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1st Gen Intel Powerbooks could have instant boot-up!
- Thread starter nylon
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SummerBreeze
macrumors 6502a
It's funny, I think that OS X starts up so quickly now. It barely takes anytime for me to boot my powerbook, as opposed to my Windows computer. When I turn that thing on (rarely does this happen) I press the button, go grab something from the kitchen, type in my password, straighten up my room, and then the thing's finally ready. This is definitely a bigger deal for Windows users.
Of course, if they can make the super fast startup even faster, more power to them!
Of course, if they can make the super fast startup even faster, more power to them!
mkrishnan
Moderator emeritus
rosalindavenue said:
I really think too, that better functioning of sleep/wake should be the emphasis and not all this instant boot stuff. Who's turning their computer on and off so frequently that they need an instant boot? And what do I care if booting takes one minute or one second, if I do it once every two weeks?
Both my computers take about the same time to boot and get a working desktop, with my Mac a bit faster. I don't reboot either of them very often, but if this tech. can improve application opening speeds, I'll take it.
MP
MP
patrick0brien said:
I never expected a reaction like this, wow!!. I find it quite ironic that Mac fan is telling me not to be snobby. In fact the traditional dismissal of any innovation non-Apple evidenced in this thread is exactly kind of 'lifting your nose' behaviour that instigated my initial reponse. Funny how that get's turned around.
Incedently I'm a great admirer of Apple and it's innovation and use their products so I don't understand why you think I don't have a common interest with the rest. The whole point of my initial post was to show how new technology could manifest itself into an excellent advance in a future Apple products. The kind of thing that Apple would be first to market with.
In regards to the article that was linked here; people extrapolated the narrowest possible analysis of the technology and then proceeded to deride it. The usual response to an innovation from Apple is, "wow!! look what (insert innovation here) might lead to". However, being an Intel technology, the response was the complete opposite.
I'm not attacking Apple in any way, it's an awesome company with awesome products. I'm just a little dissapointed with reaction of some of the people on this board. I think some people still resent the switch to Intel. But, too each his own.
My Imac still takes 30 seconds to boot and most powerbooks still take 30-40 seconds to boot so I think this would be an awesome innovation. I hope Apple takes it up.
Instant boot-up isn't a big deal to me, but it would certainly be nice to show off to friends and family. 😀
But I do like that boot-up sound...
But I do like that boot-up sound...
Epicurus
macrumors 6502
mwpeters8182 said:
The article seemed to suggest that by adding a second, mini NAND drive to the computer, not only did the software and OS load times get better, but the battery life improved as well. With OS X, boot times are not a big issue. Software load times could always use a little boost, but periodic improvements in CPU, RAM, and HDD specs chip away at that all the time. I think the biggest draw here is the battery improvements. The article didn't really give any hint as to how big these gains are, but it is interesting. Also, the article said the demonstrations were done with a 128MB NAND drive, which begs the question: What would happen if you put in a 4GB NAND drive? 😀
Anonymous Freak
macrumors 603
Nah...
We'll still hear it; it's just that by the time it's done "boooooooongggg"ing, we'll be at the desktop or login screen. :-D
katie ta achoo said:
We'll still hear it; it's just that by the time it's done "boooooooongggg"ing, we'll be at the desktop or login screen. :-D
According to the following article sources have confirmed that Apple will be using this technology in their forthcoming Intel machines.
In regards to battery life, "This past April, Microsoft and Samsung demoed a PC system using Robson. In those tests, a typical 4 hour notebook battery gained an extra 36 minutes of life using the technology. Reportedly, the goal is to at least double that by years end."
http://macenstein.com/default/archives/62
In regards to battery life, "This past April, Microsoft and Samsung demoed a PC system using Robson. In those tests, a typical 4 hour notebook battery gained an extra 36 minutes of life using the technology. Reportedly, the goal is to at least double that by years end."
http://macenstein.com/default/archives/62
slu
macrumors 68000
While I rarely need to restart my iMac, my PowerBook does get shut down when I am traveling to save on battery comsumption. And while it does not take very long to start up, I find it incredible that anyone would not want this feature. Time is your most valuable asset, and anything that saves me time (even 30 seconds) is welcome to me. And anything that can be done to reduce power consumption and heat are also welcome to me.
I am with kkapoor on this. If this were an Apple "innovation", the tone of this thread would be different.
I am with kkapoor on this. If this were an Apple "innovation", the tone of this thread would be different.
I'm using an eMac at work, running VPC so that I can access Quickbooks Enterprise Solutions (PC-only). When the Intel Macs come, I'm planning on getting one so that I can boot directly into Windows when I need to use QB. Instant boot-up would be great in this instance, you could theoretically switch from OSX to XP and back in a matter of seconds.
DaveP
macrumors 6502a
I think this would be really cool. We are used to however long it takes to open programs/boot up and could live without having a speed up. But I think it could be like spotlight for me. I didn't think it was big deal, but now that I have it I think it's great.
