01-10-2005, 12:55 PM

I am going to be making the switch from my Dell Inspiron to a 15-inch Powerbook this weekend (hooray for long weekends). One thing I'm excited about is not having to wait for this stupid computer of mine to start, which takes about 10 minutes. (and even then I'm never sure if it's REALLY done). I was just wondering how long it takes for your Powerbooks to start up. Obviously they will slow down when you have a lot on your harddrive, but I am just looking to get an average time from you all.

01-10-2005, 01:05 PM

Bout a minute for my 867mhz 1gb ram

01-10-2005, 02:09 PM

PowerBook G4 1.33GHz, 512MB:

Cold start: ~45 seconds to desktop.
Waking from sleep mode : ~5 seconds.

Both times include the time it took for me to key in my username and password.

As a rule, I never turn off my PB, I just put it to sleep before carrying it in my backpack. It wakes from sleep so fast that it presents the login screen before I've even opened the lid completely. :p

01-10-2005, 08:07 PM

See, my Inspiron will actual start quite quickly and get to the desktop fast, but then it keeps doing "start up tasks" like opening MSN Messenger and such. Do the Macs take long for these things?

01-10-2005, 08:18 PM

Not if you 'Sleep' it with the programs open. :mac:
Bit longer if you start them all from cold but not nearly as long as it takes my XP though.
On specs the XP should actually be quicker than the Mac.

01-11-2005, 07:25 PM

I have both the powerbook 15' g4 1.5 ghz with a gig of ram and a inspiron 2.5ghz Pentium 4M. My Inspiron will take soo long to boot up completly like you are talking about, like you said 10 minutes. My Powerbook will take about 45 seconds to boot up cold, and instant to boot up for a sleep state. You will not be dissapointed with the Powerbook!

01-12-2005, 04:35 PM

Originally Posted by ktparker

See, my Inspiron will actual start quite quickly and get to the desktop fast, but then it keeps doing "start up tasks" like opening MSN Messenger and such. Do the Macs take long for these things?

Background services and other processes take up those extra seconds (minutes if there is spyware/viruses/etc)

01-13-2005, 01:44 AM

yeah the reason why your windows is starting up that long is definitely due to spyware. We have a windows desktop in the house, a p3 only about 2 years old, and it was infested with spyware before I left for college. Took forever to start up. When I came home for winter break I reinstall windows xp and spyware is all gone. Its good as new and takes 45 seconds to start up. (I use it sometimes at home even though I have the powerbook, mainly to play partypoker). Anyway my pb takes like 45 seconds to start up and then its loaded. I know what you mean about the extra processes once your desktop loads. But windows xp should really not take more than 90 seconds before you can do things unless you are infested with spyware. Hence another reason to switch

01-13-2005, 01:20 PM

Yes, I realize my computer is hopelessly infected with spyware. I run AdAware all the time -- and it does nothing for the start-up time. Right now I am just trying to do something about these Trojans that mysteriously appeared this morning... I need a new PowerBook!

01-13-2005, 01:38 PM

or you need to deselect everything in the msconfig file

and google "hijack this" its a nice little tool for removing stuff in winblows