Linux + SSD Boot Time

[garyc]

Currently upgrading a machine and am thinking of using an SSD for both improved boot time and responsiveness. There have been some tests on Linux review sites which claim to show that with the current Linux distributions the SSD drives do not really hold an advantage over the mechanical drives.

Does anyone have some experience in this matter that they could share?

 

[Ockie]

My laptop definately boots faster since I shoved a SSD in there. Well..that is my perception anyway.

 

[Other Pineapple Smurf]

My laptop has both an SSD and normal HDD and after I moved the OS to the SSD boot time was amazing. I then had to move the kernel and grub back to the HDD (the SSD is not bootable on this laptop) and noticed a slow down in boot speed.

 

[garyc]

Thanks, it looks like this story about no difference in boot times was not true. Also, are there any impressions on overall system responsiveness?

Just as a bit of background in case it is relevant: This is for an HTPC that I never stop fiddling with (call it a hobby). The current objective is to make it more “appliance like”. This will require a quick boot and good system responsiveness (not to mention other things like a good UI).

 

[ponder]

I'm not to worried about boot time, my system boots in <10s on a normal 7200rpm drive. Image http://ompldr.org/vZnlvaw

 

[garyc]

I'm not to worried about boot time, my system boots in <10s on a normal 7200rpm drive. Image http://ompldr.org/vZnlvaw

Am I correct in reading this as an LXDE based distro?

 

[ginggs]

I did these tests about a year ago on a dual boot setup.

I configured Windows XP to log me in automatically and put Task Manager
in my startup folder.

On Seagate 160GB 7200RPM HDD:
From boot menu until Task Manager appeared: 67 seconds
From boot menu until only 34 processes were running: 77 seconds

On Adata S511 60GB SSD:
From boot menu until Task Manager appeared: 20 seconds
From boot menu until only 34 processes were running: 46 seconds

I configured Ubuntu to log me in automatically.

On Seagate 160GB 7200RPM HDD:
From boot menu until logged in and CPU idle: 46 seconds

On Adata S511 60GB SSD:
From boot menu until logged in and CPU idle: 25 seconds

Edit: IIRC, this would have been Ubtunu 11.04 with Ubuntu Classic (GNOME) desktop.

 

[ponder]

Am I correct in reading this as an LXDE based distro?

XFCE

It uses the lxdm session manager though (lighter than lightdm) so I can see where the presumption might stem from.
Looking at that chart there are actually things like modem-manager & network manager I can remove.

 

[garyc]

Thanks for the inputs. Seems like my best option will be to go for an SSD and then install a lightweight distro on it.

Ponder - do you have any good links for optimising XFCE based distros or is this the result of personal experience?

 

[ponder]

Ponder - do you have any good links for optimising XFCE based distros or is this the result of personal experience?

There's not much to optimise in xfce in all honesty. I do a few mods like removing all the panels and creating one panel on the side that acts a panel & launcher, I also disable desktop icons and that's about that, none of which is really optimisation. The problem with off the shelf distros are they all add a load of crud I don't need so whether I use Ubuntu, Debian, Arch or Manjaro I always do a net/base install and then only add the stuff I really need so I have less bloat and less services that start at bootup.

Arch/Manjaro now uses systemd and the only optimisation I did was to enable "Readahead"

 

[garyc]

There's not much to optimise in xfce in all honesty. I do a few mods like removing all the panels and creating one panel on the side that acts a panel & launcher, I also disable desktop icons and that's about that, none of which is really optimisation. The problem with off the shelf distros are they all add a load of crud I don't need so whether I use Ubuntu, Debian, Arch or Manjaro I always do a net/base install and then only add the stuff I really need so I have less bloat and less services that start at bootup.

Arch/Manjaro now uses systemd and the only optimisation I did was to enable "Readahead"

Thanks - tried a couple of these things last night on a VM. Looks promising.

 

[aquadog]

There have been some tests on Linux review sites which claim to show that with the current Linux distributions the SSD drives do not really hold an advantage over the mechanical drives.

This is a ridiculous claim to make. Do you have any links to the reviews? Unless there is something terribly wrong with their configuration causing the drives to not read/write at their intended speeds they should see staggering load time improvements.

 

[milomak]

i can certainly say there was a definite improvement in boot time when i moved my debian install to my ssd drive. without having actually timed it, i would say at least somewhere around 10 seconds.