unless you have a really sucky DHCP server, you're not going to shave even a second off your boot time

-f0dder (November 23, 2008, 12:28 PM)

Hmm, are you calling my DHCP server "sucky" f0dder? :P Anyway, in theory, I'd tend to agree with you on that point, but in practice, I've seen a definite improvement by assigning a static IP instead. Besides, on a home network with just a handful of PC connected, it's not a bad idea to have static IPs for each one

why do people obsess over boot time, anyway?

-f0dder (November 23, 2008, 12:28 PM)

Again, this is very personal. It may not matter to you, but it doesn't mean it can't matter for anyone, right? In my case, when I want to start using my PC, I want to start using my PC *now* or at least in a few seconds, not in 5 minutes. Imagine if each time you're going to use your car (I don't have a car, btw, but the example is good  :D), you'd have to wait for a few minutes until the car "boots up". To some people it wouldn't matter, but I'm sure others would find it very annoying.

Where was I when this thread started?!?!  :P

I'm sort of a "boot time junkie" so I try to minimize it as much as I can. Not that I reboot very often, but I hate having to *wait* for my PC to start

Anyway, I've just finished reading all this thread and thought about giving my 2 cents on the subject

MS Bootvis, which is not supported by MS since XP was released, can do this for some users, but I have found that it cannot complete its goal if you are running a dual core processor, which I am.

-J-Mac (January 30, 2008, 11:27 PM)

Are you sure about that, Jim? Because I'm running a dual core CPU and Bootvis runs just fine  :huh:

A few tips that I've found do decrease, in some cases noticeably, startup and shutdown times:

- Check your (Windows) services. You're most likely running more services in Automatic mode than necessary. The ultimate reference site to find out which services are really needed is Black Viper's
- Make sure you boot from your fastest partition and try to keep it small and defragged
- If possible, try to assign your PC a STATIC IP (<- This one really made a difference in my case) instead of letting it get a dynamic one assigned by a DHCP server (probably a router or another PC)
- Defrag your prefetch folder (<- this one also noticeably improved my start up time). The simplest way is to run from the Command Prompt (replacing "C:" with your boot drive letter if it's not "C:")
- Use Bootvis to see what's going on during boot time and identify executables and drivers that might be causing unnecessary delays
- Use Autoruns to prevent a number of unneeded programs from running at startup (I mean do you *really* need the "Java online update program" to run on EVERY boot?)

By using all of the above (and maybe a few others that I can't remember now) I've been able to bring my system down to a very fast 45 seconds total reboot time, measured from when I press the green restart button until I can see the desktop wallpaper again (I'm using auto login since I'm the only one using this PC). Not bad  :)

Paul, I don't think it lets you save the tasklist as a "session", but you can easily overcome that by first creating a "default" tasklist, and then opening it and saving it with another name to keep the "default" one unchanged and have it available later as a sort of template. You can then work with the newly saved tasklist and save its state whenever you like. The program also gives you the option (in Preferences) to keep a number of backup copies of each tasklist.