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My Lion boot time is 6.75 seconds and 8 seconds for a reboot. Is this normal?

B

BenLeong

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 31, 2010
146
224
Seattle
I hear so many complaints about Lion slowing down start-time. But mine is the fastest I've ever had for a computer.

My specs: 2011 MacBook Pro 15" high-res, 2.2GHz quad-core i7, 8GB RAM and factory-installed 128GB SSD. Lion was factory-installed.

I can post a YouTube video if anyone wants to see.
 
You have an SSD. It is near instantaneous recall. The HDD that a lot of people have, isn't as fast. So, I have longer start times, although not as bad as some people.
 
I call bs on the 6.75 sec boot time. Even a quad core i7 15" MBP takes 7-8 seconds just to get to the Apple logo, whether the computer's on Snow Leopard or Lion makes no difference in that portion.

Even with the fastest SSD's on the market today (based on the latest Sandforce controllers), it still takes even the fastest MBP's an additional 12 seconds which comes out to about 20 seconds total time from power on to the desktop.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5RTrlwLTRA
 
I guess this is a technicality, but is boot time considered the time from pressing the power button or time from screen on to the login screen/desktop? I've always considered it time from pressing power where my MacBook Pro 2010 boots in 17.5 seconds.
 
Hyper-X said:
I call bs on the 6.75 sec boot time. Even a quad core i7 15" MBP takes 7-8 seconds just to get to the Apple logo, whether the computer's on Snow Leopard or Lion makes no difference in that portion.

Even with the fastest SSD's on the market today (based on the latest Sandforce controllers), it still takes even the fastest MBP's an additional 12 seconds which comes out to about 20 seconds total time from power on to the desktop.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5RTrlwLTRA
Click to expand...


It's not BS... I'll get a YouTube video up for you to check out.

I do admit, though, that the first week of me using the computer, it took a few seconds longer to power up. But it has strangely decreased its time since then.

By the way, to clarify what I mean by boot time:

Computer is completely turned off > Press power button > Desktop

For me, this totals just under 7 seconds every time.
 
I'm going to have to say this doesn't sound right. I have a 2011 Macbook Pro with a Vertex 3 SSD (fastest SSD on the market), and my machine takes 15-17 seconds from hitting the power button to Desktop on Lion.
 
andars said:
I'm going to have to say this doesn't sound right. I have a 2011 Macbook Pro with a Vertex 3 SSD (fastest SSD on the market), and my machine takes 15-17 seconds from hitting the power button to Desktop on Lion.
Click to expand...

My late 2008 Macbook (unibody) has a Corsair F-120 and takes 14 seconds (same time as SL). I wouldn't be surprised if one of the new-top-of-the-line i7s coupled with a SATA3 drive can boot significantly faster.
 
SSD's are fast but the OP's claiming it goes from pushing the power button to the Lion desktop in under 7 seconds. The POST itself takes 7-8 seconds which is the time period between pushing power until you see the gray Apple logo. Changing/updating OS X to a newer version has no bearing on the time it needs to complete the POST.

That's where I have a hard time believing his story, until he posts a link to a vid to prove otherwise.
 
Cinder6 said:
My late 2008 Macbook (unibody) has a Corsair F-120 and takes 14 seconds (same time as SL). I wouldn't be surprised if one of the new-top-of-the-line i7s coupled with a SATA3 drive can boot significantly faster.
Click to expand...

That's what I'm saying. My laptop is a new Macbook Pro with a Core i7, and the fastest SSD currently available. It still doesn't boot as fast as what the OP claims. I could see it if you started counting after the Apple logo appears. However, sub 7 seconds for the entire boot process doesn't sound right.

I suppose I could reinstall Lion from a USB drive, but I doubt it will shave off 8 seconds from my average boot time.
 
andars said:
...but I doubt it will shave off 8 seconds from my average boot time.
Click to expand...

It can't because the POST (power on self test) takes at least 7 seconds to complete without OS booting. The speed of your CPU, how many cores it has, how much RAM you have installed have no impact on the time POST needs to complete.
 
Hyper-X said:
It can't because the POST (power on self test) takes at least 7 seconds to complete without OS booting. The speed of your CPU, how many cores it has, how much RAM you have installed have no impact on the time POST needs to complete.
Click to expand...

I agree. Though technically the amount of RAM can have an effect on the time it takes to perform preliminary memory testing during POST (at least on PCs, and depending how the BIOS is configured). This really shouldn't make a difference when comparing modern day Macs though.
 
BenLeong said:
It's not BS... I'll get a YouTube video up for you to check out. [...] Computer is completely turned off > Press power button > Desktop

For me, this totals just under 7 seconds every time.
Click to expand...

I'd like to see that...
 
BenLeong said:
By the way, to clarify what I mean by boot time:

Computer is completely turned off > Press power button > Desktop
Click to expand...
Who cares if you see a desktop in 6 seconds? Tell me how long it takes for the OS to be usable.

Lion "cheats" and gives you a screenshot of your last power down while it's still loading crap.
 
andars said:
I agree. Though technically the amount of RAM can have an effect on the time it takes to perform preliminary memory testing during POST (at least on PCs, and depending how the BIOS is configured). This really shouldn't make a difference when comparing modern day Macs though.
Click to expand...
True, however I don't think any modern machine actually does a full memory test anymore and simply performs a quick check, but you're right, more memory will add a few milliseconds to the total completion time, but that still doesn't account for 10+ seconds of boot time.

I guess we'll just have to wait until his vid is posted.
 
It is pretty awesome that we're sitting here complaining about < 10 second boot times. I think we'll all live.

/firstworldproblems
 
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