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My computer boots really slow. I am using kubuntu 16.04 with kde plasma 5.6.4. Any suggestions from the log below? I have set automatic login.

Hard-disk: HDD 5400rpm. (Other configuration details: support.hp.com/in-en/document/c04960354 RAM is 16Gb instead of 8 GB.)

My laptop also suffers from this bug: https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=107421. Not sure if it is related to the slow startup.

systemd-analyze blame:

     abhishek ~ $ systemd-analyze blame                     
     27.168s dev-sda6.device
     23.789s systemd-tmpfiles-setup-dev.service
     16.246s NetworkManager-wait-online.service
     11.262s gpu-manager.service
      8.921s apt-daily.service
      8.011s accounts-daemon.service
      6.779s NetworkManager.service
      6.569s ModemManager.service
      3.213s grub-common.service
      2.923s iio-sensor-proxy.service
      2.548s bluetooth.service
      2.448s thermald.service
      1.922s preload.service
      1.519s rsyslog.service
      1.420s quota.service
      1.407s colord.service
      1.163s networking.service
      1.128s systemd-modules-load.service
      1.072s irqbalance.service
       940ms apport.service
       915ms systemd-journald.service
       853ms udisks2.service
       816ms polkitd.service
       800ms systemd-fsck@dev-disk-by\x2duuid-CA5D\x2dF91D.service
       794ms resolvconf.service
       735ms apparmor.service
       655ms virtualbox-guest-utils.service
       598ms dev-hugepages.mount
       556ms console-setup.service
       552ms ufw.service
       527ms dev-mqueue.mount
       527ms sys-kernel-debug.mount
       521ms systemd-tmpfiles-setup.service
       422ms systemd-logind.service
       361ms systemd-sysctl.service
       354ms ondemand.service
       314ms avahi-daemon.service
       254ms systemd-udev-trigger.service
       246ms upower.service
       206ms kmod-static-nodes.service
       204ms wpa_supplicant.service
       195ms systemd-rfkill.service
       176ms [email protected]
       136ms virtualbox.service
       122ms systemd-journal-flush.service
       110ms dev-sda7.swap
        91ms systemd-udevd.service
        75ms rc-local.service
        75ms systemd-remount-fs.service
        60ms systemd-update-utmp.service
        56ms systemd-random-seed.service
        42ms boot-efi.mount
        22ms plymouth-quit.service
        13ms binfmt-support.service
        12ms plymouth-start.service
        11ms alsa-restore.service
        11ms ureadahead-stop.service
        11ms plymouth-read-write.service
        10ms snapd.socket
         9ms pppd-dns.service
         5ms systemd-user-sessions.service
         5ms systemd-update-utmp-runlevel.service
         3ms proc-sys-fs-binfmt_misc.mount
         3ms sddm.service
         2ms systemd-backlight@backlight:intel_backlight.service
         2ms rtkit-daemon.service
         2ms postfix.service
         2ms sys-fs-fuse-connections.mount

systemd-analyze critical-chain:

abhishek ~ $ systemd-analyze critical-chain 
The time after the unit is active or started is printed after the "@" character.
The time the unit takes to start is printed after the "+" character.

graphical.target @55.755s
└─multi-user.target @55.740s
  └─virtualbox.service @55.604s +136ms
    └─network-online.target @55.582s
      └─NetworkManager-wait-online.service @39.335s +16.246s
        └─NetworkManager.service @32.543s +6.779s
          └─dbus.service @32.212s
            └─basic.target @32.207s
              └─sockets.target @32.207s
                └─snapd.socket @32.190s +10ms
                  └─sysinit.target @32.169s
                    └─apparmor.service @31.433s +735ms
                      └─local-fs.target @31.422s
                        └─run-user-1000.mount @47.844s
                          └─local-fs-pre.target @26.618s
                            └─systemd-remount-fs.service @26.543s +75ms
                              └─systemd-journald.socket @2.342s
                                └─-.mount @2.328s
                                  └─system.slice @2.342s
                                    └─-.slice @2.328s

abhishek ~ $ cat /etc/fstab
# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
# device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
# that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
# / was on /dev/sda6 during installation
UUID=85cd7db1-5379-4a11-84d8-0b7ed7989962 /               ext4    errors=remount-ro 0       1
# /boot/efi was on /dev/sda1 during installation
UUID=CA5D-F91D  /boot/efi       vfat    umask=0077      0       1
# swap was on /dev/sda7 during installation
UUID=bf42c497-2871-4fcb-9c6f-ea792ccf35ab none            swap    sw              0       0
abhishek ~ $ uname -r
4.4.0-28-generic 

