Slow XP Shutdown

Eck

.user
Joined
10 Jun 2002
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393
So I've got my 36GB Raptors in RAID 0 -- they're fast as hell. It takes about 10 seconds to get to the desktop. Only problem is that it takes at least that logn to shutdown as well. It just stops at the "Windows is shutting down" screen with no harddrive activity. Then finally the harddrives are active and it shuts down quick. What could possibly be causing it? It's not that big of a deal but I'd like to fix it if possible.
 
no hardrive activity?...r u sure?

look to taskmanager and see what's running...one of those is saving data before it closes.

also if you have the "clear pagefile on shutdown" hack enabled turn that off
 
Yeah, I'm sure. I'm watching the HD light on my PC. Naturally there is some activity at first, but then after about 1 or 2 seconds at the "Windows is shutting down" screen, activity stops and it just sits there for about 8 more seconds.

Clear pagefile on shutdown is disabled.
 
Attached is a screenshot of my running processes. All I'm running is NAV 2002 and Zone Alarm. CLI is of course ATI's driver. IAANTMON.exe is my Intel RAID driver. Everything else is normal.
 

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Probably Zone Alarm and/or Norton 2002. Stop one or both just before you shutdown and see if it will make your shutdown process faster.
 
Okay, this is odd. Apparently it's happening on BOTH startup and shutdown. On startup, it hangs at "Windows is starting up" and hangs at shutdown on "Windows is shutting down".

It's not ZoneAlarm or NAV. I uninstalled NAV and closed ZoneAlarm. I even tried removing the MS .NET Framework 1.1 hotfix because I am certain it didn't do that before I applied that fix. That didn't fix it though. I must have installed something or changed a setting that caused this but I'm stumped. I did tweak the services but I recall it booting up normally after I did that. If anyone wants to double check my services here they are...

http://eck.cjb.net/services.jpg

OH, and on another interesting note, I can't enable Norton's Automatic LiveUpdate. It WAS working... man, I dunno WTF happened. Again these aren't HUGE issues but I like my stuff to run perfect.
 
Last edited:
Problem solved. I had disabled the Event Log service. Reason for doing this: it was perfectly fine to do it before SP2 if I remember correctly. So I was using my old services from way back in the day to tweak and that screwed me over I guess. I set Event Log to automatic startup and that fixed the boot problem for sure, haven't tested shutdown yet as I just got back on. Fixed the NAV Automatic LiveUpdate problem as well...

*Edit* It didn't fix the slow shutdown problem. Oh well, I guess XP is just slow like that. It shouldn't be, but I'll live with it until someone figures it out.
 
what do you mean by slow?...how long does it take to shut down?
 
I wouldn't disable to event log service. A fresh install might be in order. Upgrade to XP Pro while you are at it.
 
madmatt said:
I wouldn't disable to event log service. A fresh install might be in order. Upgrade to XP Pro while you are at it.

I fixed it by enabling event log... I just did a fresh install 3 days ago, why would I do it over?

Also why do I need Pro? It has ZERO features that would benefit me over home. Plus, I have the XP "Pro Lite" but I chose not to install it in case a Service Pack 3 is released.

And by slow, I mean it says "Windows is shutting down" and sits there for abour 10-12 seconds, no HD activity.
 
I didn't read that you had already tried to reformat. I re-read the entire thread and still didn't find that. Maybe it's me?

Some times shutdown can hang while it unloads the registry.

This can be seen in the Event Viewer, Applications, Userenv... i.e.

Windows saved user <USERNAME> registry while an application or service was still using the registry during log off. The memory used by the user's registry has not been freed. The registry will be unloaded when it is no longer in use.

This is often caused by services running as a user account, try configuring the services to run in either the LocalService or NetworkService account.
 
madmatt said:
I didn't read that you had already tried to reformat. I re-read the entire thread and still didn't find that. Maybe it's me?

Some times shutdown can hang while it unloads the registry.

This can be seen in the Event Viewer, Applications, Userenv... i.e.

Windows saved user <USERNAME> registry while an application or service was still using the registry during log off. The memory used by the user's registry has not been freed. The registry will be unloaded when it is no longer in use.

This is often caused by services running as a user account, try configuring the services to run in either the LocalService or NetworkService account.


