20 minute boot time, even after reinstallation of Windows

The Warden · Apr 22, 2010

Hello,

I'm currently experiencing an issue with a Visa Business laptop where it had suddenly been taking approximately 20 minutes to boot, after running various virus scans and checking through the boot logs I was unable to find a solution and as such decided to reinstall Windows to resolve my problem.

However, I have found that even after completely reformatting the drive and reinstalling Windows Visa I am still experiencing this extremely long boot time. I have observed that the long boot time does not occur if I select to boot in to safe mode, and for a large majority of the time when the computer is booting the hard disk activity light isn't even flashing with Windows freezing on some attempts while booting.

To attempt to see if this was a hardware issue I downloaded a copy of Linux Mint onto a DVD and booted from it, as expected it booted extremely fast (for a disk) compared to Windows. Being unable to fix the problem myself I have decided to finally request help from people whom would be more knowledgable in this area than me :P

To assist in finding the resolution of my problem I have included a copy of the bootlog (I have disabled the drivers that do not load and have noticed no difference in the overall boot time).

Thanks for your help,

Ed Canuck · Apr 22, 2010

Hi Plxply (first and only time I'll call you that),

This usually ain't a trivial exercise to diagnose.

Anything show up in Event Viewer or Reliability Monitor (see Administrative Tools in Control Panel).

I suggest you download Process Monitor, start it up, click on Options, Enable Boot Logging. Shut it down and reboot. When system is and running, start it up again, and it'll ask you if you want to save the file. You can then configure it to show the data you want to review (Options > Set columns), and set filters to weed it down to a manageable size. You'll particularly want to look at any entries that have Duration of more than a few seconds.

Ed

brummyfan · Apr 22, 2010

You need to run Malwarebytes, I am doing it now after opening your .txt file.
Malwarebytes Anti-Malware - Free software downloads and software reviews - CNET Download.com
Good luck.

The Warden · Apr 22, 2010

Thank you for your assistance, I have followed your instructions and have slimmed down the 250mb file to 15mb by only allowing events that take longer than 1 second to process.

Due to the fact I have repeatedly been recieving errors while attempting to upload it (possibly due to my horrible upload speed) I have uploaded it to MediaFire I hope this does not inconvenience anyone too much.

Logfile.zip

The largest time appears to be coming from svchost.exe taking around 240 seconds to do whatever it's trying to do, I understand that this could mean any service on the system. Is there an easy way to determine what service is making it take so long?

Thanks for your help again.

Ed Canuck · Apr 22, 2010

You can get mucho info by right-clicking any entry and clicking on Properties.

The biggie here is Windows Error reporting Service, and Avast is also a suspect..

Try running Run > MSConfig. Click on Selective Startup, then Startup tab, Disable any Avast programs. Click on Services, disable Windows Error Reporting Service, click on Apply and OK, and Restart.

See what the difference is. You're probably going to have to do some trial and error testing to isolate the culprits.

Ed

The Warden · Apr 22, 2010

Removing the Windows Error Reporting Service for startup as well as Avast seems to of had no effect on the total amount of time which Windows takes to boot. I am currently waiting for it to boot with boot logging enabled once again to hopefully find what is still causing Windows to boot slowly.

EDIT: I have now included the log for after disabling avast and the error reporting service, the large slowdown of 240 seconds has disappeared although the computer is still booting rather slowly, and isn't being reflected within the times presented by Process Monitor. Is it possible it's happening before Process Monitor starts to log information?

Logfile.zip

Ed Canuck · Apr 22, 2010

I'm afraid you're going to have to take the "trial and error" approach.

Start with MSConfig disabling all of your Startup programs, In Services click on Hide all Microsoft Services; then disable all the rest.

Restart. Your boot time should be similar to booting in Safe mode.

If not, then disable the Microsoft services one at a time, starting with Windows Error Reporting, until you notice a discernible difference.

If it is, then activate each of the other services one at a time, then each of the Startup programs, one at a time.

Best of luck,

Ed

The Warden · Apr 22, 2010

Hello again,

I've gone through every service which is included under the "Tweaked" section of this guide (Windows Vista Service Pack 2 Service Configurations by Black Viper) and disabled every once which is also recommended on the chart. However I'm still having the long startup time issue, as it would be next to impossible to disable any of the other services as they most likely provide a function that allows for a network connection or something which I commonly use would it be a good idea to consider using another operating system such as Linux on this computer to avoid the horrible boot time?

Thanks for your continued help,

Ed Canuck · Apr 22, 2010

I think you misunderstood. I was only talking about disabling the services/programs for the purpose of isolating what was causing the long boot times.

Forget about what you need on an everyday basis; we're talking about a debugging session and starting from scratch. Don't try to run any of your normal programs while you're doing it. Once we identify the problem(s), you can, hopefully, get back to normal.

Ed

kenny111111 · Apr 22, 2010

hello

see if this helps explain what Ed is talking about.....good luck

Perform a clean startup to determine whether background programs are interfering with your game or program

Katokato · Apr 22, 2010

dont forget brink's tutorials: http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/70563-boot-up.html?filter[11]=Performance%20Maintenance

what are your system specs, even though it may not be hardware, never hurts to give us as much info as possible.

run at the elevated command prompt: sfc /scannow to scan for itnegrity issues vista is having.

update ur os to sp2 make sure u get system restore in case u want to go back to sp1.

do every tweak you find/trust.

Ed Canuck · Apr 23, 2010

Thanks for jumping in, guys.

