Unusually slow UEFI Boot Time

[bikeracer4487]

I originally posted this in the homebuilt systems section, but it got no responses and I'm thinkin' it might not have been the right section. Since I don't REALLY know where the holdup is, I'm still not sure the right section, but since I've verified I'm getting the proper throughput on my hard drive, I'm assuming it's with the mother board...but anyways, on to the actual issue: (oh, and I also realized I was off on the boot times, so I timed the startup myself)

I recently upgraded to a UEFI board, and had some trouble initially with making sure I did a UEFI Windows install, but eventually I got it sorted with some help from forum members, but now I just can't help but feel that I'm missing something. Windows is installed onto a Vertex 3 SSD with the latest firmware, and I verified I did the initial installation correctly...but my boot times are still slow. Not, like 10 minutes from start to desktop but it varies between 10-15 seconds on the logo screen and around 45 seconds on the Windows loading screen. That's not really BAD, but I've heard people saying they're getting cold boot times of under 10 seconds, and I even have a UEFI laptop that does just that. I have a high-end, overclocked system that SHOULD be booting wicked fast, but it's not, and I'm hoping someone can help me figure out what I'm missing.

 

[Raiddinn]

I am no wizard at this stuff, but I am trying to give it a glance over.

It looks like you have Adobe Reader set to load automatically. If so you might want to change that to not do it. I doubt it would completely fix the problem, but its a decent place to start while waiting on MagicAndre to chime in.

 

[vicbyrd]

I scanned your summary file and the only thing that jumped out at me was

<pnpObject name="USBSTOR\Disk+Ven_Seagate+Prod_FreeAgentDesktop+Rev_100D\____________6QG05VR7+0" type="Device" activity="Start"
startTime="27572" endTime="35311" duration="7739" prePendTime="7739" description="Disk drive" friendlyName="Seagate FreeAgentDesktop USB Device"/>

A duration of 7.739 seconds seems a little long. But I'm a noob at this and this may be a background process?

MagicAndre will know. You may want to edit your post on his thread and add the .etl file from your trace so he can load it? Also I didn't see a direct link to your system summary on his thread. I don't know that he'll take to time to link over here?

Hopefully you'll get the answer soon,
Victor

 

[Raiddinn]

I was about to comment on that one too. If you have a USB Thumb Drive in the computer take it out and see if it still takes forever to start. You may have to delete the program to get it to not do what it is doing, though.

I did note, however, that pnpBootStartDuration in his example is about 2.5 seconds long and in your list it is a full 9 seconds. That is a 6.5 second discrepancy.

This seems to be your problem area in that regard

<pnpObject name="PCI\VEN_8086+DEV_1D02+SUBSYS_84EF1043+REV_05\3+11583659+0+FA" type="Device" activity="Enum" startTime="4602" endTime="8683" duration="4080" prePendTime="4080" description="Intel(R) C600 Series Chipset SATA AHCI Controller" friendlyName=""/>
<pnpObject name="PCIIDE\IDEChannel\5+3a447424+0+0" type="Device" activity="Enum" startTime="1032" endTime="4541" duration="3509" prePendTime="0" description="IDE Channel" friendlyName="ATA Channel 0"/>
<pnpObject name="PCIIDE\IDEChannel\5+3a447424+0+1" type="Device" activity="Enum" startTime="1033" endTime="4541" duration="3508" prePendTime="0" description="IDE Channel" friendlyName="ATA Channel 1"/>

- Edit - I have all the same things listed in my device manager under IDE devices too. I quickly glanced around in my BIOS and I didn't see a way to easily turn that stuff off. I was looking for ATA/ATAPI stuff, but I didn't really see too much of that type of setting that I wanted to mess with.

 

[jaquith]

^ 3508 milliseconds = 3.508 seconds

Let me do a little more research...I've not used this program but it looks interesting...

Q - What 'tweaks' if any have you made to the Page File and/or SSD 'tweaks'??

144166 milliseconds = 144.166 seconds = 2.40 minutes
<process name="xbootmgrSleep.exe" startTime="23703" endTime="144166" lifetime="120463"/>

average 63500 milliseconds = 63.5 seconds = ~1 minute / each
<process name="reader_sl.exe" startTime="25516" endTime="85927" lifetime="60410"/>
<process name="WmiPrvSE.exe" startTime="27327" endTime="95123" lifetime="67795"/>

 

[Raiddinn]

I realize that 3508 ms is the same thing as 3.5s

AFAIK, the xbootmgrsleep and wmiprvse listings are normal.