Logs: http://paste.ubuntu.com/18601516/

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  • What are your system specs? CPU, RAM, Hard Drives (mechanical/ssd?) etc
    – Delorean
    Jul 5, 2016 at 16:40
  • @Dorian support.hp.com/in-en/document/c04960354 RAM is 16Gb instead of 8 GB. Rest is same. Jul 5, 2016 at 17:31
  • 1
    I had similar issues with slow booting which I never solved : askubuntu.com/questions/774954/… I ended up downgrading from Ubuntu 16.04 to Ubuntu Gnome 14.04 and my booting time went from 55 seconds to 20 seconds. And my system, which is new, runs so much faster now.
    – Delorean
    Jul 5, 2016 at 17:37
  • @Dorian Thanks, but I am not very keen on downgrading ubuntu or changing my DE from KDE. Jul 10, 2016 at 12:13
  • what is on sda6? what is in the /etc/fstab? with what kernel was the systemd-analyze output? the mainline 4.7? did you try to upgrade your BIOS (if one is available)?
    – k1l
    Jul 12, 2016 at 21:50

1 Answer 1

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+25

The bottleneck is your hard drive, on top of 16.04 just being slower to boot up. A 5400 RPM disk is the slowest out there. Even 7200 or 10k RPM drives will result in a boot time of 40-60 seconds with Ubuntu 16.04.

I have a PC with triple RAID 0 array with 10k RPM drives, and my Kubuntu 16.04 takes about 15 seconds to boot. But my RAID array is very fast.

On my laptop, I had Kubuntu 15.04, and it took about 20 seconds to boot (with autologin). I upgraded to 16.04 and my boot time went up to 55 seconds, and I tried for along time to try to improve the boot speed. I ended up disabling and removing so much that I started having problems with the OS and made it unstable, and I was never able to get it any faster.

My issue: 16.04: Slow boot no matter what I remove or do (Files for analysis provided)

My weeks of trying in the link above didn't help with my 1TB 5400RPM drive.

If you absolutely do not want to downgrade to Kubuntu 14.04, or even 15.04, then your only option is to upgrade your hard drive. I'm telling you this from experience. You can either upgrade to a 7200RPM, or 10K RPM drive, or switch to an SSD drive. A faster RPM mechanical drive will be a cheaper option.

Smaller SSD's are quite affordable, and even 500GB ones aren't that expensive (about $120-150). If you don't mind using an external USB drive for your long-term storage, you could get away with a 120GB SSD easily, and those are under $100.

If your laptop can take a second hard drive, you can use your SSD for the OS, and the 1TB for storage. That was my setup before, I have an HP DV7 laptop which can take 2 drives.

My solution in the link I provided was to downgrade to 14.04 which cut my boot time to less than half (55 seconds to ~20 seconds). I've now also swapped out my 5400RPM 1TB drive for an SSD and my boot time is now about 5 seconds.

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  • 1
    Thanks for the answer! Is there a reason why 16.04 is slower in boot than others? Jul 13, 2016 at 16:12
  • I would attribute it to added features and more hardware support. Newer software and OS's almost always run better on newer hardware because they have added features that take advantage of the latest hardware capabilities. Sometimes a new version might just be bug fixes, but in the case of an OS LTS, it's new features that need more from hardware. Take a very old OS and put it on new hardware and it will run VERY fast. Put a new OS on old hardware and it'll be very very slow. It's just the evolution of software/hardware.
    – Delorean
    Jul 13, 2016 at 16:17

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