Windows 7 - Boot Performance Issues

I have noticed over the last two months some slow boot times. I have turned off some of the unnecassary startup programs and noticed a lot of errors in the event log. I was wondering if anyone could help me understand what the mean.

Here is a couple of the log reports

Log Name: Microsoft-Windows-Diagnostics-Performance/Operational
Source: Microsoft-Windows-Diagnostics-Performance
Date: 9/30/2009 11:43:25 AM
Event ID: 100
Task Category: Boot Performance Monitoring
Level: Error
Keywords: Event Log
User: LOCAL SERVICE
Computer: Jason-PC
Description:
Windows has started up:
Boot Duration : 129022ms
IsDegradation : false
Incident Time (UTC) : ‎2009‎-‎09‎-‎30T15:40:38.827600600Z

Here is the critical error one
Log Name: Microsoft-Windows-Diagnostics-Performance/Operational
Source: Microsoft-Windows-Diagnostics-Performance
Date: 9/30/2009 11:20:34 PM
Event ID: 100
Task Category: Boot Performance Monitoring
Level: Critical
Keywords: Event Log
User: LOCAL SERVICE
Computer: Jason-PC
Description:
Windows has started up:
Boot Duration : 170002ms
IsDegradation : false
Incident Time (UTC) : ‎2009‎-‎10‎-‎01T03:17:29.843200600Z

And the most recent one:

Log Name: Microsoft-Windows-Diagnostics-Performance/Operational
Source: Microsoft-Windows-Diagnostics-Performance
Date: 9/30/2009 11:20:34 PM
Event ID: 101
Task Category: Boot Performance Monitoring
Level: Warning
Keywords: Event Log
User: LOCAL SERVICE
Computer: Jason-PC
Description:
This application took longer than usual to start up, resulting in a performance degradation in the system startup process:
File Name : dwm.exe
Friendly Name : Desktop Window Manager
Version : 6.1.7100.0 (winmain_win7rc.090421-1700)
Total Time : 3134ms
Degradation Time : 1823ms
Incident Time (UTC) : ‎2009‎-‎10‎-‎01T03:17:29.843200600Z


When I did the first install everything was booting up quickly. I am hoping that when I get the retail version and reinstall everything will be back to normal and fast. I am just concerned this is a hardware issue. I dont like the term, "Boot Degradation"...

Please note the boot time is 170002 ms which is over 2 minutes of boot time.

Here is more detailed information for those more tech savvy than me
BootTsVersion2
BootStartTime2009-10-01T03:17:29.843200600Z
BootEndTime2009-10-01T03:20:25.473324800Z
SystemBootInstance212
UserBootInstance206
BootTime170002
MainPathBootTime105953
BootKernelInitTime66
BootDriverInitTime1332
BootDevicesInitTime1951
BootPrefetchInitTime0
BootPrefetchBytes0
BootAutoChkTime0
BootSmssInitTime12216
BootCriticalServicesInitTime2170
BootUserProfileProcessingTime52335
BootMachineProfileProcessingTime3
BootExplorerInitTime29536
BootNumStartupApps7
BootPostBootTime64049
BootIsRebootAfterInstallfalse
BootRootCauseStepImprovementBits512
BootRootCauseGradualImprovementBits0
BootRootCauseStepDegradationBits0
BootRootCauseGradualDegradationBits0
BootIsDegradationfalse
BootIsStepDegradationfalse
BootIsGradualDegradationfalse
BootImprovementDelta0
BootDegradationDelta0
BootIsRootCauseIdentifiedtrue
OSLoaderDuration3798
BootPNPInitStartTimeMS66
BootPNPInitDuration2031
OtherKernelInitDuration4567
SystemPNPInitStartTimeMS6184
SystemPNPInitDuration1252
SessionInitStartTimeMS7850
Session0InitDuration3601
Session1InitDuration219
SessionInitOtherDuration8395
WinLogonStartTimeMS20066
OtherLogonInitActivityDuration4012
UserLogonWaitDuration7494

None of this shows just what programs and processes are starting up when you first boot into Windows.

While nothing will ever beat a fresh clean install of Windows free of unnecessary startup items and other registry glitches you have to look over what programs load up along with Windows as well as expecting some degree of slow down once you load Windows up with all kinds of apps.

For tweaking things a bit to improve overall performance the first item is seeing which programs that load up with Windows are not necessary where you can uncheck them in the startup list in the msconfig utility there. For the log errors that could be from any number of things like a bad install of one program or a driver loading sideways one time and not the next.

Have you tried clearing your prefetch..?


Remember that once you have cleared it the next boot will take twice as long, but once it has re-learnt its drivers and cached them each boot after that will be much faster..

I forgot about that. I cleared the prefetch and the first two boots were quite slow but this last boot was much faster. Hopefully this will remain the same.

Thanks for the reminder

For those that are here researching because you have a similiar problem - do NOT clear your prefetch. Prefetch is a program that tracks and keeps the order of programs and services in your boot time - unless you change that order or take out programs/services at startup or even add them in.

If you clear Prefetch then you're starting all over again so it acutally SLOWS DOWN your startup. DO NOT CLEAR PREFETCH to speed up your boot time!