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[Forum] Bootup timeANN.lu
Posted on 14-Sep-2004 03:51 GMT by Anonymous129 comments
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Can anyone tell me how long it takes to boot a default install of AmigaOS4 on a Amigaone G3 or G4 system?
Bootup time : Comment 51 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Agima on 14-Sep-2004 17:35 GMT
In reply to Comment 50 (Don Cox):
@Don

I think you're right as far the ROM idea goes. Seems like it would be the quickest way to boot.

As far as ROM prices, yeah, you'd think they'd be dirt cheap and available in large sizes these days.
Bootup time : Comment 52 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Christophe Decanini on 14-Sep-2004 17:36 GMT
In reply to Comment 50 (Don Cox):
ROM access is still much slower than RAM or even HD.
Even on older Amigas you could get better performances with remapping ROM into RAM.
Bootup time : Comment 53 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 14-Sep-2004 17:44 GMT
In reply to Comment 52 (Christophe Decanini):
Certainly on old Amigas the ROM was slower than dynamic RAM. Is this still true of modern Flash ROMs? If so, why?

However, we are talking about boot times, not running speed. If you want the fastest boot time, don't copy.

I don't recall the speedup from copying the ROM into RAM being very much, but there was a speedup. However, a modern system also has much more CPU cache than an old Amiga - quite a lot of the Amiga OS would be running in cache. This still involves copying, of course, but in a way that would not impact booting.
Bootup time : Comment 54 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Christophe Decanini on 14-Sep-2004 18:09 GMT
In reply to Comment 53 (Don Cox):
ROM are certainly too expensive to host a desktop OS. Also flashing a ROM everytime you need a change in the OS is problematic.
An alternative would be to have first the system run and then copied from a CF (or from the network) to a RAD drive. Occasionaly you can commit the OS updates to the CF or to the network drive.
Bootup time : Comment 55 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Agima on 14-Sep-2004 18:16 GMT
In reply to Comment 52 (Christophe Decanini):
>>ROM access is still much slower than RAM or even HD.
>>Even on older Amigas you could get better performances with remapping ROM into RAM.

You're talking about 'old' Amiga rom technology vs. a ROM image being mapped into 32bit ram on an Accelerator card though. Of course it is going to be faster. That has more to do with the then Amiga rom technology VS. the newer RAM technology that came out on accelerator cards.


I think Don is meaning more of comparison with 'current' ROM technology vs. harddrive speed. I don't know which is faster. I would assume ROM technology just by it's solid state nature could be quicker than accessing data form a spinning disk. RAM obviously is a lot faster then hard drive technology. I don't see why it wouldn't be possible to read information from a ROM near the speed you can read it from RAM.
Bootup time : Comment 56 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Christophe Decanini on 14-Sep-2004 18:40 GMT
In reply to Comment 55 (Agima):
I don't know how the technology changed for ROMS speed wise but I assume that you can either have the low speed, low capacity ROMS such as the one used in the Amiga and other boards for the Amiga at a cheap price or get something more modern such as the ROMs found in the routers:
http://www.epinions.com/Read_Only_Memory-16_MB_or_more

This is a lot of money and who knows how fast it is.
The pegasos 1 has (or was supposed to have ?)a CF card connector.
My Activy set top box mobo has such a connector too. It looks that CF is the most affordable way to boot diskless.
Bootup time : Comment 57 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 14-Sep-2004 18:43 GMT
In reply to Comment 54 (Christophe Decanini):
"An alternative would be to have first the system run and then copied from a CF (or from the network) to a RAD drive."

A RAD drive is still a drive, with filesystem overhead.

The idea is not to copy at all. Have the OS actually there in memory, ready to run.

Anyone know the cost of 30 Megs of ROM?
Bootup time : Comment 58 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Kolbjørn Barmen on 14-Sep-2004 19:03 GMT
In reply to Comment 34 (Rafo):
Indeed - so what if it takes my A1200 a couple of minutes to boot, once it is up it will run for months. Not AmigaOS though, that penguin OS :)
Bootup time : Comment 59 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Agima on 14-Sep-2004 19:07 GMT
In reply to Comment 56 (Christophe Decanini):
I think that link is to FLASH memory not ROMs. FLASH is totaly different.

