10-15 minutes To Boot Up?

Thank you everyone for these very helpful suggestions. Looks like I will have a lot of things to try now. I ran a full disk error check with scan for bad sectors and the problem still persists.

Then I connected a cloned drive from about 2 weeks ago before instaling Win 7 SP1 and the video card update and it still took 15 minutes to start up with the older drivers. Thus my strong suspicion is that there is either something wrong with the hardware or the video card firmware has been changed. The system will boot up in safe mode so I suspect the video card firmware. Yesterday, I got the blue screen of death which confirms something is seriously wrong with the system.

I will try some of the suggestions and keep you posted.

Kind Regards

Chris

Thanks. Just tried Soluto. Great little programme. It indicates boot time about 10 minutes and Windows system (subsystems and core processes) and Norton is taking most of the time to load in that order. Not sure if the video card drivers are the real problem though. Might also be Norton is interfering with something. Also tried removing one stick of ram and then swapping with the other stick but that made no difference. Scanning with Malwarebytes showed nothing. I will continue with the other steps.



Kind Regards

Chris

Hi again Chris -

In addition to the troubleshooting steps posted earlier, check the Device Manager for any drivers in error. If you are using the chipset issued by the installer, try setting a Restore point and swapping in the chipset from the Support Downloads webpage for your model computer or mobo. Then update your Display driver or try rolling back to earlier version(s). Driver Install - Device Manager - Windows 7 Forums

If the logs and other resources listed don't make the problem evident, run the boot trace. We are fortunate to have Cluberti who administers the tracing tool in residence here who can help you interpret the boot trace if you upload its .etl output file to a file sharing service and link it. Trace Windows 7 boot-shutdown-hibernate-standby-resume issues - MSFN Forums

For example on a recent trace on older Dell laptop with 2 minute startup, turns out the System Files needed defragging which cut startup time in half, but the rest was due to slow 5400rpm HD.

Well I would like to say a big thank you to everyone who has helped me with issue. I have learned a lot about possible causes of boot problems and debugging techniques. I will save this thread for future reference. I also love the Soluto programme!

Well the final steps were as follows. I tried running the system file checker in OS mode sfc/scannow and it showed no integrity violations. Then I went back and was prepared to go through all the other steps that were suggested.

A special thank you to Gregrocker. Quote: In addition to the troubleshooting steps posted earlier, check the Device Manager for any drivers in error.

I checked the device manager and it had a warning symbol next to my Epson V700 scanner connected by firewire. "This device will not start". I tried to turn on the scanner and it was dead. I checked all the plugs on the scanner and also the firewire plug in the firewire card on my PC and they seemed OK. I checked the power cable and turned off the switch at the wall and then on again and the scanner came to life. It must have been a bad connection somewhere on one of the plugs or the wall socket. I tried rebooting with the scanner on. Instead of a 10 minute boot time my computer now boots in 1 minute 34 seconds. I feel so releived! Now, why a bad connection would have such an impact on the boot time beats me. Even when the scanner is turned off the computer normally boots fine. Maybe the bad connection caused a voltage violation and this interfered with the firewire data transfer and driver loading?

Anyway, I am so happy to be up and running again. Thanks again to everyone, this is a great forum!

Kind Regards

Chris

Glad it helped Chris. If the scanner presents any futher problems, you might want to check it's SUpport Downloads webpage to see if it has any newer software/driver to try. If it is an older scanner, it might need to be installed in Compatibility Mode.

My guess would be it's driver was failing to load as it showed up in Plug-n-play during each startup. This may be a known issue which can be googled to find the solution, email or chat the manufacturer, post in their forum, or start a new topic here with scanner model in title.