SSD Drives how much quicker should the boot time be

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Paul-H

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Hi all

The only issue i have with my PC is the very slow boot time and was wondering if replacing the SATA3 boot drive with a SSD drive would speed things up a worthwhile amount.

My current PC specs are Intel i7 3.4ghz processor with 16gb ram and 2TB SATA3 boot drive. I am running Windows 10 64bit.

Current boot time, times from power button press to end of HD activity is currently 5 minutes, there are a couple of software applications slowing things down a bit, like the datacolor Spyder software which delays loading the Display profile until most other drivers and devices have loaded but without them the boot time is still around 4 minutes, which seems an eternity when I am sat here waiting.

So was thinking of adding a SSD drive to use as the boot drive as I understand they are much quicker, but are they quicker at boot time or just in general use. if they are quicker at boot time how much could I expect it to boot quicker.

Thanks in advance for any input on this

Paul
 
I bought a pretty basic Acer laptop. I don't use a laptop alot so didn't want to spend a load on a top spec machine. Boot time was appalling but I think it only had a 5400rpm drive in it and like yourself Windows 10 could take a couple of minutes to book completely.

I replaced the drive with an SSD drive and now windows boots in less than 10-15 seconds from a cold start.
 
The difference is incredible and not just in boot time :)
 
If you install using UEFI setup rather BIOS it can improve boot time further. My windows 10 pc boots up in little more than a few seconds with password prompt appearing so quickly its seems as though its just come out of sleep!!

Further load time after entering my password is minimal. I have little in the way of extra programmes on startup.

My specs

HP ProDesk 400 G3 SFF Desktop, Intel Core i7-6700 3.4GHz, 16GB RAM, 128GB SSD

I'm actually selling my computer in classified as I've gone portable with a macbook.
 
I know this going slightly off topic, I am looking to replace my laptop, I do my main editing on my desk top but just want laptop for when away and so forth. I was thinking about getting one with 8 GB RAM i5 processor. I don't want to spend too much ideally no more then £500 would one with 128 GB SSD be OK or would I be better off getting the next one up 256 GB. Not going to have lots of programs LR/PS probably the Go pro and Microsoft any thoughts would be welcomed.
 
Paul-H said:
Current boot time, times from power button press to end of HD activity is currently 5 minutes, there are a couple of software applications slowing things down a bit, like the datacolor Spyder software which delays loading the Display profile until most other drivers and devices have loaded but without them the boot time is still around 4 minutes, which seems an eternity when I am sat here waiting.

So was thinking of adding a SSD drive to use as the boot drive as I understand they are much quicker, but are they quicker at boot time or just in general use. if they are quicker at boot time how much could I expect it to boot quicker.
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OMG, 4-5 mins to Boot up. :eek: There is something wrong with your current system if is taking more than a minute to Boot imho. Higher specced computers like your own should be quicker. You need to chack what is running at start up, and what you don't need if you haven't done so already.

When I updated my Desktop PC I included a SSD, and it went from just over a minute to so quick that the Windows animation didn't have time to finish before it asked for the password. It has slowed down now to about 5-10 secs after the animation has finished. Never timed it though, as it is quick enough. :)

I read the the SSD run quicker with the UEFI setting on the motherboard, and also found that that has to be set before installation of the OS.

I got my Laptop with an SSD and it loads up equally as quick.
 
5 minutes is excessive even for mechanical.

What else do you have in the startup list? (see task manager, startup tab)

Also check the disk column of the performance tab of task manager while the disk is thrashing, to see what is causing it.
 
redhed17 said:
I read the the SSD run quicker with the UEFI setting on the motherboard, and also found that that has to be set before installation of the OS.
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You don't need uefi, you do need the sata controller in ahci mode though. You can change this after Windows install but steps need to be followed to prevent blue screen on boot.
 
Alan Neilson said:
I know this going slightly off topic, I am looking to replace my laptop, I do my main editing on my desk top but just want laptop for when away and so forth. I was thinking about getting one with 8 GB RAM i5 processor. I don't want to spend too much ideally no more then £500 would one with 128 GB SSD be OK or would I be better off getting the next one up 256 GB. Not going to have lots of programs LR/PS probably the Go pro and Microsoft any thoughts would be welcomed.
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There's always good machines in the classified section. I think there are 2 pretty good laptops there at the moment for around the £500 mark.

