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Quick Boot Linux Hopes To Win Over Windows Users
Al writes "A company called Presto hopes to exploit the painful amount of time it takes for Windows computers to start up by offering a streamlined version of Linux that boots in just seconds. Presto's distro comes with Firefox, Skype and other goodies pre-installed and the company has also created an app store so that users can install only what they really need. The software was demonstrated at this year's Demo conference in Palm Desert, CA. Interestingly, the company barely mentions the name Linux on its website. Is this a clever stealth-marketing ploy for converting Windows users to Linux?"
Perhaps I am the exception to the rule but every machine I have ever used (and I've used a bunch) boots faster than it comes out of hibernation.
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
I really don't get this mentality. My first gen Asus 701 took all of 30 seconds to fully boot. I've since put UbuntuEee on it an it now takes about 40 seconds. IS your life that full that you just can't wait less than a minute?
Netbooks aren't meant to be whipped out for quick searches. They're meant to be an ultra portable that surfs, does email, word processing and other work. Pretty much what you would use a back breaking laptop for.
My XP box that I'm using now at work (2 core 2.33 GHz Xeon) boot Windows REALLY fast. It is under 30 seconds to get to the "Ctrl-Alt-Del to login" screen. It's great.
Then you log in.
Then you wait 5 minutes or so for it to finish loading everything and settle down enough to be usable (the desktop comes up nearly instantly but can't be used). If you open Outlook (as I have to), you're waiting another 5 minutes for that too.
I'm disk limited (a faster disk would help things) but it's just terrible. I can get in quick, but I can't do anything for minutes afterwords (like a simple Firefox open and search).
My Mac (MBP, 2.4GHz) doesn't boot as fast, maybe a minute to get to the desktop? But when the desktop comes up the computer is usable. It feels slow as it finishes loading stuff, but as soon as I get to the desktop I can start issuing commands (open Safari, etc.) and they happen. I doesn't feel "stuck" like XP does just after start-up.
As others have said, there is a simple solution to all this. My Mac is almost never off, it sleeps when I move it. It comes up and ready in like 3 seconds. By the time I finish opening the display, it's ready. My XP box is never turned off or logged off, I lock it. It unlocks in 2-3 seconds. If it were to hibernate, it'd only take a few seconds longer, still light years ahead of a boot.
I can tell you that these kind of things (little fast OSes) can get obnoxious. As soon as you run into a limitation (say you want to access something you don't have setup it in, or a program like Quicken) you have to suffer the full reboot. When you want to transition there is no easy way. You can't take your surfing from the fast-boot environment with you into Windows. All that rebooting gets really annoying. Now that I have a phone that can do a quick look-up on the 'net, I have even less reason to boot into this to see that "one quick thing".
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
I'm not sure it's the apps. I think what actually happens is that Vista puts up a login prompt well before it has truly finished booting. i.e. before all the services have started.
The result is that you can login but the machine runs like a dog with no legs for the next 5 minutes as it tries to complete the boot process and deal with you trying to use it all at once.
How long does it take your transistor radio to switch on? What about your television? (Unless it is decades old, it is probably two seconds or less.) When you turn on your kitchen tap, how long is it before water starts coming out? What about when you turn the ignition key in your car? Does it churn for 30 seconds before it is ready to drive off? (Well I know some cars do...)
If you think that 30 seconds is fast just because it is a computer, then I think you have really low standards.
(I know this wasn't the main point of your post.)
I never use hibernation for a few reasons.
1) It's a recipe for data loss on shared partitions if you dual boot.
2) I use an SSD and prefer 4 GB of space over saving ~20 seconds by hibernating instead of booting normally.
3) The OS gets a fresh start. This *shouldn't* matter, but often slightly affects speed and memory consumption.
4) Slowed boot time is an indicator of general performance issues. I might not notice a gradual doubling of application start up time, but boot times are more obvious.
Hibernation/Sleep is also not perfectly flawless. My dual-core WinXP workstation goes to sleep fine, wakes up fine ... but any application that uses 3D will find itself running at exactly half-speed until I do a reboot.
I suspect there's some multi-core weirdness that wasn't accounted for in a driver somewhere.
That goes off the topic. You should be asking "why *not*" rather than "why," under the simple premise that your way may not be The Way.