Boot times: ASUS vs. Gigabyte

[enright]

Recent Gigabyte MBs have a feature called QuickBoot that bypasses some of the POST diagnostics after three successful boots, which supposedly significantly cuts down on boot time.

My questions are:

1) Does ASUS have anything similar?
2) Does it really have an impact? I can't find any reviews that include "boot times" in their benchmarks.

With SSDs cutting the OS boot times so drastically, those few seconds of MB POST diagnostics are actually now a significant percentage of overall boot time. This seems like a great feature, but no one seems to mention it. Anyone have any experience with it or know of a good benchmark / review?

Thanks!

John

 

[IamShakes]

i know my P55-E Pro has both a quick book option and an setting to adjust the amount of time before booting the operating system (5s, 10s, maybe more settings)

I don't really notice much of a difference in post times from my old system on a gigabyte board vs my new system on an Asus board.

 

[enright]

Recent Gigabyte MBs have a feature called QuickBoot that bypasses some of the POST diagnostics after three successful boots, which supposedly significantly cuts down on boot time.

Does it really have an impact? I can't find any reviews that include "boot times" in their benchmarks.

I will answer my own question here in case anyone else is wondering the same thing. I went with the x58a-ud5 and enabled quick boot - and it does shave a few seconds off the boot process - and it is noticeable. I haven't timed it, but I'd say it reduces the pre-OS boot time by about half.

I realize that sleep / suspend modes make boot times a moot point, but there's just something cool about being able to go from power off to desktop in just a few seconds. Maybe this is because I remember when boot times were measured in minutes, not seconds.

John

 

[Tekky99]

Can I ask you what your boot time for the BIOS is now? I mean the time between you switch on the PC and the POST is finished. I'm looking for a good Motherboard for a new PC and would like to have a boot time for the BIOS of less than 10 seconds.

 

[wpcoe]

FYI, a big improvement from Gigabyte between my old P35 and new P55 boot times is in the AHCI BIOS. The P35 would pause about ten seconds (with a series of dots appearing on screen while pausing) before querying the ports, but the P55 goes right to work with no such pause.

 

[videopho]

FYI, a big improvement from Gigabyte between my old P35 and new P55 boot times is in the AHCI BIOS. The P35 would pause about ten seconds (with a series of dots appearing on screen while pausing) before querying the ports, but the P55 goes right to work with no such pause.

My GA 55 does the same at quick boot.
It's so darn fast. < 5 s
Then again I have no RAID in the set up if that does add up.

 

[Sheninat0r]

I was under the impression Quick Boot was a common BIOS feature which just skipped some optional checks before loading the OS; at least, I remember having it on my A8N-something motherboard back in the Athlon 64 days.

 

[Tekky99]

My GA 55 does the same at quick boot.
It's so darn fast. < 5 s
Then again I have no RAID in the set up if that does add up.

Can you confirm to me that from the time you hit the power button until the end of POST it only takes 5 seconds?

 

[videopho]

Can you confirm to me that from the time you hit the power button until the end of POST it only takes 5 seconds?

Approx. 6 sec +/- 2 sec of margin

 

[Tekky99]

Approx. 6 sec +/- 2 sec of margin

Thanks for your answer Wow, I'm really tempted to get that board. My ASUS takes about 23 seconds. I assume you achieved this not only with the BIOS QuickBoot, but you also enabled the OS QuickBoot. Is it no problem if I unplug the computer over night? How long does it take if you only enable BIOS QuickBoot?

 

[GearJunkie]

I have an ASUS P6T WS Pro M/B, and it takes 12 secends from pushing the power button to first seeing the BIOS/post screen. It takes about 3 seconds to initialize, and then I see the Windows "loading" screen for about 5 seconds before I get the logon screen.

Just FYI...

 

[ModestGamer]

Why does everyone obsess over boot time ? I mean its nice to boot up relatively fast but the bios is hardly slowing much of anything down. No to mention. When it boot time more then like

0.0000000000000001&#37; of the total PC user interface time ?

My machine boots in 45-60seconds depending on which user profile is in use. its not blazing fast but its not slow either. If I use the pc for 3 hours what does 1 minute really mean ?

 

[Zap]

Why does everyone obsess over boot time ?

Because we are the "right now" generation? :hmm:

 

[nipplefish]

My p7p55d-e pro is pretty slow to boot IMO... I turn it on, several seconds go by, then "Loading Asus Express Gate" or something comes up on the screen for a few more seconds, then it POSTs... I think the POST is probably about as long as the actual Windows boot time.

That said, I reboot about once a month, so it doesn't really matter to me.

 

[mrcmtl]

My Crosshair IV Formula takes about 14-15s before getting to the OS loading screen. 5-6s to actually see the POST screen(thats when the video card's fan is screaming) then a 2s at the actual POST screen and another 4s to load the 2 SATA controller and after that I see the core unlocker screen for 2s, after that it's windows.

 

[electroju]

enright, the reason why reviewers are not stating the boot times is because is now irrelevant. Most of the motherboards have similar boot times. You should look for quality of the motherboard instead of boot times. A quality product will be more reliable and stable compared to product that is poorly made. By selecting a quality product, you will be rebooting less and it will just work when being powered on.

Why does everyone obsess over boot time ?

Most people run Windows, so they have to reboot multiple times a day. I use Linux, so the reboots is not necessary for Linux to work correctly.

I agree, boot times are irrelevant to the computer if it just works. I am happy if the computer boots up in 2 minutes. Any longer then something is wrong. In Vista, it takes longer than 2 minutes that is just plain wrong. All computers that I have boots up in two minutes. This means from power up and then to the operating system. My oldest computer, an 80386DX-40, boots up within 2 minutes. I do not use Windows Vista because of the boot up time is more than 2 minutes. I am against using Windows, so I use Linux.

I am the generation of just work.

 

[sandorski]

enright, the reason why reviewers are not stating the boot times is because is now irrelevant. Most of the motherboards have similar boot times. You should look for quality of the motherboard instead of boot times. A quality product will be more reliable and stable compared to product that is poorly made. By selecting a quality product, you will be rebooting less and it will just work when being powered on.



Most people run Windows, so they have to reboot multiple times a day. I use Linux, so the reboots is not necessary for Linux to work correctly.

I agree, boot times are irrelevant to the computer if it just works. I am happy if the computer boots up in 2 minutes. Any longer then something is wrong. In Vista, it takes longer than 2 minutes that is just plain wrong. All computers that I have boots up in two minutes. This means from power up and then to the operating system. My oldest computer, an 80386DX-40, boots up within 2 minutes. I do not use Windows Vista because of the boot up time is more than 2 minutes. I am against using Windows, so I use Linux.

I am the generation of just work.

I use Windows and go weeks and sometimes months between Reboots.

 

[nenforcer]

Hey GearJunkie, doesn't your motherboard include an onboard SAS controller? You must have that disabled because empty SCSI / SAS chains easliy add another 10-20 seconds to boot time.

 

[jaydeee]

I also have quick boot on my asus board, this will bypass RAM test I suppose.

I agree that 2 to 3 seconds POST will now be a great difference in boot time.

 

[GearJunkie]

Hey GearJunkie, doesn't your motherboard include an onboard SAS controller? You must have that disabled because empty SCSI / SAS chains easliy add another 10-20 seconds to boot time.

Thanks for the tip nenforcer, but I have the BIOS nice and tight. Everything is disabled that I don't use... SAS, sound, firewire, express gate, marvell controller, 2nd ethernet port, etc. I've had a few different ASUS X58 boards, and they all seem to take at least 10sec to post. But thanks anyway!