I picked one of these up at Circuit City last week and am looking to speed it up where ever possible. (Reviewed below). It has a normal SATA II drive in it and I know an SSD drive would significantly speed it up, but don't want to spend any more $ on it. http://www.trustedreviews.com/storage/review/2008/05/08/OCZ-64GB-SATA-II-SSD... has pretty graphs to compare. I weaseled a RAM upgrade out of my hard ware guy so I have 1.5gigs in it now (max'd). I ran speed tests between booting off the SATA II drive and the same install via USB 2.0 thumb drive and boot times were around 50 seconds for either. I know there are SSD ExpressCards for cheap (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820191057) but I read that the ExpressCards are really just USB 2.0 speeds anyway so I wouldn't see any difference from my thumb drive test. Short of compiling my own kernel (which I never can seem to do right), any other advise on how to speed up a netbook's boot time? I will say once booted, everything runs pretty well, though I'm sure I wouldn't mind more speed then, too! grazie! Mike Review: Stopped in to Circuit City today and (impulsively?) bought a Lenovo IdeaPad S10. I've been looking for something to waste my money on/replace the Dell I bought that I ended up not liking and turning over to my wife, so it wasn't extremely impulsive, just a little impulsive. Anyway, it was 10% of the normal price, which brought it down to $370. Not a great deal at that price since online it is like $350 or so, but the one I got has twice as much RAM and hard drive space as online numbers, plus no shipping. Specs: Intel Atom N270 1.6ghz CPU (Intel has returned to multi-threading) 10.2 inch screen 1GIG RAM 160Gig SATA II Hard drive Wired/Wireless NIC cards 3 Cell Lithium-Ion 2.64lbs No CDROM (not a big deal as I have a Lenovo USB CDROM drive anyway) The size: possibly the perfect size...small, light weight without being tiny. 10.2 inch 1024x600 screen and not an impossibly tiny keyboard (though obviously not full sized). It is about the size of a larger hard cover book. The OS: Comes with Windows XP and it ran very well...applications opened fast, web surfing was responsive and I could open several apps at once without much hit to performance. After 27 different questions about my loyalty to Bill Gates, I decided it was time to upgrade. Concerned that the new hardware may have issues with older versions of Linux, I jumped right into an as-yet-to-be released version of Ubuntu (9.04). Booted right up, answered a couple questions and installed like a champ...saw the disk, the RAM, the wireless card, everything...during the install. Upon reboot into Linux though, nothing...it just wouldn't boot. "No OS found". I thought my partitioning might be screwing me up, so I let the installer pick, but to no avail. I booted off live CD's, but when I mounted and chroot'd into my install, the install didn't even see my /dev/sda. At one point I finally got to a grub > boot, but still wouldn't boot to the OS. I tried a Debian 4.0 install, but that didn't see either the wired or wireless nics. Similar to the Ubuntu, Fedora 10 installed, but would never boot. So I tried a Ubuntu 8.10 install and everything was fine! Installed with my partitions (/boot, /, /home and swap) and all is well in the world. Wired, wireless, SATA, screen resolution....everything works straight from the install. I'm still testing and upgrading but over all this is a great netbook and takes to Ubuntu Linux straight away, and for less than $400 a great addition to my daily commute.