ROM is usually cheap. I'm thinking more the Nintedo cartridge type. Liek Zelda 64 was 32 megabytes I believe. The entire game only cost $50.
Bootup time : Comment 60 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 14-Sep-2004 20:36 GMT
In reply to Comment 6 (Anonymous):
My WinXP Pro-SP2 (Windows 2004) boot times are;
1. loads within 32 seconds (VGA BIOS Initiation to Login).
2. loads within 23 seconds via Hibernate (VGA BIOS Initiation to Desktop).

This via an AMD Athlon 64 3200+/nForce3/1GB PC3200 using Seagate 120GB 7200RPM PATA.
Bootup time : Comment 61 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 14-Sep-2004 20:43 GMT
In reply to Comment 7 (priest):
Boot times has very little to do with the processor (in a modern PC). Other issues apart from the processor will slow the boot time.
Bootup time : Comment 62 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 14-Sep-2004 20:45 GMT
In reply to Comment 6 (Anonymous):
What’s your boot time in that particular system?
Bootup time : Comment 63 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 14-Sep-2004 20:50 GMT
In reply to Comment 60 (hammer):
Addendum
Faster WinXP boot times can be reach by cutting down the services that Windows XP loads at boot time i.e. this is where MS Windows XP Embedded Edition’s target market.
Bootup time : Comment 64 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Dan on 14-Sep-2004 21:28 GMT
In reply to Comment 63 (hammer):
Bah, they are all snails compared to my Newton.
OS4,MOS,XP,WinCE/pocketpc, linux whatever my Newton MP2000 beats them all, press the button and it´s on.
Bootup time : Comment 65 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Christophe Decanini on 14-Sep-2004 21:44 GMT
In reply to Comment 59 (Agima):
I wanted to provide an example quickly and of course I ended up with something wrong.
The game cartridge is good example except that it can not be reflashed. Anyone knows what kind of performance it is up too ?
Bootup time : Comment 66 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Zylesea on 14-Sep-2004 22:04 GMT
In reply to Comment 63 (hammer):
@ hammer

Well don't forget while counting boot times with windows that windos
booting is not finished when entering the log on dialog, neither it is
when that funny melody sounds (if enabled) but after hd activity comes
down. Before all things aren't loaded the system is not up. My Me
setup does need only some 20 to 30 seconds to rach the log on, but to
be completely ready (hd activity comes to end..) it takes a goog 90 to
120 seconds (not too much installed (OOo, VisualC++, Sun's JRE,
Mozilla).

My W2k maschine (2.4Ghz celeron) comes surprisingly quick to the log
on dialog, but this marks at best the first 3rd or 4th of the whole
boot process...

MOS (Peg1) and QNX (PIII/650) reach a really finished stage after
about 20 (MOS) to 30 (QNX (incl. typing in my log on ID)) seconds.
Bootup time : Comment 67 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 15-Sep-2004 00:14 GMT
In reply to Comment 66 (Zylesea):
IF one wants compare "lack of services"/"bare minimalist" OS; why not compare it with ReactOS (Open source Windows NT4)? That is, ReactOS loads from VGA BIOS to Desktop about 16 seconds.

>Well don't forget while counting boot times with windows that windos
>booting is not finished when entering the log on dialog, neither it is
>when that funny melody sounds (if enabled) but after hd activity comes
>down.

With Windows NT (specifically WinXP) architecture, non-user specific services is loaded before login screen e.g. print and file server services.
Bootup time : Comment 68 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Bernie Meyer on 15-Sep-2004 00:29 GMT
In reply to Comment 48 (Don Cox):
No, it's not the interface --- it's the ROM itself which is slow.Why do you think PCs have the "shadow ram" option for all their ROM areas?
Bootup time : Comment 69 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 15-Sep-2004 00:38 GMT
In reply to Comment 66 (Zylesea):
> My Me setup does need only some 20 to 30 seconds to rach the log on, but to
>be completely ready (hd activity comes to end..) it takes a goog 90 to
>120 seconds

