[SOLVED] Linux Mint 19 very slow boot times of ten minutes or so.

[raywoods]

I’ve been having a problem with both Mate and Cinnamon, 64 and 32 bit in Linux Mint 19 Boot, in fact I had noticed something wrong with 18.3 64 bit before. I have found Mint 19 now resembles Windows XP and Vista in their boot times on my old Dell Latitude D630 with 2GB RAM and Intel® Core™2 Duo CPU T8100 @ 2.10GHz × 2. I’ve upgraded the Hard Disk with a 500GB WD spinning disk. Even a quick voyage into Manjaro produced similar problems so, I assume it is something deep down in the Linux Engine Room.

On booting the ISO from a USB Stick the boot time is protracted. Once installed there is a very long delay before Plymouth starts after POST in the order of 55 seconds. There is a lot of HD activity but after Plymouth goes off the screen there is a very long wait and only occasional activity from the HD light. Eventually the Log in screen appears but afterwards inactivity strikes again. After a long wait (>5 minutes) Desktop pictures start flashing up and then go blank again. Once the GUI starts everything behaves itself, (unlike Windows XP and Vista) with all commands and requests acted upon without delay.

Shutting down is not so bad but I’ve noticed some drm errors are shown on the screen before shutting down. I’ve made a copy of the syslog file in /var/logs/ which may help (all 16+ MBytes of it). I've tried to attach the file but the system (attachments) isn't seeing it in my home directory (size?).

Needless to say, I can’t go on like this and have reinstalled Mint 18.3 32 bit onto my computer which is booting as quickly as before so, the computer works! I’ve also suspended installing Mint 19 on to my friends computers, who also run old hardware like me and use Linux Mint as a salvation from Windows.

Ideas anyone?

[catweazel]

I assume it is something deep down in the Linux Engine Room.

It's highly likely to be your very old hardware. For linux to advance it cannot continue to support decade old hardware. I think you have two choices. Upgrade the hardware or don't upgrade the OS.

[raywoods]

With respect, that's only a way to p!ss people off, especially as 32 bit is still being supported and, that is old hardware.

[gm10]

On the slow booting Mint 19 (if you still have it), run

Code: Select all

systemd-analyze blame

to see what's taking so long during the boot.

Also post the output of

Code: Select all

inxi -Fxz

if you want us to look over it.

[raywoods]

I will reinstall and have a go tomorrow (bed beckons)!
Thank you.

[catweazel]

I will reinstall and have a go tomorrow (bed beckons)!

I would take @gm10's advice first before pulling out a sledgehammer.

[raywoods]

catweazel

If you read my original post you will see I had gone back to Mint 18.3 32 bit so will need to install Mint 19 again to do the tests.

[gm10]

Yep, I had understood that. You said that it also takes a long time to boot from the Mint 19 live USB though, feel free to run the commands from that. I just meant not to run them from your Mint 18.3 since you said that that one was booting without delays.

We wont be able to make any changes to the live USB of course so it's better to ultimately have an installed one. If you want to keep your Mint 18.3 in place you could also add an extra partition to install it to, 10 (better 15) GB would be enough (use gparted from the live USB to shrink one of your existing ones if necessary).

[catweazel]

catweazel

If you read my original post you will see I had gone back to Mint 18.3 32 bit so will need to install Mint 19 again to do the tests.

I blame my very advanced age.

[externa1]

Did you apply all updates after mint19 install ? I mean also the kernel ones ?

I noticed on an old HP G62 (bought 2010) with AMD CPU that i have to stay with kernel below 4.15.23 (i now use the kernel from install media - 4.15.20) it's boot time is as fast as it should (about 5 - 8 sec with ssd)
I moved the kernel upgrade package to the blacklist in update manager

I think the problem comes with the intel/amd cpu firmware/patch - that is going to be applied from kernel 4.15.23 onward (also tried 4.17 kernel - same slow boot)

So on your side i would install lm19 then reboot and not installing any updates (espessial kernel) and test the boot times - after that install updates (without kernel update) and then also test boot performance after

rg
Christian

[DaleOu]

Did you apply all updates after mint19 install ? I mean also the kernel ones ?

I noticed on an old HP G62 (bought 2010) with AMD CPU that i have to stay with kernel below 4.15.23 (i now use the kernel from install media - 4.15.20) it's boot time is as fast as it should (about 5 - 8 sec with ssd)
I moved the kernel upgrade package to the blacklist in update manager

I think the problem comes with the intel/amd cpu firmware/patch - that is going to be applied from kernel 4.15.23 onward (also tried 4.17 kernel - same slow boot)

So on your side i would install lm19 then reboot and not installing any updates (espessial kernel) and test the boot times - after that install updates (without kernel update) and then also test boot performance after

rg
Christian

This may very well be my issue. I have a not-ancient laptop (Asus U47A, Core i7) that booted in 12 seconds under 18.3. After reimaging to Tara, it was maybe two seconds longer. Took upgrades. Five to six minute boot. Reimaged. Back to 12 second boot. sudo-apt-get update/upgrade, 6 minute boot. THIRD reimage (was getting no joy at all from any diagnostics), I added stuff a little at a time, and finally 4.15.0.24.26 kernel. 6 minute boot. TimeShifted back to the previous kernel. 12 second boot. I'll be blacklisting this kernel until I hear about a real solution. Thank you for the knowledge.

