fastest booting OS needed

[Brandon]

whats the fastest booting OS out there? im setting up my P3 667 256MB, 25GB, some passive 4MB AGP as a music thing in the basement, and i need an OS that would load in less then 15 seconds. linux windows anything that cam play MP3 MP3 pro and WMA (winamp really)

Edited July 19, 2004 by musicmaster

[Osiris]

Look dont listen to this stability and linux v windows crap very simply

Linux generally loads reasonably fast but to this day the fastest boot ive seen has to be WindowsME. It even boots fast off old crap machines so it should be quite fine for what you have.

Additionally you could just run any Windows higher then 98? and just use Standby and Hibernate modes. Standby will load up damn quick.

But yeah for running winamp, stability, usability etc none of those are your concerns so personally if you want bootup im thinking WindowsMe. Or if your happy to waste a cpl cents a day, just use standby mode and use whatever you want.

[nexx]

Just want to play music?

http://geexbox.org/

Boots for me in 5 seconds :)

[Fredde87]

i was just about to suggest geexbox :p

the longest bit about the boot is the bios posts and that ****... I would though go with Windows XP Embedded... Get it at www.microsoft.com/windows/embedded.. use the evaluation.. you can use it for 180 days but you can either reinstall it every 6 months or you will find a way around it ;)

windows embedded is a program which you run, you can then choose what part you want.. i would select drivers + winlogon + (cant remember what it is called the basics that you must have) + network support (if you want to stream music over the network) + winamp... it will boot really fast...

edit: geexbox will not boot in 5 seconds on a p3... but it is fast as well...

edit2: sorry did se that you said it booten in 5 seconds for you...

Edited July 20, 2004 by Fredde87

[AsciiSmoke]

Not got any suggestions other than what you've got so far but I'd just like to say.

I've got a second sys like this, I call it my M-Box (multimedia-box) It's connected to my TV in a little Shuttle Case I use it for recording TV and playing Divx/WMA/DVD as well as some games that play good through a usb gamepad like NFSU and PSPE as well as some basic web browsing like checking local cinema times and reading film reviews. Helps if you got a tv that can accept a 800x600 signal without getting too blurry. It's a real nice thing to have next to your TV if you can get a quiet enough PSU/Cooling Fan/HDD

Heartily Recommended

Ascii

[futb0l]

Windows XP is very fast. Use bootvis.

You might also try some of the Linux Distro.

[poisonarrow]

XP Embedded boots up in about 20 seconds for me.

If you can't be arsed with that, then just use Hibernation with Windows XP.

[Dessimat0r]

BeOS is the fastest booting OS, that still remains fullly functional ;)

[Fredde87]

test zero what system is that and what components are you using?

[poisonarrow]

I'm running an AMD Athlon XP 2800+ with 512MB DDR RAM.

Here's what I did:

• Imported my hardware configuration into Target Designer
  
• Modified the Target Device Settings* (using the Settings panel)
  
• Added the Information Appliance Design Template
  
• Configured the Information Appliance component (using the Settings panel)
  
• Ran a Dependency Check (F5)
  
• Removed components that I don't use
  
• Configured the User Interface Core component (using the Settings panel)
  
• Added and configured the Automatic Logon component (using the Settings panel)
  
• Built the target image without running a Dependency Check (F7)
  

* specifically, Boot ARC Path and Boot Partition Size

Here's a list of the components I added:

• Automatic Logon
  
• Add Hardware Control Panel
  
• Add/Remove Programs Control Panel
  
• Date/Time Control Panel
  
• Device Manager
  
• Display Control Panel
  
• Keyboard & Mouse Control Panel
  
• Map Network Drives/Network Places Wizard
  
• Power Meter Control Panel
  
• Registry Editor
  
• System Control Panel
  
• Task Manager
  
• Tray Icon Add/Remove Support
  
• Users Control Panel
  
• Windows Accessories (minus Wordpad)
  
• CMD - Windows Command Processor
  

I'm having problems installing the ATi drivers though. :wacko:

[Fred Derf Veteran]

XP boots faster than 2000 and NT, so stay away from those. If you disabled the eye-candy from XP you might find it fast enough.

Other than that, you could boot from a CD-ROM that creates a 128MB RAM drive that contained Windows 95 and a music player.

Assuming that this guy hasn't stripped the networking components then you get your music from the network.

http://www.geocities.com/politalk/win95/emrgcy95.htm

He says you can boot in as little a 2 seconds.

n.b. I've noticed that CD burners seem to add a few seconds to the 9x boot time but perhaps that's only when burning software is installed.

Edit: I guess it does support networking

With Network access you can transfer long filenames from one computer to the other without having Windows installed.

[ThaOddie]

whats the fastest booting OS out there? im setting up my P3 667 256MB, 25GB, some passive 4MB AGP as a music thing in the basement, and i need an OS that would load in less then 15 seconds. linux windows anything that cam play MP3 MP3 pro and WMA (winamp really)

install DOS 6.22 on your rig and it will boot in less than 10 seconds...that's a promise!!!

:D LOL :D

[ThaOddie]

I'm running an AMD Athlon XP 2800+ with 512MB DDR RAM.

