Why Linux boots and shutdown faster than Windows

[Batu69]

 

Do you ever wonder why Linux based operating systems like Ubuntu,Linux Mint,Elementary OS,Kali Linux etc boots and shutdown faster than Windows operating system ?

No!

 

In this article we are going to break down it for you.

Why Linux Boots Faster than Windows ?

First we are going to discuss why Linux boots faster than windows .

A lot factors affect the boot time of both Linux and Windows. Some of the notable reasons are :

Kernel :

Kernel is the nucleus of an operating system. It has complete control over everything that occurs in the system.

Linux Kernel is monolithic — means it holds all functionality,even drivers ,memory management, task scheduler and file system. So while booting Kernel loads all these functions at once.

And Windows NT kernel is like a micro-kernel which only holds basic features during boot process, then loads other functions,drivers and file systems. Which makes Windows to boot a bit slower than Linux.

Services and Programs :

In Windows many services auto-starts during start up along with many programs like Antivirus which makes booting process slow. While in case of Linux it is limited.

Backward compatibility :

Backward compatibility allow software system to successfully use interfaces and data from earlier versions of the system or with other systems.

And Windows have long history and they support old software frameworks, so during boot time Windows have to load these libraries to make the Windows experience smoother.

While Linux distributions doesn’t have backward compatibility feature.

Fragmentation :

Fragmentation means the storing of a file in several separate areas of memory scattered throughout a hard disk.

In Windows files are fragmented. So hard disk takes more time for read and write during start up. And also when you installs more programs in Windows, then system takes more time to load. You can notices these by delay in boot time with new and used Windows system.

 

And in Linux filesystem used is EXT, which doesn’t requires fragmentation. Because Linux allocates files in a more intelligent way. Instead of placing multiple files near each other on the hard disk, Linux file systems scatter different files all over the disk, leaving a large amount of free space between them. So  read and write during start up is faster.

Desktop Environment :

Another main reason behind faster Linux boot is its Desktop Environment (DE). Which is quite faster than Windows.

Why Linux Shutdown Faster than Windows ?

Now we are going to discuss why Linux shutdown faster than Windows.

Services in Windows delays shutdown :

During Windows shutdown, most services will generate at least one event on terminating. Sometimes each service may have many events.

Eg “NTP Service terminating”, “Printer Driver got signal to terminate”, “Printer Driver is flushing the queue” “Printer Driver Exiting”. These Events are “objects” and are slow to create and destroy, which adds up to shutdown time.

However, during shutdown on Linux, most processes simply print a line on the console or/var/log/messages and exit. Which makes a smoother shutdown.

Cache :

Windows may cache many things and these caches have to be flushed to filesystem on shutdown. But caches are handled better in Linux, with periodic “fsync” executions, on better filesystems.

GUI :

Graphical User Interface (GUI) in Windows saves a lot of state information most of which is stored as objects. Which affect shutdown time.

While in case of Linux, Command Line Interface (CLI) has almost nothing to save, except for the shell history file. Most state information is in simple text files.

Process & Programs :

Like services, some process and programs in Windows a lot more time to exit during shutdown and it will hung up and sometimes we have to forcibly terminate the task.

And Linux takes less time to each process to exit, and most programs may respond quickly and exit faster during shutdown.

However unlike previous Windows versions, Windows 10 some what improved its boot and shutdown time but still doesn’t faster than Linux.

 

Article source

[steven36]

I dont think Linux boots faster than Windows and many Linux users would agree  with me.

Why Linux boot is slower than windows boot?

https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=226949

Windows boots faster than Linux  but is slower at shunting down than Linux  . 
 

Quote

 

Both timed from Grub Boot Menu

Windows 7: 24 seconds to login screen... 5 seconds to Desktop. Click Thunderbird - starts straight away

Linux Mint 18 Mate: 40-55 seconds (it's got a mind of it's own ) to login screen or Desktop (it's got a mind of it's own with that too... sometimes I see the timed login screen, other times it bypasses it. ) )

However, Windows 7 was pre-installed on this Laptop, so hardware and software drivers are a perfect match. Linux was downloaded, and has to match as much different hardware as possible, often without access to closed source code... so it's not a fair fight.

And... how many times do you restart your computer each day - me, it's booted up in the morning and shut down at night. So it doesn't matter to me how long it takes to boot (although I do try to get the time down if I think it's delayed by some error)... and shut down is less than 5 seconds (it's got a mind of... ).

(BTW, Antix boots from live USB faster than Windows or Mint)

 

Antix  dont use systemd  its one of the  few that dont  still  and maybe that has something to do with it. 

 

[babelpatcher]

1 hour ago, steven36 said:

I dont think Linux boots faster than Windows and many Linux users would agree  with me.

