Why does my computer take so long to boot up?

It takes about 10 min to boot from power on to log on page.

This question was answered on May 28, 2004. Much of the information contained herein may have changed since posting.

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This may take awhile but hang in there

First as your computer boots up it detects the optical drives or hard drives are connected this takes a few seconds to process which makes it longer to boot by defining the hard drives in your computer's Bios you can take off a few seconds off boot time watch your screen as the computer detects each drive and remember where they are found your main hard drive should be found as the primary master also look to see where they are foound and if it reports back "None" and remember the channel (Primary Slave and more ) once you know which ports are used by each drive you will need to enter the Bios by pressing the ESC button during the startup screen (Ram count screen) once there select the "Standard CMOS Setup" option this will take you to the drive configuration area where you can say what kind of hard drive is installed in your system to do this you will need to get your hard drive's configuration settings which are on top of the hard drive and in your hard drive's documentation if you are not able to get the configuration settings get your hard drive's make and model using them to get the configuration settings on the manufacturers web site once you have the settings enter them into the port in addition if you have any empty IDE ports with no drives connected make sure to select "None" for the port if you install any additional drives into your computer you will need to return to the Bios and allow the port selecting 'User' or 'Auto' instead of 'None' second you will need to enable the 'Quick Power On Self Test' this option is in different parts of the Bios depending on the make and model of the motherboard if you search you will find it allowing this option will speed up the boot process by bypassing the long Ram check third find the setting in the Bios called 'Boot Sequence' and set it to C,SCSI,A or C,A,SCSI this will tell the computer to boot from the C drive first checking the A drive before loading the operating system in you have a computer problem you will need your computer to boot from the A drive before attempting to boot from the C drive if this is the case set this setting back to A,C, SCSI there you go it was long but i hope it helps.

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Posted by michael of Katharine Gibbs School - New York on May 28, 2004

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