in that most people normally do not need to turn their machines off completely and are better using sleep mode / hibernate, and this is the thing that needs optimization in the first place.

ojosilva 15y ago

I find it a bit suspicious that the video has been spliced at 0:33. Maybe the boot hadn't really finished and a "Still loading" window popped-up.

artursapek 15y ago

I don't really care as much about the boot time as the time between my desktop showing up and any of my commands being recognized. On my old Thinkpad as soon as the desktop and Start menubar showed up I got the same two laggy warnings about incompatible drivers every single time I would boot, and for 20 seconds or so icons wouldn't even respond to me hovering over them. Then I would have to wait another 20-45 seconds for anything to open while all the little icons and their respective programs were loading in the bottom right part, among with other background activity. Granted the computer was a couple years older than average users' these days, but psychologically it was just infuriating to think the computer is ready for me, and then having to sit through the "second boot." Instead of a super-fast boot they should focus on a super-simple boot which isn't torture to watch. I can walk away from my machine and do something else for a minute while it's booting, just like anyone does when they're popping popcorn. But the popcorn should be easy to open once it's "done."

upthedale 15y ago
That's likely all the installed stuff you have accumulated over time with components set to run at startup - not the OS itself. Think programs like iTunes, Flash, Skype, Java, to name just a few common things people install which is guilty of this (annoyingly even Microsoft's own programs like Messenger can contribute to the problem too). All of them do stuff at startup, be it checking for updates or kicking off background services. Have a look at Autoruns[1], which is a great SysInternals tool to show you what is set to run at startup, and lets you selectively disable them. [1] http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.aspx http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.asp...
- artursapek 15y ago
  I hear you, but I have to say it's mostly stuff that Lenovo packed into the box for me. There was a little bit of the 3rd party programs; Adobe; Skype; but mostly not. See my reply here http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2978973 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2978973
NolF 15y ago
typing msconfig in the search box and goign to the startup tab will allow you to disable most programs that automatically startup at boot. Just leave essentials such as software for laptop mouse or sound, and you should be gold. Soluto is also a pretty good program to help you with the process, but you don't really need that one.

ck2 15y ago

Of course in the real world you'll need to add anti-virus, anti-rootkit, anti-spyware, keyboard scrambler and personal firewall to windows so you need to add about 5-10 seconds to their sterile boot times.

demetris 15y ago
Of these five I only have the firewall enabled on my Windows 7 desktop. And that only because I can’t be bothered to look into some issues with interdependencies when you disable the Windows firewall. (Can’t recall what exactly now.) I don’t think the firewall adds anything significant to the startup time; it is just one of the dozens of services that start automatically. Then, for many people an antivirus program may also be useful. Would that add 5 to 10 seconds to the startup time of a modern machine? For the other 3—anti-rootkit, anti-spyware, keyboard scrambler— why do you think they are necessary for every user of Windows?
- seabee 15y ago
  > I don’t think the firewall adds anything significant to the startup time Think how long iptables takes to load, plus installing a couple of system hooks to detect unknown programs and a GUI window to warn about them. This stuff only takes a long time to load if you're loading in a huge framework and JIT at startup - startup times are very quick for C++ programs using Win32 API calls or WTL. I'd say anti-virus and anti-spyware are mostly treated as one these days (anti-malware) - with things like Microsoft Security Essentials, Norton Internet Security, etc. I use MSE and it sure as hell doesn't add 5 seconds to startup. It doesn't even add 1. But perhaps it's because I'm running a 'post-modern' machine with an SSD...
joenathan 15y ago
Or just add anti-braindead and you wont need all that.
acdha 15y ago
At least 10 seconds, although in fairness I've used Windows since 3.0 without any of the above and have yet to experience a problem because of it. It's just not a suitable configuration for the average user.

BonoboBoner 15y ago

Fast boot no longer matters. Fast sleep/wakeup is important. I love that ipad-like instant possible usage of my macbook air. I open it and it is just there.

sid0 15y ago
It's as if you haven't even read the article. Despite fast sleep/wakeup existing in Windows, lots of people tend to not use it.
AndrewDucker 15y ago
Same is true on Windows. It takes less than the time it takes for me to open the lid of my laptop for it to be ready to use.

olaf 15y ago

fast? faster!

exithrowaway 15y ago

I have a feeling the reason more folks shut their whole computer down in windows is because sleep / resume is "untrustworthy". I've tried using sleep/resume over multiple windows laptops , and half the time it either didn't turn the display on, or worse, the wifi wouldn't enable which caused me to reboot anyways. I haven't had the same problems since I switched to mac, aside from occasionally having the screen not come up immediately. This lets me run many things and not feel fearful about it all getting lost when I resume. * that said, I did watch a non-techie guy always shut down his imac when he didn't use it, seemed awkward to me but eh.

epochwolf 15y ago
I've had Windows XP/Vista crash on resume or fail to sleep at all more than often than not.

mkup 15y ago

And what if I turn off my computer with Windows 8 and add/remove/swap PCI cards? HDDs? It will crash when booting and corrupt my data, isn't it? In Windows 95 I had two options: reboot and poweroff. In Windows 2000 I had three options: reboot, poweroff and sleep. In Windows XP/Vista I have four options: reboot, poweroff, sleep and hibernate. Finally, in Windows 8 I will have five options: reboot, poweroff-which-is-not-really-a-poweroff, poweroff-which-is-really-a-poweroff, sleep, sleep-and-then-hibernate-if-battery-is-low. True Microsoft Way. It remembers me funny examples from Alan Cooper book 'The Inmates Are Running the Asylum'.

polshaw 15y ago
> It will crash when booting and corrupt my data I'm sorry but i have to call you out here; i would be suprised if MS hasn't thought of this in some way; whether detecting changes and initating a more complete boot or dealing with it in the GUI.. but even if it required you to select a 'full' shutdown/boot, i would say it was completely worth it for a 7s boot time. Further, i find your imagination regarding the practical handling of these power states rather lacking. The way i see it there will simply be 'reboot', 'power off' (which hibernates the kernel as described in the article, reloading it where checks show necessary), and 'standby' (which also writes ram to disk allowing resuming from hibernate with power loss -- i would imagine this could be turned off with a setting). So, contrary to your rant, i am going to bet that there will be one less standard option. But i guess things were better in the w95 days?.
- mkup 15y ago
  > whether detecting changes and initating a more complete boot or dealing with it in the GUI. Sure, they can detect hw changes and make full cold boot, therefore losing all RAM data which was saved to the disk at the point of hibernation. (It would be like a quick dirty reset.) Or they can restore that data back to RAM and crash the kernel instantly. In either case, RAM contents are lost. So each time I turn off the PC, I have to plan ahead, "do I want to use poweroff-type-I or poweroff-type-II option?" If I won't guess right, then I lose my data.
  - 15y ago