Add another 7 seconds on top of 32 seconds for the said A64 box. Program files directory's size is about 17.7GB (games are stored separately). Less after-login seconds can be achieved IF I remove SBAudigy’s agent (for Audigy's control panel).
Bootup time : Comment 70 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Bernie Meyer on 15-Sep-2004 00:46 GMT
In reply to Comment 44 (Christophe Decanini):
Yes, that sort of thing still aplies. Only what you are guaranteed is more like "any block can be written 10,000 times".Which really isn't a problem for loading your OS from it (Even if you update your OS every day, 10,000 writes are still about 30 years worth). On the other hand, if flash memory is all you have on, say, a ticket machine selling 1000+ tickets a day, which could lose power at any moment (thus can't store things in RAM for any period of time), can only communicate over an unreliable RF link, and has to be designed to work for 10 years, *then* you start to worry about this sort of thing.... :)
Bootup time : Comment 71 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 15-Sep-2004 00:55 GMT
In reply to Comment 69 (hammer):
Note that XPlite utility, some what duplicates the Windows XP Embedded Edition’s ability to control the installed MS Windows XP (Desktop)’s included components. This is just to illustrate the different products for different markets.

To keep things into perspective, Windows XP Embedded Edition’s installation base will out number the total AOS4.0 installation base.
Bootup time : Comment 72 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 15-Sep-2004 01:06 GMT
In reply to Comment 64 (Dan):
My old WinBIOS has similar function i.e. WIMP via PC’s BIOS.
Bootup time : Comment 73 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 15-Sep-2004 01:10 GMT
In reply to Comment 72 (hammer):
Addendum
Not referring to Win32 BIOS utility.
Bootup time : Comment 74 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hammer on 15-Sep-2004 01:14 GMT
In reply to Comment 73 (hammer):
Addendum2
To be specific, it’s an old PC Partner MB520N motherboard.
Bootup time : Comment 75 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by megol on 15-Sep-2004 02:49 GMT
In reply to Comment 22 (Don Cox):
"If you want a fast boot time, you have to put all of the OS in ROM. Any computer that loads its OS from a disk will be much slower than one that runs it in ROM."

Not necessary. The speed of a modern HDD is in the range 30-60MBps (sustained) on larger transfers, while the kind of "ROM" (Flash)used today have pretty slow access times. Yes Flash is faster but not as much as one can imagine. What kills the performance is the fact that most OS don't fetch big enough blocks from the HDD.

"Of course the obvious problem is that 30 or 40 Megs of ROM is expensive."

Again, not necessary... NAND Flash is pretty cheap.

"A perfect computer would boot in less than half a second (as Z80 computers did) and could be switched off at any moment (almost true of Amigas). It would be like a radio."

The way to accomplish that is to use a sleep mode and thus never needing to turn it off. The only other real way to speed it up would require a serious redesign of the operating system and hardware.
Bootup time : Comment 76 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by megol on 15-Sep-2004 02:55 GMT
In reply to Comment 32 (MarkTime):
Seek time _can_ easily be the limiting factor @ boot. But, yes the transfer speed difference makes that advantage mostly fictional. NAND Flash have ~12MBps peak transferrate, HDDs can have almost 4 times that...
Bootup time : Comment 77 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Bernie Meyer on 15-Sep-2004 03:38 GMT
In reply to Comment 76 (megol):
So for optimum bootup speed, load one 30MB block linearly from the harddisk into memory, and call it a ramdisk (or call it a "ROM" which is "simply there").Of course, the idea of booting up in half a second is unrealistic --- that works if your OS knows exactly what hardware it's running on, like in the case of the old Z80/6502 home computers. If you have to go discovering hardware (or, God forbid, checking for working memory --- which can be done nondestructively), things are going to take longer even at that stage.
Bootup time : Comment 78 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Jorge on 15-Sep-2004 04:55 GMT
In reply to Comment 59 (Agima):
>ROM is usually cheap