"Mike" == Mike Leo <mleo963@yahoo.com> writes:
Mike> Short of compiling my own kernel (which I never can seem to do Mike> right), any other advise on how to speed up a netbook's boot Mike> time? I suspect that your boot time is spent in udev and module loading stuff. There's a bunch of work in the linux kernel with a tool called 'bootchart' which tracks how stuff boots up. With 8.10, it's trivial to drop in a new kernel. Also, if you compile in all the modules your need on bootup, and minimize the modules you have otherwise (say for USB devices, etc) then you should see a speed up. Do an 'lsmod' and see which modules you have loaded. Then go and grab the latest linux kernel (2.6.29-rc4 say...) and compile it using the *exact* same config from your 8.10 kernel. Test it out, using the 'mkinitrd' script to rebuild your initrd for loading. Update grub with the new info and reboot. See if it's faster. And if it boots properly If it does, then go back into the config under the new kernel and start moving more stuff into the kernel image, and putting less stuff into modules. Rebuild and boot. See how it goes. Also, I'd go through and see which software packages are installed and starting up daemons and I'd nuke as many of them as you can. Maybe ntpd doesn't need to run, or avahi or some other funky stuff. Like bluez, etc. It's hard to say what will and won't work, but getting the kernel and device initialization to be as parallel as possible will help boot times. Also, check out the 'moblin' project from Intel, they've been working on making netbooks boot faster too. John
all good info. bootchart doesn't seem to work at all for me. I apt-get install it which is fine but it configures itself to use /sbin/bootchartd which doesn't get installed. Kind'a weird. Maybe i'm missing something. Moblin is not debian based so I know I'd miss my apt, but I'll give it a shot at some point I'm sure. ________________________________ From: John Stoffel <john@stoffel.org> To: Worcester Linux Users Group <wlug@mail.wlug.org> Sent: Thursday, February 12, 2009 10:14:21 AM Subject: Re: [Wlug] Lenovo S10 Netbook
"Mike" == Mike Leo <mleo963@yahoo.com> writes:
Mike> Short of compiling my own kernel (which I never can seem to do Mike> right), any other advise on how to speed up a netbook's boot Mike> time? I suspect that your boot time is spent in udev and module loading stuff. There's a bunch of work in the linux kernel with a tool called 'bootchart' which tracks how stuff boots up. With 8.10, it's trivial to drop in a new kernel. Also, if you compile in all the modules your need on bootup, and minimize the modules you have otherwise (say for USB devices, etc) then you should see a speed up. Do an 'lsmod' and see which modules you have loaded. Then go and grab the latest linux kernel (2.6.29-rc4 say...) and compile it using the *exact* same config from your 8.10 kernel. Test it out, using the 'mkinitrd' script to rebuild your initrd for loading. Update grub with the new info and reboot. See if it's faster. And if it boots properly If it does, then go back into the config under the new kernel and start moving more stuff into the kernel image, and putting less stuff into modules. Rebuild and boot. See how it goes. Also, I'd go through and see which software packages are installed and starting up daemons and I'd nuke as many of them as you can. Maybe ntpd doesn't need to run, or avahi or some other funky stuff. Like bluez, etc. It's hard to say what will and won't work, but getting the kernel and device initialization to be as parallel as possible will help boot times. Also, check out the 'moblin' project from Intel, they've been working on making netbooks boot faster too. John _______________________________________________ Wlug mailing list Wlug@mail.wlug.org http://mail.wlug.org/mailman/listinfo/wlug
Mike> all good info. Thanks. Mike> bootchart doesn't seem to work at all for me. I apt-get install Mike> it which is fine but it configures itself to use Mike> /sbin/bootchartd which doesn't get installed. Kind'a weird. Mike> Maybe i'm missing something. Possibly. I haven't tried it out myself yet. My new box works just fine and boots quickly, the memory test in BIOS is the longest part. Mike> Moblin is not debian based so I know I'd miss my apt, but I'll Mike> give it a shot at some point I'm sure. Yeah, I hate yum myself, it's so slow esp after using apt for a while. :] But it's tempting. I think they've got a system booting in under 10 second. But as you say, if it's not apt, then I'll probably just stay away... John Mike> ________________________________ Mike> From: John Stoffel <john@stoffel.org> Mike> To: Worcester Linux Users Group <wlug@mail.wlug.org> Mike> Sent: Thursday, February 12, 2009 10:14:21 AM Mike> Subject: Re: [Wlug] Lenovo S10 Netbook
"Mike" == Mike Leo <mleo963@yahoo.com> writes:
Mike> Short of compiling my own kernel (which I never can seem to do Mike> right), any other advise on how to speed up a netbook's boot Mike> time? Mike> I suspect that your boot time is spent in udev and module loading Mike> stuff. There's a bunch of work in the linux kernel with a tool called Mike> 'bootchart' which tracks how stuff boots up. Mike> With 8.10, it's trivial to drop in a new kernel. Also, if you compile Mike> in all the modules your need on bootup, and minimize the modules you Mike> have otherwise (say for USB devices, etc) then you should see a speed Mike> up. Mike> Do an 'lsmod' and see which modules you have loaded. Then go and grab Mike> the latest linux kernel (2.6.29-rc4 say...) and compile it using the Mike> *exact* same config from your 8.10 kernel. Mike> Test it out, using the 'mkinitrd' script to rebuild your initrd for Mike> loading. Update grub with the new info and reboot. See if it's Mike> faster. And if it boots properly Mike> If it does, then go back into the config under the new kernel and Mike> start moving more stuff into the kernel image, and putting less stuff Mike> into modules. Rebuild and boot. See how it goes. Mike> Also, I'd go through and see which software packages are installed and Mike> starting up daemons and I'd nuke as many of them as you can. Maybe Mike> ntpd doesn't need to run, or avahi or some other funky stuff. Like Mike> bluez, etc. Mike> It's hard to say what will and won't work, but getting the kernel and Mike> device initialization to be as parallel as possible will help boot Mike> times. Also, check out the 'moblin' project from Intel, they've been Mike> working on making netbooks boot faster too. Mike> John Mike> _______________________________________________ Mike> Wlug mailing list Mike> Wlug@mail.wlug.org Mike> http://mail.wlug.org/mailman/listinfo/wlug Mike> _______________________________________________ Mike> Wlug mailing list Mike> Wlug@mail.wlug.org Mike> http://mail.wlug.org/mailman/listinfo/wlug
Maybe I'm odd, but boot time is almost completely unimportant to me.I never reboot my desktop and my laptop goes on suspend 49 times out of 50. It's impressive that they have boot time that low now though. Eric John Stoffel wrote:
Mike> all good info.
