Therefore, I will repeat what I wrote in my post above

From this point of view, I would be interested to see comparisons of the loading speed of different alternative init systems.
Win is of little interest to me; on a computer with i7, SSD and Win8 the difference is even more noticeable (but you need either a stopwatch or something similar to measure fractions of a second).
This is easier to measure on an older computer.

But from a purely practical point of view, ten seconds of loading is not a problem for me; I’m more concerned about the number of running system processes.

//techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/ask-the-performance-team/windows-8-windows-server-2012-faster-boot-process/ba-p/375131

It does not exist in Windows 7.

That all three OSes mentioned boot slowly on an old computer containing 2008 spinning drives shouldn't be a surprise - even if WD3200AAKS usually has better performance than Samsung HD080HJ, there are plenty of factors which might account for the reported 5 seconds difference.

Anyhow, if people want to discuss boot times, might I suggest a distinct dedicated thread (with some degree of methodicalness applied).

ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hibernation_(computing)#Microsoft_Windows

has been available in some form since microsoft windows 95...

The computer turns off from the power supply; it does not know any sleep modes from birth. smile

The issue JWM-Kit references likely doesn't affect you if you're running Windows 7. As far as I can tell, Windows' "fake shutdown" "fast startup" was implemented starting in Windows 10.

For those unfamiliar with this "feature," here's how it works. When you tell Windows 10+ to "shut down," it just... lies to you. It instead invokes sleep state S4, aka hibernation or suspend to disk. Whether or not you pull the plug at this point has no bearing, as power is not required in S4, because the system state has been saved to non-volatile memory. If you want Windows to actually shut down, you need to hold down Shift when you select the shut down option. Fast startup can also be permanently disabled in Power & sleep settings.

Have you tried checking it yourself?

Ok, let's be specific.

I gave the boot time for Linux on my old computer, GIGA-BYTE GA-945GCM-S2L motherboard, E8400 3.0 GHz processor, Western Digital Caviar Blue 320GB 7200rpm 16MB WD3200AAKS 3.5 SATA II hard drive.
The computer turns off from the power supply; it does not know any sleep modes from birth.

On the same computer, Win7 is installed on a Samsung 80GB 7200rpm 8MB hard drive (HD080HJ).
Its boot time from pressing the grub menu to the loaded desktop (not to the user selection prompt, after which the desktop still loads as is the case with Linux) is 30 seconds.

Linux also has a hibernation feature merged in, IIRC, but last time I checked, the implementation is iffy because it only saves the OS state, not the current state of hardware devices. So once it comes back up, device drivers might get into the wrong state because the hardware isn't in the expected state from when the system was last hibernated.  That was years ago, though, I don't know if the situation has improved since.

But Win7(8) still loads faster.

Does it? or is it just that windows lies and hibernates when you tell it to shutdown.  Compare the boot time from a real cold start.  You probably already know this, but  holding down the shift key when you press shutdown will shut down windows for real.

Personally, I'm not really bothered by how long a system takes to start up or shut down.

If I needed to do something on my computer now, Now, NOW...I should have turned it on earlier...or not shut it down in the first place.  However, I can't recall when an extra +/- 30 seconds was detrimental to my life (although I am Amnesiastical).

I just don't want "things" forced on me.

P.S. Nor do I watch 10-second fake entertainment TikTok videos.   I tried it once...just to see what all the hub-bub was about. It was the worst minute of my life.

This isn't against Uncle aluma's OP...just throwing it in for what it's worth.

What have we come to?
One computer, openSuSe 15.5 with systemd and Daedalus 5.0 with sysv, the same DE and functionality.
The boot time from the start from the grub menu to the WM user selection menu is the same, on my old computer it was 35 seconds.

But Win7(8) still loads faster.

Nowadays, however, with the likes of MS and systemd-style software, it's no longer about empowering the user; it's all about how the author / company / whoever else gets to dictate how you should use the device that you purchased

Exactly. I paid for the hardware (and software in some important cases). I pay for the electricity. It's my computer in the same way that my toothbrush is a tool that intimately belongs me and me alone.

Rent-seeking in a nutshell.

It really is simply hubris, rather than an indictment on the lack of intelligence of the end user. Microsoft, Apple, Google, and RedHat honestly believe that the way they do things is "the right way" and that they're simply making it available for everyone's convenience.

The social contract which led to the prosperity and intellectual freedom of Stallman's generation is over, replaced by a rent-seeking bourgeoisie who has an unprecedented concentration of wealth and thus influence. A rising tide may lift all boats, but these people only care that the water is deep enough to keep their yachts afloat and the plebeians struggling to tread water - waters never quite rough enough for the suffering masses to die off, just inhospitable enough to ensure the bourgeoisie have an ample supply of desperate labor. The dream has died, again. This is what genuinely hurts; Like Stallman, I truly believe in the goodness of Man.

this commentary was interesting:

ttps://www.theregister.com/2023/12/27/bruce_perens_post_open/

My take on this has always been that it's an issue of empowerment: do you empower the user, or do you empower someone else (usually, yourself, or whoever you're writing the code for)?  That's the root of the issue. Computers were invented as tools to help human beings perform complex tasks (computation). They were always meant to be subservient to the user. The user decides what needs to be solved or performed, and the user initiates the computation. The machine empowers the user by offering its capabilities to be at the user's disposal.