I've got that in the event viewer... Hmm. How do I configure the services to do that?!
 
fimchick said:
10 to 12 seconds for shutdown is not long enough for concern :)

It is when I've got RAIDED Raptors. :)


American Zombie said:

Been there, tried that. Nothing applied. I'm pretty sure it has something to do with what MadMatt brought up.

Matt: I guess I was expecting you to know that I just got the Raptors in a few days ago and did a fresh install? I didn't write it out, my bad. Didn't mean to come off edgy if you took it that way. Thanks for the help.
 
Eck said:
It is when I've got RAIDED Raptors. :)...

I am afraid I disagree with you, and agree with fimchick....

Havign said that I am almost certain I would point you in the direction of the ways to speed this up. Having said that I would advice caution in the registry hacking you will need to make to improve this.

Basically there are a couple of timeout to kill paramters - one is for Apps and one is for services I think.... you can change the apps one and it will just override any outstanding saving activity, so you might lose work in progress if you left things untidy at shutdown. Overriding the services killing timeout is more of a risky proposition, but with your RAID raptors you could probably half both and then see if you can trim more, or if you need to.

I have not tried looking back or browsing my registry to fidn these values - I am expecting you to maybe have some idea whereof I speak or to "STFW" as they say on IRC ;)

Lemme know... chances are this will largely be the area you need to look in or you'll have something to say about it.... And I still think you are being finnickity to want a faster shutdown.... (IMHO shutdown should be a pretty rare event, maybe once or twice a month, so if it takes a bit what is the issue?)
 
Eck,

It has nothing to do with your hardware. Usually this "warning" comes and goes at it pleases. It is a timing issue with Windows. It happens. You can safely ignore this warning; it is not doing any harm other than taking longer for Windows to shutdown.
 
Mainframeguy said:
I am afraid I disagree with you, and agree with fimchick....

Havign said that I am almost certain I would point you in the direction of the ways to speed this up. Having said that I would advice caution in the registry hacking you will need to make to improve this.

Basically there are a couple of timeout to kill paramters - one is for Apps and one is for services I think.... you can change the apps one and it will just override any outstanding saving activity, so you might lose work in progress if you left things untidy at shutdown. Overriding the services killing timeout is more of a risky proposition, but with your RAID raptors you could probably half both and then see if you can trim more, or if you need to.

I have not tried looking back or browsing my registry to fidn these values - I am expecting you to maybe have some idea whereof I speak or to "STFW" as they say on IRC ;)

Lemme know... chances are this will largely be the area you need to look in or you'll have something to say about it.... And I still think you are being finnickity to want a faster shutdown.... (IMHO shutdown should be a pretty rare event, maybe once or twice a month, so if it takes a bit what is the issue?)

You're right, shutdown is more of a rare event. But when there's something up with my system I try to fix it. I already "STFW" about my issue, not much seemed to apply. However I do believe madmatt found this issue so I don't think there's much I can do about it. I will still look into to changing the apps/services timeout. Thanks.
 
Mainframeguy said:
I am afraid I disagree with you, and agree with fimchick....

Havign said that I am almost certain I would point you in the direction of the ways to speed this up. Having said that I would advice caution in the registry hacking you will need to make to improve this.

Basically there are a couple of timeout to kill paramters - one is for Apps and one is for services I think.... you can change the apps one and it will just override any outstanding saving activity, so you might lose work in progress if you left things untidy at shutdown. Overriding the services killing timeout is more of a risky proposition, but with your RAID raptors you could probably half both and then see if you can trim more, or if you need to.

I have not tried looking back or browsing my registry to fidn these values - I am expecting you to maybe have some idea whereof I speak or to "STF W" as they say on IRC ;)

Lemme know... chances are this will largely be the area you need to look in or you'll have something to say about it.... And I still think you are being finnickity to want a faster shutdown.... (IMHO shutdown should be a pretty rare event, maybe once or twice a month, so if it takes a bit what is the issue?)

Flippin' sweet! Thanks man, I was able to fix it. I searched for the services timeout, found it. Just in case you're wondering, it's:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\WaitToKillServiceTimeout

Mine was set at 20000 (default of 20 seconds [okay so I underestimated]), I changed it to 1000 and XP shuts down fast now. I'm happy, thanks.
 
*smug grin* told ya :) Nice to be lazy and have someone fidn what they need from a pointer in the right direction. The app one is set to ten second by default, but that probably will not bother you. Oh and also the value you have changed your services timeout to is probably a safe one with a Raid setup - XP's default is to allow for the slower drives generally speaking.
 

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