Why Linux boot is slower than windows boot?

https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=226949

Windows boots faster than Linux  but is slower at shunting down than Linux  . 
 

Antix  dont use systemd  its one of the  few that dont  still  and maybe that has something to do with it. 

 

 

i'm with dual-boot OS (windows 10 pro v1607 14393.321 & Ubuntu 16.04 LTS)

 

many unneeded service disabled in windows 10 while no chages to my ubuntu.

 

still, Ubuntu boot, reboot and shutdown much much much more faster than the f**king-slow windows 10.

[steven36]

1 hour ago, babelpatcher said:

 

i'm with dual-boot OS (windows 10 pro v1607 14393.321 & Ubuntu 16.04 LTS)

 

many unneeded service disabled in windows 10 while no chages to my ubuntu.

 

still, Ubuntu boot, reboot and shutdown much much much more faster than the f**king-slow windows 10.

It depends on you're hardware  it means you're hardware is more suited  for Ubuntu  than Windows 10 is all . Both of my systems  Windows 10  boot up is faster than Linux Mint  and Manjaro Linux  ..You cant make claims  that something is faster or slower  when no ones systems are the same!

 

My Dell Mini Tower Intel Machine they made some with Ubuntu  on it and some with Windows on it,  but the version of Ubuntu they have now is not the same but it works on it  but that mean it's fast as 14.04 on it. .

 

The system I'm on now  Ubuntu 16.04 LTS want boot up at all ,  only Manjaro Linux  or some other distro Arch works for newer System upgrades . Windows 10 works fine and i dont have worry about some upstream update zapping my system like I do using a distro based on Arch or maybe i do if M$ ever gives me a bad update and i take it. .

 

I dont really like Ubuntu that much because they dont really make a effort  to make sure  it works on all systems like Manjaro Linux does . A LTS  or are any other type OS is not worth a hill of beans if  it want boot up. Ubuntu 16.04  made me so mad  that i almost stop using Linux but  i found Manjaro Linux and i changed my mind and I still use one based on Ubuntu 16.04,  Linux Mint 18 on my Intel  system and on AMD I use Linux Mint 17.3   but I also  use Manjaro Linux 16.10 on AMD its my favorite. I'm triple booting my AMD machine.

 

I only tolerate Ubuntu most likely I will drop  Linux Mint soon  I been on Linux Long enough  that i know how too install packages in ARCH . Only thing I like about Linux Mint is Wine  works better than it  do in ARCH or Ubuntu.

[DKT27]

I have some doubts about the filesystem though. How does spreading files all over the disk help. Infact, this can cause increase in read times and wear on the HDD. While I myself use a automatic defragger now, I strongly think the arrange by folder method offered by a defrag software has to be one of the most helpful and useful feature.

 

The problem with fragmentation is, a same file is spread over the drive. But the bigger problem with filesystems is, no two folders are next to each other, meaning, if you open a software, one folder belonging to that software is on the one side of the HDD, with the other one being on the other side, this slows the speed of opening the software.

 

Also, while people do recommend limiting them and I agree, but the good thing with partitions is, the more you have, the lesser the folders / files of the same origin spread, as there is lesser room available as it is limited by the partition allotted on the HDD.

 

All this does not matter on SSD. I wish I could afford it.

[steven36]

33 minutes ago, DKT27 said:

I have some doubts about the filesystem though. How does spreading files all over the disk help. Infact, this can cause increase in read times and wear on the HDD. While I myself use a automatic defragger now, I strongly think the arrange by folder method offered by a defrag software has to be one of the most helpful and useful feature.

I had a HHD give out on me were I used windows 8.1 a few years by then I had Windows 10 on it after that happened I started fooling with Linux . One HDD  i have windows 10  on now is old as dirt  it came in  my old XP i junked . New is not always better when comes to HDD . I have 2 Toshiba 1TB portable  HDD that are very old one still says its in great shape   the other says it going die any day now for 2 years but still works . You  never know how long a HDD  will last. Anyways if you that worried about frag on Linux get a SSD. You aslo  can install  e4defrag from a live USB and defrag for Linux

 

I'm not worried about it really

Quote

 

Windows with it's FAT or NTFS file systems tends to place files continuously one behind another from beginning of disk or partition. This leads to file fragmentation as these files are modified over time (files are split into multiple parts). Accessing a fragmented file may require several I/O calls (SLOW) to read that one file.

Linux file system such as ext3 or ext4 on the other hand tend to place files spread out over the disk with free space available so the file could grow without being split into fragments. That is why you do not have to worry about fragmentation while your disk usage is below 80%.

 

Just  remove stuff you dont use witch just makes the system safer, clean it and  dont fill it up with crap  and you should be fine.  

 

 

[jamesbond]

i did shut down my win7 notebook last time more than 6 months ago... so i don't really care how long it takes, honestly.