I personally find 128GB fine, however it depends on how many of your photos you will want to keep on there. I shoot on a 64GB SD card and rarely fill it, and I pretty quickly move my RAW files and jpegs off. If you are filling SD cards of more than 64GB in size, then you might want to think about the 256GB otherwise, very quickly, unless you are always moving your pictures off of your laptop, then you are going to quickly run out of space. Particularly if you are away, and shooting plenty photos, the extra space might be what you need.
 
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Gil Bev said:
There's always good machines in the classified section. I think there are 2 pretty good laptops there at the moment for around the £500 mark.

I personally find 128GB fine, however it depends on how many of your photos you will want to keep on there. I shoot on a 64GB SD card and rarely fill it, and I pretty quickly move my RAW files and jpegs off. If you are filling SD cards of more than 64GB in size, then you might want to think about the 256GB otherwise, very quickly, unless you are always moving your pictures off of your laptop, then you are going to quickly run out of space. Particularly if you are away, and shooting plenty photos, the extra space might be what you need.
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I was thinking of buying new as had problems before when getting something "certified refurbished" before. Plan on just having programs on the laptop and store all photos on a separate drive like I do now, so as long as a 128 GB is going to give enough space for operating system and software might go down that route.
 
Yes, you should get 70GB of left over space on a 128GB drive if you install windows 10 professional, office, and lightroom. That's how much I've left on my desktop.
 
I have a 250gb SSD with win 10, Office, Adobe CC and a couple of small progs and it uses 60gb.
It boots from cold in around 20 secs and loads LR in library mode with a picture in around 10 secs.
If yours is taking 4-5 mins with spinning disc there is something wrong
 
Definitely worth getting 256GB for a main SSD, because 70GB isn't much spare capacity when processing images: I've been known to upload 64GB of images from a single card after returning from holiday.
 
HP EliteBook £130 bidded on ebay ex business. 12 seconds boot, 12 seconds shut down
 
I have rebuilt my PC at the beginning of the year with SSD for the operating system and another SSD for programs. I use normal spinning HDD for data storage.
My boot up time from pressing start to desk top is apx 26 sec's
My motherboard supports M.2 so hopefully soon I will get a M.2 in PCI format and the boot up might even be halfed !
 
Paul-H said:
SSD installed and running well, full boot is now around 40 seconds and Photoshop 2017 is up in running in around 4 seconds.

Why I didn't do this years ago is another question.

Paul
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fresh install should boot in around 15-20 secs depending on hardware
 
I use a Hackintosh with OS X 10.12.6 and Windows 10 in a dual boot setup. Both on Samsung 500GB SSD's with Sata 3's for storage. Boot time for OSX about 20 seconds and 25 for Windows 10 but that takes into account I go through Clover Boot Manager. I never switch my computer off it is on 24/7 and when I'm not using it I put it into sleep mode so realistically boot times don't really matter.
 
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Boot time to login screen around 8sec here, with another couple of seconds after login to desktop - 3 year old Dell XPS laptop.
 
Paul-H said:
It was a fresh clean install

Nothing extra loading at startup either, perhaps I bought a slow SSD, 40 seconds is still fast to me, compared to the 5 minutes the old HDD took
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My PC takes around 40 seconds too. That's with quite a few things loading at startup - e.g. wireless keyboard & mouse, monitor calibration software, password manager, sound card etc. The only time I got a considerably faster startup was immediately after installing Windows (i.e. before anything else was installed). I always put Windows & programmes on an SSD and everything else on a SATA HDD. The CPU is an i5 and there are six drives altogether (two SSDs and 4 HDDs).
 
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I just installed Windows as dual boot on my 2015 12" Macbook, a lowly core-m processor and reasonably fast HD and it boots fully in 20 seconds. 40 seconds still seems a long time for a computer with your specs.
 
Mine a 500gb was just under £150

I do suspect that some of those super fast start times are not just down to the SSD, or maybe my system is loading more than theirs

Wireless keyboard and mouse drivers for sound, network and graphics plus network sound system and monitor calibration software, everything is disabled in the task manager startup section other than Anti virus.

Don't have the Momentum Cache option turned on, that is supposed to speed thinks up quite a bit

For those that get a super fast startup, what extra settings are you using.

Paul
 
neil_g said:
.... all the correct (manufacturer not windows version) chipset drivers installed?
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That's a point. My Seagate SSD** is using Windows drivers. How do I get it to use the manufacturer's chipset drivers? (I don't even know which chipset it is).

** (an ST480HM000-1G5162)
 
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