Whether you have a MacBook or Windows 10 laptop, we can help you cut down its startup time.
If your laptop takes its sweet time booting up, then here are some things you can do to put a little pep back in its startup step.
Get an SSD
You can breathe new life and faster boot times into old laptops by replacing spinning hard drives (HDD) with a new solid-state drive (SSD).
Without needing to physically spin a disk to locate the data you’ve requested, SSDs are substantially faster than traditional HDDs. After installing an SSD, the first thing you’ll notice is the speed improvement it causes when you boot up your laptop.
You’ll have to open your laptop and perform a bit of surgery, but it’s a basic procedure. In a nutshell, you will need to gather a few tools, clone your hard drive to the new drive, open your laptop, remove its old hard drive and then add in a SSD in its place.
Reduce startup items
Sometimes the applications you install go ahead and include themselves among the applications that your laptop loads when it starts up. The longer that list of applications, the longer it takes to start up. Thankfully, both Windows and OS X both let you choose which applications make this list.
If you are unwilling to purchase or install an SSD, then you’ll like this move because its free and easy. And if your laptop already has an SSD, then you can further shorten its boot time.
Windows: Fast startup
For Windows 10 laptops, there’s a setting called fast startup. It cuts down on startup time by creating a state between shutdown and hibernation where your system state is saved as a hibernation file, which is then loaded when you start up your laptop again. It saves Windows the trouble of reloading the kernel, drivers, and your settings. Unlike hibernation mode though, your open folders and applications are not saved with fast startup.
OS X: Automatic login
This last tip is for Mac owners who have more than one user account set up. With automatic login, you bypass the login screen and log right into one of your accounts to speed the startup process along. Because this setting lets you log into OS X without needing to enter your password, automatic login is not advisable if you carry your laptop with you everywhere you go and are prone to leaving it unattended in public places. If your laptop spends most of the time safely at home, here’s how to enable it.