Also AFAIK, those things happen after he has logged in, which doesn't really matter to him.

The things slowing his boot down by a couple seconds here and there before he gets to the login screen are what he is concerned about I think.

I am no wizard with this stuff, but that is how I understand everything.

 

[jaquith]

^I just do what I originally posted, and BEFORE I install ANY applications I test both Windows and the PC -- then I make damn certain any Applications I use are fully compatible with my OS and lastly the only 'tweeks' I do to my SSD is to:
1. Run WEI once so Windows knows I have an SSD install and Disables Defrag.
2. Reduce the Page File to 2048MB / 2048MB
3. I don't 'tweak' - long run those 'tweaks' do more harm than good.

So far "xbootmgrSleep.exe" is a symptom of something else...

 

[Raiddinn]

<pnpObject name="PCI\VEN_8086+DEV_1D02+SUBSYS_84EF1043+REV_05\3+11583659+0+FA" type="Device" activity="Enum" startTime="4602" endTime="8683" duration="4080" prePendTime="4080" description="Intel(R) C600 Series Chipset SATA AHCI Controller" friendlyName=""/>
<pnpObject name="PCIIDE\IDEChannel\5+3a447424+0+0" type="Device" activity="Enum" startTime="1032" endTime="4541" duration="3509" prePendTime="0" description="IDE Channel" friendlyName="ATA Channel 0"/>
<pnpObject name="PCIIDE\IDEChannel\5+3a447424+0+1" type="Device" activity="Enum" startTime="1033" endTime="4541" duration="3508" prePendTime="0" description="IDE Channel" friendlyName="ATA Channel 1"/>

Upon further inspection, these seem to be somehow linked to SATA devices like hard drives and CD drives. Like it is waiting 3 - 4 seconds for each device for whatever reason. It is possible that in Magic Andre's example there just was 1 whole less device connected (no CD drive, for example) and that might account for most of the reduction.

Then again, I am no expert on this stuff, just looking into it as I go along.

- Edit - Going back to what I said earlier, could you disconnect a CD drive if you have it and unplug some sort of external hard drive if you have one and then re-run the above trace and make a second pastebin with the new information in it. I would like to compare the two.

 

[vicbyrd]

I see that MagicAndre identified your Intel SATA controller as an issue and confirmed the the Passport is also slowing things down. Looks consistent with the results "guessed at" by the other posters here. Let us know how your reconfiguration works.

TIA

 

[jaquith]

Huh?! - http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/314615-30-unusually-slow-uefi-boot-time#t2108773

144166 milliseconds = 144.166 seconds = 2.40 minutes
<process name="xbootmgrSleep.exe" startTime="23703" endTime="144166" lifetime="120463"/>

average 63500 milliseconds = 63.5 seconds = ~1 minute / each
<process name="reader_sl.exe" startTime="25516" endTime="85927" lifetime="60410"/>
<process name="WmiPrvSE.exe" startTime="27327" endTime="95123" lifetime="67795"/>

 

[bikeracer4487]

Sorry, Jaquith, missed your question about my tweaks. The only real tweaks I did were to set the page file to 16MB / 512MB, turn off indexing and write caching, and and disable prefetch and superfetch.

Really not sure what to do about the SATA controller issue...not really any way I can work around that... And plugging in that USB external drive after start up, would be really annoying and kind of negate the benefit of a fast startup... I'm currently trying to figure out how to crack open the enclosure without damaging the hard drive inside so I can swap it into a USB 3.0 enclosure...

 

[jaquith]

The only tweak I can buy into is the Indexing, and I 'get' the reasons behind the others IF you had a puny SSD. Further, I would undo those and use a 2048MB/2048MB Page File.

IF you installed the OS from the DVD and RSTE Driver from a USB then that's a known problem. The Guide ... the Guide ... follow it.

--

Edit - then the completely goofy thing is for the GB or two saved the SSD performance drops -- worst is folks forget Default locations of stuff like their OST or PST files. My wife's is ~40GB for her OL...but she likes snappy searches.