Just to add my 2c to the ROM storry: Battery backed SRam could do, as well. Is cheap, fast and relyable. - And can be updated by SW. Some use a ROM portion in case the battery fails...
Bootup time : Comment 79 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Jorge on 15-Sep-2004 05:04 GMT
In reply to Comment 76 (megol):
What ever you want, but (Small) Embedded sytems hardly use mechanical parts, and startup times of HDs are relevant for instant on. There's no way around this. Even IDE defines a (min) timeout for devices. No change to go around this.
A "ROM" a like system can execute in place, an inteligent pageing can even map ROM (pages) to RAM on the fly, without any noticeable interaction (e.g. FastROM or the like). So, no limits on slow Flash/ROM/SDRam or whatever you want devices.
Embedded systems also try to avoid mechanical parts simply because they might break faster (well HDs have a good MTBF now).
BTW: Does anyone no, if the XBox boots the HD before a game can be played ? I hardly believe it...no other console does!
Bootup time : Comment 80 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by priest on 15-Sep-2004 05:54 GMT
In reply to Comment 32 (MarkTime):
You missed the point totally. Curently one of the biggest boot time bottlenec is the spinup of HDD. Compact flash works immediately. No delay.
Bootup time : Comment 81 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 15-Sep-2004 05:55 GMT
In reply to Comment 60 (hammer):
"1. loads within 32 seconds (VGA BIOS Initiation to Login).
2. loads within 23 seconds via Hibernate (VGA BIOS Initiation to Desktop)."

And my argument is that this is 100 times too slow. How do you engineer a boot in half a second or less, such as we had 20 years ago?

Yes, the OS is bigger now, with a GUI instead of a DOS prompt, but also the hardware is at least 100 times faster, so it should have kept up.
Bootup time : Comment 82 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by priest on 15-Sep-2004 05:55 GMT
In reply to Comment 34 (Rafo):
"have to reboot"

Depends totally on the use of a computer.
Bootup time : Comment 83 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 15-Sep-2004 05:57 GMT
In reply to Comment 64 (Dan):
"my Newton MP2000 beats them all, press the button and it´s on."

As it should be, but can you be more precise. Half a second? Quarter of a second?
Bootup time : Comment 84 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by priest on 15-Sep-2004 05:58 GMT
In reply to Comment 36 (DoctorMorbius_FP):
Can MOS be booted from the RAM drive then?


(just to be "geek" ...)
Bootup time : Comment 85 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 15-Sep-2004 06:02 GMT
In reply to Comment 75 (megol):
"The speed of a modern HDD is in the range 30-60MBps (sustained) on larger transfers, while the kind of "ROM" (Flash)used today have pretty slow access times."

But while you are "transferring" that code, the code in a ROM is actually being executed.

How slow is "pretty slow" and why is it so slow? What is the technical problem in ROM design that makes it 1000 times (or whatever) slower than dynamic RAM?
Bootup time : Comment 86 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Dan on 15-Sep-2004 06:46 GMT
In reply to Comment 83 (Don Cox):
Posted by Don Cox (Registered user) on 15-Sep-2004 07:57:11
In Reply to Comment 64 (Dan):
"my Newton MP2000 beats them all, press the button and it´s on."

As it should be, but can you be more precise. Half a second? Quarter of a second?
Less than a second. tired to clock it by hand and got results from 70/100s of a second to 1 second and 10/100.
Coldboot when the batterypack is removed takes 11s.

My Ti-89, 68000 12Mhz-based graphing calculator also clocks under a second.
My 300Mhz pocketpc 1,3 seconds and 1,5s havent clocked coldboot but it says wait 30s on the screen when it does one.
My Z80 based graphing calculators, TI82,TI85,TI86 boots in a half second or less.

Anyone has the boottime for Palm pdas or Psions?

Of course the Newton and the calculators have a superior userinterfaces to desktops or pocketpc.
Steve Jobs is just another Bill Gates, the Newton could have revolutionize how "computers" is used but he killed it because of office-politics and started the iSuck line of goodlooking crap.

Yes, I loved the Newton it was even better than Amigas!
Bootup time : Comment 87 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by priest on 15-Sep-2004 06:53 GMT
In reply to Comment 80 (priest):
"Curently one of the biggest boot time bottlenec is the spinup of HDD"

Hmmm... I should have said "one of the biggest" bottlenec.

Especially so if one is going to improve from peg2 10 seconds. ;)
Bootup time : Comment 88 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by priest on 15-Sep-2004 06:53 GMT
In reply to Comment 87 (priest):
LOL!