Here's what I did:

• Imported my hardware configuration into Target Designer
  
• Modified the Target Device Settings* (using the Settings panel)
  
• Added the Information Appliance Design Template
  
• Configured the Information Appliance component (using the Settings panel)
  
• Ran a Dependency Check (F5)
  
• Removed components that I don't use
  
• Added components from Software > Sytem > User Interface
  
• Added the Windows Installer Service and Autologin components
  
• Configured the User Interface Core component (using the Settings panel)
  
• Added and configured the Automatic Logon component (using the Settings panel)
  
• Built the target image without running a Dependency Check (F7)
  

* specifically, Boot ARC Path and Boot Partition Size

I'm having problems installing the ATi drivers though. :wacko:

AHHHH you're working with XP embedded!!! That will boot like lightning :woot: :woot:

[tomwarren Veteran]

Use XP embedded or 2000 embedded and use bootvis. Should be around 15secs

[sp0rk]

XP(prior to SP1 update) booted in about 5 seconds for me on an AthlonXP 3000+ with 256mb 3200 DDR RAM.

[Storm]

geexbox is nice :D

[sandman45654]

Dos is actually worth a try. Download MpxPlay and give it a look. It will be very fast and quite stable.

http://www.geocities.com/mpxplay/

[Ollie64]

What about AmigaOS - up and running Sensible Soccer in 10 seconds!

[boomn]

I suggest XP since you can easily put it into standyby mode, which will boot back up in less than 2 seconds

[chacho]

Use XP embedded or 2000 embedded and use bootvis. Should be around 15secs

bootvis doesn't improve boot performance. read the bootvis page at microsoft

[insanekiwi]

tunexp from driverheaven :yes:

use the ultra-fast boot feature.

[ahodgey]

If you dont mind the PC using a little bit of power and you have the hardware to do it then I would say Win XP with Stand by in the S3 position (bios setting)

This starts up in about the time it takes the monitor to warm up ie. about 2-3 secs. (Remember this is not an actual cold boot)

Stand by in S3 dumps the hibernate file into the RAM and the pc just keeps this powered so there are no fans or anything else running (which happens with standby in S1). Just a little juice to keep the memory up. On restarting it just loads the hibernate file out of ram which is the quickest possible method. No bios / raid load up as its all still detected.

Been using standby for a long time now (about a year) and it totally rocks imo. Also cool for WOL as dont have to wait ages for it to boot up.

Only side effect you sometimes have is it takes a little while for the DNS service to start after coming out of standby so you might not be able to browse the web by names for the first 5-10 secs after boot, but for music this would be no probs

[Dessimat0r]

If you dont mind the PC using a little bit of power and you have the hardware to do it then I would say Win XP with Stand by in the S3 position (bios setting)

This starts up in about the time it takes the monitor to warm up ie. about 2-3 secs. (Remember this is not an actual cold boot)

Stand by in S3 dumps the hibernate file into the RAM and the pc just keeps this powered so there are no fans or anything else running (which happens with standby in S1). Just a little juice to keep the memory up. On restarting it just loads the hibernate file out of ram which is the quickest possible method. No bios / raid load up as its all still detected.

Been using standby for a long time now (about a year) and it totally rocks imo. Also cool for WOL as dont have to wait ages for it to boot up.

Only side effect you sometimes have is it takes a little while for the DNS service to start after coming out of standby so you might not be able to browse the web by names for the first 5-10 secs after boot, but for music this would be no probs

Actually, it does not dump any hibernate file into RAM, the contents of the RAM which you need to preserve are already in the RAM. All that S3 does is keep it powered.

[Visentinel]

Dos 6.22 - Windows 3.1

Winamp 16bit

It wont get faster than that ;)

[Visentinel]

If you dont mind the PC using a little bit of power and you have the hardware to do it then I would say Win XP with Stand by in the S3 position (bios setting)

This starts up in about the time it takes the monitor to warm up ie. about 2-3 secs. (Remember this is not an actual cold boot)

Stand by in S3 dumps the hibernate file into the RAM and the pc just keeps this powered so there are no fans or anything else running (which happens with standby in S1). Just a little juice to keep the memory up. On restarting it just loads the hibernate file out of ram which is the quickest possible method. No bios / raid load up as its all still detected.

Been using standby for a long time now (about a year) and it totally rocks imo. Also cool for WOL as dont have to wait ages for it to boot up.

Only side effect you sometimes have is it takes a little while for the DNS service to start after coming out of standby so you might not be able to browse the web by names for the first 5-10 secs after boot, but for music this would be no probs

Actually, it does not dump any hibernate file into RAM, the contents of the RAM which you need to preserve are already in the RAM. All that S3 does is keep it powered.

what the hell :laugh: :laugh:

S1 is Standby, the system is put in Sleep Mode

and Hibernate, the contents of the ram is saved into the Hibernate file. :rolleyes:

S3 is Suspend to ram, PC is powered off but the DDR is Kept Powered.

:rofl:

[Brandon]

Okay, used windows 98SE and with winamp loaded in startup boots in 22seconds with no pagefile (i ebded up having 384MB ram, so that was enough)

with the page file it jumped to 34sec