 

[bikeracer4487]

Haha, I know, I know, I installed both the drivers and the OS from the same USB drive. As for the page file, that came from the guide that YOUR guide referred me to. I wasn't expected a huge increase in performance or hard drive life, I just didn't really see the need for a very large page file when I've got 16GB in physical memory.

 

[jaquith]

Imagine my defaults (32GB RAM) 32GB / 48GB. The first thing I did was to change it, but Apps like Adobe run like crap with anything less, and ideally 'nowadays' you shouldn't need any...

The only reference I meant for folks to use (see) is setting up a bootable and flash drive install. I could simply write how to do it but the visual aide seemed nice.

 

[gitprofnikat]

I noticed in ASUS' videos on overclocking, that their boot times, whether in stock or overclocked modes, on their UEFI motherboards have that same delay in loading Windows that you are discussing, and what I have noticed on with my P9X79/3930K sysem as well, where the latter part of the loading just prior to sign on is longer than on my Dell XPS9100 with an x58/960 combo. I wonder if it's just a function of how these UEFI motherboards behave, compared to the older standard BIOS based systems, since the components are otherwise relatively similar, and, as mentioned, with faster processors, you'd expect faster, if anything. I have my Marvell SATA controller turned off, have 32 GB Quad RAM, NVidia 670 Graphics, and no other cards plugged into slots. I have a 240 GB Force 3 GT main hard drive, and a 512 M4 SSD for data/backup...no mechanical drives, and 2 LG optical drives. I have virtually everything turned off in MSCONFIG Startup, so I too was surprised to be booting more slowly than with the Dell, but we're only talking about 6 seconds or so, so what is really the big deal, other than for the interesting academic discussion.

 

[gitprofnikat]

I should add that I have the latest BIOS motherboard update, 2104, so that's not the problem unless subsequent updates might improve the situation!

 

[TETRAGRAMMATON7]

Typically this is a sign of Memory, the UEFI go through a process @ boot to check the: RAM, CPU, MOBO, etc -- i.e. all of those LEDs you see it polling through.

There are a couple versions of "16GB (4x4GB) Corsair Vengeance DDR3-1600" -- one is a Dual Channel kit and the other is a Quad Channel kit but each has different CAS Timings.

Q - What Vengeance kit? ; please provide a link

In the UEFI (BIOS) make certain AI Overclock Turner -> XMP and look at the VCCSA Voltage in particular. The difference between some Dual (24) & Quad (27) is the TRAS timing and the VCCSA and/or PLL Voltages. There are 9-9-9-24 Quad kits, but being optimized for Quad Channel includes both deeper timings i.e. beyond (CAS-TRCD-TRP-TRAS) and deeper Voltages i.e. beyond (DRAM and VCCSA).

Example:
CMZ16GX3M4X1600C9 9-9-9-27 ; Quad
CMZ16GX3M4A1600C9 9-9-9-24 ; Dual

Further, I've found the best way to install the OS on an X79 is to set the Intel SATA -> RAID and if needed set it back to AHCI later. This insures the Intel RSTE driver is installed to reduce corruption down the line and reduce some other oddball issues like waking from hybrid sleep, etc -- and added benefit is improved HDD (R/W).

Guide - http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/303873-30-wont-resume-sleep-booted-raid#t2068879

I've got 16G of Corsair Vengeance 8-8-8-2-24...not bought as a Quad Mem Pack but both DIMMS come from the same batch. Seems to be OK until now...a few other things I'd like to try first! Speed!?...the more the better!

 

[michael.holopainen]

One word: USB

specially hubs.. My computer booted in about 10s.

Then connected my dislays usb to computer and moved keyboard wireless usb dongle to my monitor. Now UEFI boot takes from 3-7 minutes! And this BEFORE the OS even stars to load.

So rip out all usb devices and cables and connect usb keyboad direcly to motherboards usb connector and see if computer boots fast.

 

[w00tsy]

This solved a similar issue for me. I had an NZXT USB-HUB Rev 1.1 installed, unplugged it completely and the system went from 2 min boot time to 30 secs.

One word: USB

specially hubs.. My computer booted in about 10s.

Then connected my dislays usb to computer and moved keyboard wireless usb dongle to my monitor. Now UEFI boot takes from 3-7 minutes! And this BEFORE the OS even stars to load.

So rip out all usb devices and cables and connect usb keyboad direcly to motherboards usb connector and see if computer boots fast.