Boot time query

[Forum Man]

Given the expertise displayed in other posts, I am a relative novice.
I recently purchased a new desktop PC. Config below. I have added a PCIe card to support four extra SATA disks – just two installed.
I am a little concerned/curious about the boot time. I installed Win 11 Pro on the new system and applied all MS updates and driver updates. The boot now takes the following times.

From power on to Bios invite to press DEL key - 35 seconds

Duration of invite screen - 30 seconds

First Windows screen appears after - 30 more seconds

Total boot to PIN invite - 1 min 35 seconds.

Compared to my old Win 10 system this is quite long.

But is it typical and normal? If so, read no further!!



I asked the PCS view and their support person pointed me to this:

The default setting on a new Win 11 Pro install is to have FAST STARTUP enabled in the Power Options settings. I checked and it is enabled.

The PCS advice is to disable it in order to speed up the boot time. This appears to me to be counter-intuitive?

Can someone explain why turning off FAST STARTUP might speed up the boot time? I am slow to change the setting until I understand the reason. Searches suggest it makes no difference.

FM



Case
FRACTAL DEFINE 7 BLACK QUIET MID-TOWER CASE
Promotional Item
Get a discount code for 20% off select peripherals at Corsair.com
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 9 7900 12 Core CPU (4.0GHz-5.4GHz/76MB CACHE/AM5)
Motherboard
ASUS® TUF GAMING X670E-PLUS WIFI (AM5, DDR5, PCIe 5.0, Wi-Fi 6E)
Memory (RAM)
32GB Corsair VENGEANCE RGB DDR5 5600MHz (2 x 16GB)
Graphics Card
INTEGRATED GRAPHICS ACCELERATOR (GPU)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
512GB SOLIDIGM P44 PRO GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 7000MB/sR, 4700MB/sW)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
2TB SOLIDIGM P41+ GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 4125MB/sR, 3325MB/sW)
1st Storage Drive
6TB SEAGATE IRONWOLF PRO 3.5", 7200 RPM 256MB CACHE
Power Supply
CORSAIR 750W RMe SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1.5 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
DeepCool AK620 ZERO DARK High-Performance Dual Tower CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Card
ONBOARD 2.5Gbe LAN PORT
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED

 

[TonyCarter]

I'm noticing much longer boot-to-desktop times on the AM5 (7800x3D) platform than I did on the AM4 (5800X)...and I know some of it has to do with memory training at each boot (which is under Memory Context Restore on Asus motherboards which can be turned off if your's is stable...but will only save 10 seconds in my experience).

But even with that off, my boot-to-desktop takes 50-70 seconds (according to the start-up time in task manager), vs the 15-20 seconds it took previously. But I only turn it on & off once a day, so 20 seconds extra won't really matter.

 

[ubuysa]

Fast Startup causes Windows to hibernate the kernel on a normal shutdown. On a cold boot the kernel is resumed, thus reducing the Windows startup time. This really only makes any difference if the boot drive is an HDD, if the boot drive is an SSD (as yours is) then Fast Startup doesn't really make much difference.

Some third-party drivers don't play that well with Fast Startup and so with an SSD boot drive it's much better to disable Fast Startup and avoid any driver issues.

There is a similar (but different) feature in the BIOS settings called Fast Boot. This causes the UEFI firmware to load the minimal set of device drivers required to start the Windows boot process. If this option is not enabled it might be worth enabling it to see whether it helps. If it doesn't you can always disable it again.

Did it take longer to boot after you'd installed the SATA PCIe card? Or has it always been like this?

 

[SpyderTracks]

May be worth checking your BIOS version also, early BIOS revisions had a bug where they would do memory training on each boot, it should only occur on the first boot.

Memory training takes about 1 minute.

**Do check the version, but don't update the BIOS without checking with PCS first, you may void your warranty otherwise.** thanks @ubuysa

 

[ubuysa]

Do check the version, but don't update the BIOS without checking with PCS first, you may void your warranty otherwise.

 

[SpyderTracks]

Do check the version, but don't update the BIOS without checking with PCS first, you may void your warranty otherwise.

Yep, 100%, apologies, should have stated that!

 

[Forum Man]

May be worth checking your BIOS version also, early BIOS revisions had a bug where they would do memory training on each boot, it should only occur on the first boot.

Memory training takes about 1 minute.

**Do check the version, but don't update the BIOS without checking with PCS first, you may void your warranty otherwise.** thanks @ubuysa

Thanks for your interest. Yes, the BIOS is the latest available.
FM

 

[Forum Man]

Fast Startup causes Windows to hibernate the kernel on a normal shutdown. On a cold boot the kernel is resumed, thus reducing the Windows startup time. This really only makes any difference if the boot drive is an HDD, if the boot drive is an SSD (as yours is) then Fast Startup doesn't really make much difference.

Some third-party drivers don't play that well with Fast Startup and so with an SSD boot drive it's much better to disable Fast Startup and avoid any driver issues.

There is a similar (but different) feature in the BIOS settings called Fast Boot. This causes the UEFI firmware to load the minimal set of device drivers required to start the Windows boot process. If this option is not enabled it might be worth enabling it to see whether it helps. If it doesn't you can always disable it again.

Did it take longer to boot after you'd installed the SATA PCIe card? Or has it always been like this?

Thank you for those comments Ubuysa.
I will go ahead and disable the Fast Startup.
Boot time is the same with or without the PCIe card.
I can find no reference to a Fast Boot in the BIOS?? I assumed that Fast Startup was just another name for Fast Boot.
Should there also be a Fast Boot setting? I recall it as being called POST in times past.
In summary it appears that 1 min 30 secs is about par for the Boot course.
So I'll sleep easy
F M

 

[ubuysa]

Some BIOSes have the Fast Boot option and some don't. Don't worry that you don't, you really can sleep easy.

From power on to Bios invite to press DEL key - 35 seconds

This is the Power On Self Test (POST) running. Some BIOSes allow you to specify how thorough you want the POST to be. If you have such an option in your BIOS set the test to the minimum length.

Duration of invite screen - 30 seconds

Most BIOSes allow you to specify how long the 'Press F2 or Del to enter BIOS setup' should be displayed. Find that option (if your BIOS has it) and reduce that to around 10 seconds.

First Windows screen appears after - 30 more seconds

This is the Windows boot time. If you open Task Manager and click the Startup tab. On there you can see which processes have the highest impact on Windows boot time. Post a screenshot if you'd like help with that.