Thanks.
Mike> bootchart doesn't seem to work at all for me. I apt-get install Mike> it which is fine but it configures itself to use Mike> /sbin/bootchartd which doesn't get installed. Kind'a weird. Mike> Maybe i'm missing something.
Possibly. I haven't tried it out myself yet. My new box works just fine and boots quickly, the memory test in BIOS is the longest part.
Mike> Moblin is not debian based so I know I'd miss my apt, but I'll Mike> give it a shot at some point I'm sure.
Yeah, I hate yum myself, it's so slow esp after using apt for a while. :] But it's tempting. I think they've got a system booting in under 10 second.
But as you say, if it's not apt, then I'll probably just stay away...
John
Eric> Maybe I'm odd, but boot time is almost completely unimportant to Eric> me.I never reboot my desktop and my laptop goes on suspend 49 Eric> times out of 50. It's impressive that they have boot time that Eric> low now though. I don't think you're odd at all. Like you say, I don't reboot my desktop that oftern, and I reboot my main home file server even less often. My work laptop is WinXP (soon to be Vista... sigh) and while it suspends ok, the hardest part is the wait for the wireless network to come back up. :] But, on the other hand, I can understand wanting to have a quicker bootup time, since turning the system *off* saves more power than suspending, and suspending is still a black art. Every week or so my WinXP box loses it's mind and I have to reboot no matter what. It's not simple. Cheers, John
not odd, no....but i have nothing else to do with this netbook so I thought I'd try and tweak the heck out of it! ________________________________ From: John Stoffel <john@stoffel.org> To: Worcester Linux Users Group <wlug@mail.wlug.org> Sent: Friday, February 13, 2009 9:00:51 AM Subject: Re: [Wlug] Lenovo S10 Netbook Eric> Maybe I'm odd, but boot time is almost completely unimportant to Eric> me.I never reboot my desktop and my laptop goes on suspend 49 Eric> times out of 50. It's impressive that they have boot time that Eric> low now though. I don't think you're odd at all. Like you say, I don't reboot my desktop that oftern, and I reboot my main home file server even less often. My work laptop is WinXP (soon to be Vista... sigh) and while it suspends ok, the hardest part is the wait for the wireless network to come back up. :] But, on the other hand, I can understand wanting to have a quicker bootup time, since turning the system *off* saves more power than suspending, and suspending is still a black art. Every week or so my WinXP box loses it's mind and I have to reboot no matter what. It's not simple. Cheers, John _______________________________________________ Wlug mailing list Wlug@mail.wlug.org http://mail.wlug.org/mailman/listinfo/wlug
"Mike" == Mike Leo <mleo963@yahoo.com> writes:
Mike> not odd, no....but i have nothing else to do with this netbook Mike> so I thought I'd try and tweak the heck out of it! Go for it! I'm tempted to get a netbook at some point... but since work gives me a laptop, it's not a huge rush. Though it's possibly something my wife could use for her work... while keeping her main machine downstairs for photo editing, etc. John
holy penguins!! my average boot time with various forms of ubuntu on disk or USB thumb drive is about 1 minute. Moblin is 30 seconds!! I'm impressed now.
participants (3)
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Eric Stein -
John Stoffel -
Mike Leo