Too fast!

Barrucadu · 2008-05-26 13:59:46

I just stripped down /etc/rc.sysinit by about 200 lines and booting is even faster! I haven't timed it, but it seems very fast. I'm just trying to think of a way around my 'daemon problem', I have two daemons that must start before two other daemons can start - so naturally these (and syslog) are the only daemons which are not backgrounded, slowing booting a bit.
I seem to have a thing for making my computer boot faster... It's only a matter of time before I compile my own optimized kernel.

Kane · 2008-05-26 14:24:19

Care to expand on what you have removed etc? im interested

I compile my own kernel to remove everything not used, for no other reason than just because i can lol
I've only managed to get my boot time down to 20s (from about 28 i think), mainly reducing the udev time from around 7s to around 1.7s

Barrucadu · 2008-05-26 14:55:29

I just went through and removed everything that I had no use for, such as:
* Everything to do with encrypted filesystems (this was a BIG chunk)
* Checking the timezone of the hardware clock
* Checking whether utf8 was in use
* Everything with a comment above it saying it was obsolete, but was still there for some reason
* Various other if-statements that I knew the result of, and the result would never change.

shazeal · 2008-05-26 20:22:06

Lol, you could try sending all the librarys you are going to be loading to /dev/null I seem to remember some mad gentooer doing just that so that all the librarys were cached before loading, seemed to meet some success in reducing load time, but gentoo is slow as compared to Arch

ornitorrincos · 2008-05-26 21:01:36

following it more or less I reduced my boot time in two seconds(at least that says bootchart)

LTSmash · 2008-05-26 21:54:35

Can you post your file?

Barrucadu · 2008-05-27 07:54:53

Here you go: http://pastebin.com/m2535ebc9
Of course, keep a backup of your original rc.sysinit before trying this, and you'll almost certainly need to change some things in it.

droog · 2008-05-27 08:51:10

Not sure if you've seen kmandelas blog but he has alot of info about reducing boot time in arch
heres a link http://kmandla.wordpress.com/howtos/ check the arch section mainly this one
http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2007/01/27 … toloading/

Barrucadu · 2008-05-28 14:45:16

Kane wrote:

I compile my own kernel to remove everything not used, for no other reason than just because i can lol

I just compiled a kernel for the first successful time, and got my boot time from 33s to 27s, which isn't bad for a first successful attempt.

Raccoon1400 · 2008-05-28 22:40:05

Would your rc.sysinit file work in my machine?
Core 2 duo, 64 bit OS, ext3 partition, ntfs non-root partition

Raccoon1400 · 2008-05-29 00:43:15

I tried your file. First I tried my file with the raid/encryption parts removed
59 sec grub to gnome, 30 to X
your file:
1min, 4 sec to gnome
Original time:
59 sec

Shadowmeph · 2008-05-30 00:13:32

how do I figure out what I need and what I don't need in this my rc.sysinit file because I can pretty much start my machine and go make a cup of coffee and come back and it still is loading especially when it gets to checking files. my pc is a intel 2core e8500 with two gigs of ram it isn't a slouch but my boot time seems very slow to me

B-Con · 2008-05-30 07:24:47

shazeal wrote:

Lol, you could try sending all the librarys you are going to be loading to /dev/null I seem to remember some mad gentooer doing just that so that all the librarys were cached before loading, seemed to meet some success in reducing load time, but gentoo is slow as compared to Arch

Could you elaborate? What do you mean by sending the libraries to /dev/null?

senjin · 2008-06-26 14:56:22

I guess he means doing "cat file > /dev/null" so it get's cached in RAM and it's loaded faster next time... but how could it speed up the boot? You'd need to find moments during the boot where the hdd isn't used and cache the files in background during that time.

B-Con · 2008-06-26 19:05:51

^ It would speed up the initial responce of programs once boot has finished, but otherwise, yeah, can't see that helping the boot process.

ilikenwf · 2008-07-28 05:40:09

Thanks for the tips...I went extreme. I don't use mod autoload or anything like that, and I'm trying to find a way to get rid of udev...and may try a different init system (einit) when it's done being rewritten...anyway...

I did some of this, but have totally tweaked nearly every part of my boot process, and am running a custom Xserver, (see the xserver-gentoo-onesecondx in AUR), as well as the Zen kernel (see AUR), which is pretty well stripped except for what I need. Boot time for me is 13sec. It'd be faster if I didn't use KDE and rely on dbus and hal....that said, KDM takes a bit to start even when the Xserver has started, and post isn't counted....alongside that, I think one or two seconds discrepancy could be tacked on from time to time if not all the time, as bootchart doesn't seem to be super accurate....here's my bootchart:

http://img257.imageshack.us/img257/7908 … entkf6.png

TigTex · 2008-07-28 16:22:33

I only have the "base" hook in mkinitcpio.conf, 2 daemons not backgrounded, custom kernel, rc.sysinit tweaked, modautoload off, and some mods in startkde. My pentium4 1.5 (256mb ram, hdd 40gb ) boots to full working kdemod3 in less then 25secs (post beep to kde)... and uses only 29mb of ram (without caches...)

Last edited by TigTex (2008-07-28 16:24:43)

Arch Linux

#1 2008-05-26 13:59:46

Too fast!

#2 2008-05-26 14:24:19

Re: Too fast!

#3 2008-05-26 14:55:29

Re: Too fast!

#4 2008-05-26 20:22:06

Re: Too fast!

#5 2008-05-26 21:01:36

Re: Too fast!

#6 2008-05-26 21:54:35

Re: Too fast!

#7 2008-05-27 07:54:53

Re: Too fast!

#8 2008-05-27 08:51:10

Re: Too fast!

#9 2008-05-28 14:45:16

Re: Too fast!

#10 2008-05-28 22:40:05

Re: Too fast!

#11 2008-05-29 00:43:15

Re: Too fast!

#12 2008-05-30 00:13:32

Re: Too fast!

#13 2008-05-30 07:24:47

Re: Too fast!

#14 2008-06-26 14:56:22

Re: Too fast!

#15 2008-06-26 19:05:51

Re: Too fast!

#16 2008-07-28 05:40:09

Re: Too fast!

#17 2008-07-28 16:22:33

Re: Too fast!

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