By the way, my Windows desktop boots significantly faster than my G4 iBook. The Windows machine takes less than 30 seconds to the login screen and is responsive within a few seconds of logging in. My iBook takes about 2 minutes. (Note, I do run a very clean Windows box without too many programs installed)
By the way, my Windows desktop boots significantly faster than my G4 iBook. The Windows machine takes less than 30 seconds to the login screen and is responsive within a few seconds of logging in. My iBook takes about 2 minutes. (Note, I do run a very clean Windows box without too many programs installed)
blitzkrieg79
macrumors 6502
fartheststar said:
I have a Pentium 2.53 Ghz at home and it definately doesn't take 2 minutes to start up, more like 30 seconds...
My G5 PowerMac takes a little longer than that...
Anyway, I would gladly welcome faster loading times as time equals money and in some Pro apps it takes a couple of good seconds out of my life and sometimes to the point when it can get frustrating (I guess I get nervous fast but hell, it's 21st century and we still use hard drives as main option for storage instead of memory RAM/ROM like devices)...
It would definately made my job a lot less frustrating and more enjoyable if I would just click on any file/program/game and it would load up in an instant but I guess its still ways off...
Mechcozmo
macrumors 603
kkapoor said:
Er, Apple has been able to do this with OS 8 and OS 9 too. Instant wake from sleep. Kinda been around for a while, yknow?
This is different, but requires certain hardware. Apple is very big on using software to accomplish their goals and not make hardware to fix the software. (As in, if WinXP sucks at sleeping, then don't make hardware to allow instant shutdown/restart, fix WinXP!)
Mechcozmo said:
This is instant boot from a turned off machine, not instant wake from sleep. This is also partial NAND resident OS not HD resident. So this hasn't been around at all in Apple machines, yknow!
Secondly, Apple primarily derives its revenue from hardware sales not software sales. Hence if there is a hardware innovation, as history has demonstrated, Apple will generally be the first to adopt. Finally, this isn't about software fixing hardware or vice-versa, its about new innovative technology.
Come on! 🙄 A Windows XP laptop/computer wakes up from sleep in approximately 1 second.rosalindavenue said:
I don't mean to sound rude, but some people in this thread are clueless about Windows PCs.
"It takes 2 minutes to boot a Windows machine."
Yeah? Try removing all those little apps from autostart. It's not the OS's fault that you want to cram your RAM full of apps.
"If you don't shut down your apps before going to sleep, they'll crash when you wake the computer up."
Is that so? I've been using a Windows XP laptop since late summer and, no, apps do not crash after coming out of sleep mode. Yes, you should probably not interrupt a computation (like Matlab, MP3-rip, compile job or rendering), but that's pretty given, right?
I can't believe what some of you are making up. I realise that this is a Mac forum and PC bashing pretty much comes with the package, but please try and stay even somewhat close to the truth.
I find this new quick start/load feature pretty nice, although not crucial. I fail to see how it will be so much more useful for Windows users, though...
Aliquis
macrumors regular
True true, regardless of whether people think "oh, I don't need that", if it was actually in play already, and you happened to experience hitting the powerbutton on a friend's machine, and it snapped through startup faster than a couple seconds or just a cool splash screen, or even nothing at all... can any of you really say that you wouldn't think, "what the crap? wait, that was awesome!"
To put it in perspective, when you hit the power on a Palm or PDA device, it just flicks on. That seems like it would be very cool to have the same thing on your laptop.
Lastly, the powersavings, if viable seem to be reason alone by itself?
Great post btw.
To put it in perspective, when you hit the power on a Palm or PDA device, it just flicks on. That seems like it would be very cool to have the same thing on your laptop.
Lastly, the powersavings, if viable seem to be reason alone by itself?
Great post btw.
Mechcozmo
macrumors 603
SteveG4Cube said:
Or you could virtualize Windows, run it at slightly-under native speed, and not have ANY time in between OSs. Plus, you don't have to close all your OS X apps to start up Windows.
Virtualization will be the new cure-all for Windows issues on OS X.
kkapoor said:
I know. But sleep lets me keep programs open, etc. Shutting down doesn't. That's the biggest issue. I'd much rather have an instant wake-from-sleep than an instant startup because the waking up keeps everything that I was doing there and ready.
Mikael said:
Er, I've closed the lid on my PowerBook as it was rendering in FCE. When I opened the lid again 4 hours later, it started right back up with no issues.
Same while ripping a DVD with MacTheRipper. Close the lid, opened it up (this time only 20 minutes later) and it started right back up.
And again, the same while encoding with ffmpegX. Encoding to H.264 with 3 other queued files. Went to sleep, woke up later, no issues.
Each time Safari reconnected to the network and had no issues with me opening new pages. The FCE example was even going between two different locations (proxy servers and whatnot). No issues.
So, it isn't a given. You can and should be able to use the sleep mode whenever you feel like it, not when the computer says, "Sorry bud but I need to do something."
Mechcozmo said:
You have to look at the role of mobility computing. Most people who use their machines on the road tend to shut their machines down completely in order to conserve battery life. Your case applies to those people that use their machine as a desktop replacement where the machine stays put.
Mechcozmo
macrumors 603
kkapoor said:
I actually travel quite a bit. My PowerBook isn't chained to the desk. Sleep mode means I can close the lid and reopen it a day later with all the stuff I needed to keep working on with negligible battery loss.
Aliquis said:
Actually, that isn't instant startup. It is in a deep-sleep, much like a Mac's sleep mode is already. Press the reset button on a Palm and you will see it REALLY start up. (Which is only a few seconds, but then again, the OS is about 1 MB)