I can not read what I wrote. (time to take a nap)
Bootup time : Comment 89 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Dan on 15-Sep-2004 06:59 GMT
In reply to Comment 86 (Dan):
Why worry about bootup time?
Its shut down time that irritates me when I´m at a pc. (no don´t come dragging with the sleep mode I tried it once and lost some work, won´t use it again on a desktop pc)
BTW has anyone noticed that all the really cool portables/pdas runs on standard batteries like AA. first Palms, the Newton, Psion, HP200XL, the first HP Omnibooks.
Bootup time : Comment 90 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by itix on 15-Sep-2004 07:03 GMT
My C64 is ready in 1 second. Winner?
Bootup time : Comment 91 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hooligan/dcs on 15-Sep-2004 07:26 GMT
In reply to Comment 90 (itix):
My Casio calculator starts in fraction of a second. Next.
Bootup time : Comment 92 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Nicolas Mendoza on 15-Sep-2004 07:53 GMT
In reply to Comment 91 (hooligan/dcs):
My AmigaOne is always on ;D
Bootup time : Comment 93 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by priest on 15-Sep-2004 08:18 GMT
Relevance:
- it's a good feature if desktop OS can start up fast (as well as shut down)
- it can ease the pain of system setup
- it makes OS crash slightly more tolerable
- fast startup also makes it easier to use the OS in some embedded device (where immediate startup is expected)
- it's ALMOST as good performance meter as MIPS rating ;-)
Bootup time : Comment 94 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by hooligan/dcs on 15-Sep-2004 09:01 GMT
In reply to Comment 92 (Nicolas Mendoza):
Ok, but when you started it for the FIRST time, how did the boottime compare to my Casio's fraction of a second? :)
Bootup time : Comment 95 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Christophe Decanini on 15-Sep-2004 11:39 GMT
In reply to Comment 81 (Don Cox):
"2. loads within 23 seconds via Hibernate (VGA BIOS Initiation to Desktop)."

My wife ibook take about 1s to wake up from sleep. This is pretty good as the machine is very rarely rebooted.
Bootup time : Comment 96 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Agima on 15-Sep-2004 12:21 GMT
I think there is a lot of confusion about the difference between ROM, FLASH Memory, and then things like Compact Flash cards that can be used like a harddrive.

Compact Flash type cards have a slower data rate than HDD. Something around 12MB/sec that people are quoting here and would most likely be slower at loading your OS.


What I think Don is talking about is the possibility of putting the OS some where else, like ROM or FLASH memory.

ROM can be read near the speed of RAM and is much much faster than an HDD.

There are different kinds of FLASH memory. Some flash memory actually is 'RAM' that has a battery integrated into it that saves the data. Battery life on these is typically 5 to 10 years. (There may be some these days that recharge that battery). But this type of FLASH has data transfer rates like RAM, because it actually is RAM and can be written to and erased at will.
Bootup time : Comment 97 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 15-Sep-2004 13:01 GMT
In reply to Comment 96 (Agima):
"ROM can be read near the speed of RAM and is much much faster than an HDD."

Bernie says it's much slower, but I think he is defending some kind of Unix-like OS which could not be used from a ROM.


"There are different kinds of FLASH memory. Some flash memory actually is 'RAM' that has a battery integrated into it that saves the data. Battery life on these is typically 5 to 10 years. (There may be some these days that recharge that battery). But this type of FLASH has data transfer rates like RAM, because it actually is RAM and can be written to and erased at will."

That sounds like what we want.
Bootup time : Comment 98 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Nicolas Mendoza on 15-Sep-2004 13:06 GMT
In reply to Comment 94 (hooligan/dcs):
It was on when I got it. :-P
Bootup time : Comment 99 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Christophe Decanini on 15-Sep-2004 13:09 GMT
In reply to Comment 96 (Agima):
"ROM can be read near the speed of RAM and is much much faster than an HDD."

By any chance do you have some information supporting this ?
I always thought ROM speed was always much slower than RAM speed.
Bootup time : Comment 100 of 129ANN.lu
Posted by Agima on 15-Sep-2004 13:16 GMT
In reply to Comment 97 (Don Cox):
>>Bernie says it's much slower, but I think he is defending some kind of Unix-like OS which could not be used from a ROM.


There are all kinds of ROMS and some are slower (PROMS EEPROMS), but traditionaly ROMS that are prefabricated (like you find in emeded devices) are near the speed of RAM.

There are many types of FLASH memory as well and some aren't as fast as RAM either, but some close. Usually the you can read from FLASH (again not Compact Flash type cards) near RAM speeds, but writing is slower than writing to RAM. Still both can be much much much faster than any HDD though.
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