I think I was suffering from a little burnout late yesterday and wasn't explaining things too well.

Ed

The Warden · Apr 23, 2010

kenny111111 said:
Perform a clean startup to determine whether background programs are interfering with your game or program

Thanks for your advice I have followed the steps within the guide although I seem to be having the long boot issue, although I do appreciate anyones input at this point

Katokato said:
dont forget brink's tutorials: http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/70563-boot-up.html?filter[11]=Performance%20Maintenance

I have followed the information contained within the guide although I still appear to be having the same issues.

Katokato said:
what are your system specs, even though it may not be hardware, never hurts to give us as much info as possible.

Sony Vaio VGN-SR26GN
Windows Vista Business SP2 32-bit
CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo P8400 2.27ghz
RAM: 3GB
Hard drive: Toshiba MK2546GSX (250GB)
Graphics: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3470

Katokato said:
run at the elevated command prompt: sfc /scannow to scan for itnegrity issues vista is having.

I have done previously following someone else's advice and had returned no results, although I have ran it once again, unfortunately that also reported the same as before.

Katokato said:
update ur os to sp2 make sure u get system restore in case u want to go back to sp1.

I have already done so as the installation disk I have used had SP2 included (as it was downloaded from TechNet)

Ed Canuck said:
I think I was suffering from a little burnout late yesterday and wasn't explaining things too well.

Your help so far has been excellent and I really do appreciate the effort you place into helping others.

Now, on to more bad news. I have gone into to Msconfig and hit the "Disable all" button on the services after applying it I noticed that only avast, task scheduler and Group policy remained enabled (I assume avast isn't the culprit as I was having the issue before I installed avast itself). After rebooting hoping that this would solve my problems I discovered that my computer is still taking an extremely long time to boot.

After eliminating all of the services is there anything else that could be causing a slow boot?

Thanks for everyone's help again,

brummyfan · Apr 23, 2010

Hi plxply,
Have you run Malwarebyetes?

Ed Canuck · Apr 23, 2010

1. Exactly how long does it take from BIOS screen to boot finish?

2. Did you disable all Startup programs as well? If not, do so, click Apply, and go back to the Services tab; disable all there , too, especially Avast, even though you don't think it's the problem, and click apply.

If you still have long boot with only Group Policy and Task Scheduler enabled, we're in a whole different ball game.

Ed

P.S. Back in an hour or two.

The Warden · Apr 23, 2010

brummyfan said:
Have you run Malwarebyetes?

Yes I have run a full scan with Malwarebytes and it did not detect anything, is there anyway that malware could potentially get onto the computer even after a re installation of Windows (excluding the possibility that the image from TechNet itself was infected)?

kenny111111 · Apr 23, 2010

hello
just thinking out loud... is the bios reset to boot the hdd in the 1st order?, also do you have any extra stuff plugged into the usb slots. (external hdd, wireless mouse) and one more thing make sure theres no dvd or cd in the tray....or an sd card (if it applies)...good luck

ps... how does it boot into safe mode??

The Warden · Apr 23, 2010

Ed Canuck said:
1. Exactly how long does it take from BIOS screen to boot finish?

I have just timed the boot process and it takes exactly 15 minutes and 37.45 seconds.

Ed Canuck said:
2. Did you disable all Startup programs as well? If not, do so, click Apply, and go back to the Services tab; disable all there , too, especially Avast, even though you don't think it's the problem, and click apply.

As Avast did not allow me to disable the services (as expected) I decided to completely remove the application and I can now confirm that the services and start-up application no longer shows in msconfig.

Ed Canuck said:
If you still have long boot with only Group Policy and Task Scheduler enabled, we're in a whole different ball game.

Something tells me this ball game isn't going to be fun

EDIT:

kenny111111 said:
hello
just thinking out loud... is the bios reset to boot the hdd in the 1st order?

I have previously reset the BIOS and also updated it thinking there may be an issue there, and it unfortunately hasn't resolved the issue.

kenny111111 said:
also do you have any extra stuff plugged into the usb slots. (external hdd, wireless mouse) and one more thing make sure theres no dvd or cd in the tray....or an sd card (if it applies)

Nothing is connected to the computer as it's booting, the only removable thing that's connected is the battery which I highly doubt would be causing an issue.

kenny111111 said:
ps... how does it boot into safe mode??

When booting into safe mode it takes approximately the same amount of time as booting the computer. Here is a picture of the information shown as the computer is booting into safe mode:

http://img534.imageshack.us/img534/6509/23042010078.jpg

Ed Canuck · Apr 23, 2010

Plxply said:
I have observed that the long boot time does not occur if I select to boot in to safe mode, and for a large majority of the time when the computer is booting the hard disk activity light isn't even flashing with Windows freezing on some attempts while booting.

This is from your very first post.

Plxply said:
When booting into safe mode it takes approximately the same amount of time as booting the computer. Here is a picture of the information shown as the computer is booting into safe mode:

So you're saying now that the "long boot time" now applies to Safe mode as well?

What changed?

Ed

The Warden · Apr 23, 2010

Ed Canuck said:
So you're saying now that the "long boot time" now applies to Safe mode as well?

What changed?

To be honest I'm not quite sure what has changed apart from the steps which you suggested, the first time which I booted into safe mode was literally right after Windows Vista installed to see if the boot problem persisted there.

Also to hopefully help more, the slow boot time was also evident during installation, as when the computer was restarting between the various stages (Installing Windows features ect) it was also going very slow compared to other installations I've done.

20 minute boot time, even after reinstallation of Windows

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