Nowadays, however, with the likes of MS and systemd-style software, it's no longer about empowering the user; it's all about how the author / company / whoever else gets to dictate how you should use the device that you purchased -- or worse yet, in recent years you don't even own anything anymore, your device is no longer a tool for your own empowerment; it's merely a service rented to you for payment. The renter gets to decide how, when and what you do with your device -- it's no longer the user who is empowered, but the renter. The author or the company that he works for.

Open source has always been about user empowerment: what got Richard Stallman started with open source is the desire for user empowerment: if the user has the expertise to fix the printer driver or write his own printer driver, why should he be artificially restrained from doing so?  The printer is a tool meant to empower the user; it should not become a vehicle for the manufacturer to squeeze more pennies out of the user's pocket. The user already paid for the printer; he should be able to do what he wants with it.

The development with RH and Ubuntu and sadly, Debian, over the past decade or so has been the gradual shift away from the empowerment of the user back to the empowerment of the organization. Away from the philosophy of the user being able to make changes to the system as he wishes back to the MS paradigm of the user being too dumb to do anything except what we enlightened developers have decided beforehand is simple enough for the user's dumb brain to comprehend.  The user doesn't know how to configure the system and shouldn't be expected to do so, we know better, we make the hard decisions for them and they're just consumers waiting to be spoonfed.

IOW, the empowerment of the upstream rather than the empowerment of the user.

I've been using Linux since 1997 and the last 10-12 years Linux only. No MS, no dual boot.

Awesome, me too!  I actually left the MS world behind in the early days of Windows '97. Back when protected mode was still a thing people talked about, and the option of switching to DOS mode stlll existed (i.e., not just Command Prompt, but the actual, real DOS mode in non-protected mode).  I hated Windows 3.1, and '95 and '97 did not impress me either -- I always felt they did not deliver on their promise: protected mode was supposed to solve the problem of programs stepping over each other that often happened in the DOS world; in exchange for restricted access to system resources, you were supposed to reap the benefit of having a true multitasking system. But the implementation was disappointing, to say the least.  There were all sorts of bugs and loopholes and performance problems, plus your typical MS shove-it-down-your-throat junk that left a bad taste in my mouth.

Upon a friend's recommendation, I started looking into Linux, and chose Debian as the most flexible option that let me configure my system the way I wanted.  This was back in the days before debian-installer and apt-get; I had to download a CD image of the base system and then individually download .deb packages (figuring out the dependencies myself based on information from debian.org) and install them by hand with dpkg.  Initially I had dual boot, but it wasn't long before I ditched dual boot completely and left the Windows world forever.  I've never looked back since.

I've never bought into the "desktop metaphor". IMNSHO it's a poor way of looking at computing. One unique characteristic of humanity is language -- not just isolated words but grammar and structure that conveys complex, abstract thought beyond just "me hungry, me wanna eat, me angry, me beat you up". To express computation, language is the ideal vehicle. Thus, the best way to communicate with the computer is via language -- with grammar, syntax, and intent, like what you get at the shell prompt.  The "desktop metaphor" pushed by MS reduces human-computer interaction back into the stone age of point-and-grunt, "me hungry, me want browser, me move this here, me push this there". It reduces the powerful abstractions of language back to the inferior metaphor of moving physical objects around.  (Plus, most people's desks tend to get messy over time from the clutter of junk piling up on it -- is that the way you want to be using your machine? Messy, inaccurate, accumulates junk over time -- like Windows tends to do. Now you know why.)

My first contact with the Posix world was in university where we had a SunOS server serving X terminals running twm; my early Debian installs all used twm, later ctwm.  It was one step above MS's "desktop metaphor", but still not ideal.  Eventually, after many years, I gradually moved away from overlapping windows to tiled window managers, and eventually adopted Ratpoison: a mouseless WM completely driven by keyboard.  My productivity shot up by an order of magnitude -- all those hand movements between mouse and keyboard slowed me down in so many ways that I never realized; now that the rodent is finally banished to a secondary role and everything was keyboard-driven, my interaction with the computer is more expressive and much more efficient. No more point-and-grunt, I communicate with the machine with real language -- be it shell, vim (the modal interaction is actually a grammar in disguise), or a full-blown programming language.  These days I only keep the rodent around to interact with primitive UIs like the browser that's still stuck in the stone age of point-and-grunt.

As long as there remains enough people who can think above the level of point-and-grunt, I think we're safe, somebody will always come up with something focused on handing power to the user rather than whoever is trying to assume control over your device.

(one letter missing in the link above. correct link here: https://www.theregister.com/2023/12/27/ … post_open/ )

ttps://www.theregister.com/2023/12/27/bruce_perens_post_open/