[raywoods]

So everyone knows the state of play on my computer, I've reinstalled Mint 19 MATE 64 bit (from Mint 18.3 MATE 32 bit - which now too is showing the same problems, so I may have to go even further back in time if these endeavours fail). I then updated the system to ensure all published fixes are in place, then rebooted.
ray@woods-laptop:~$ systemd-analyze blame
32.463s lightdm.service
32.453s plymouth-quit-wait.service
30.068s colord.service
7.489s networkd-dispatcher.service
7.161s ModemManager.service
7.136s networking.service
6.894s udisks2.service
5.793s grub-common.service
5.454s accounts-daemon.service
5.250s dev-sda5.device
4.839s NetworkManager.service
3.534s speech-dispatcher.service
3.304s ubuntu-system-adjustments.service
3.251s hddtemp.service
3.245s lm-sensors.service
3.216s pppd-dns.service
3.205s rsyslog.service
2.824s systemd-logind.service
2.816s wpa_supplicant.service
2.523s thermald.service
1.788s lvm2-monitor.service
1.770s systemd-journal-flush.service
1.724s polkit.service

ray@woods-laptop:~$ inxi -Fxz
System: Host: woods-laptop Kernel: 4.15.0-24-generic x86_64
bits: 64 gcc: 7.3.0
Desktop: MATE 1.20.1 (Gtk 3.22.30-1ubuntu1)
Distro: Linux Mint 19 Tara
Machine: Device: portable System: Dell product: Latitude D630 serial: N/A
Mobo: Dell model: 0KU184 serial: N/A
BIOS: Dell v: A13 date: 07/28/2008
Battery BAT0: charge: 86.6 Wh 137.8% condition: 62.8/86.6 Wh (73%)
model: Sony DELL 00 status: Full
CPU: Dual core Intel Core2 Duo T8100 (-MCP-)
arch: Penryn rev.6 cache: 3072 KB
flags: (lm nx sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 ssse3 vmx) bmips: 8376
clock speeds: max: 2101 MHz 1: 1387 MHz 2: 1485 MHz
^[[1;2A^[[1;2A^[[1;2AGraphics: Card: Intel Mobile GM965/GL960 Integrated Graphics Controller (primary)
bus-ID: 00:02.0
Display Server: x11 (X.Org 1.19.6 )
drivers: modesetting (unloaded: fbdev,vesa)
Resolution: 1280x800@60.04hz
OpenGL: renderer: Mesa DRI Intel 965GM
version: 2.1 Mesa 18.0.0-rc5 Direct Render: Yes
Audio: Card Intel 82801H (ICH8 Family) HD Audio Controller
driver: snd_hda_intel bus-ID: 00:1b.0
Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture v: k4.15.0-24-generic
Network: Card-1: Broadcom Limited NetXtreme BCM5755M Gigabit Ethernet PCIE
driver: tg3 v: 3.137 bus-ID: 09:00.0
IF: enp9s0 state: down mac: <filter>
Card-2: Intel PRO/Wireless 3945ABG [Golan] Network Connection
driver: iwl3945 v: in-tree:s bus-ID: 0c:00.0
IF: wlp12s0 state: up mac: <filter>
Drives: HDD Total Size: 500.1GB (27.0% used)
ID-1: /dev/sda model: WDC_WD5000LPVX size: 500.1GB
Partition: ID-1: / size: 28G used: 6.4G (25%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda5
ID-2: /home size: 427G used: 116G (29%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda6
ID-3: swap-1 size: 4.00GB used: 0.00GB (0%)
fs: swap dev: /dev/sda1
RAID: No RAID devices: /proc/mdstat, md_mod kernel module present
Sensors: System Temperatures: cpu: 51.0C mobo: N/A
Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: N/A
Info: Processes: 154 Uptime: 21 min Memory: 815.8/1984.2MB
Init: systemd runlevel: 5 Gcc sys: 7.3.0
Client: Shell (bash 4.4.191) inxi: 2.3

I've seen quite a few other threads about relating to very slow boot times so there appears to be a common theme arising. (Perhaps all Developers should get their old rigs out from the attic and try them there before releasing their little gems out into the big wide World?)

Anyway, as before, any ideas will be appreciated.

[gm10]

I've seen quite a few other threads about relating to very slow boot times so there appears to be a common theme arising. (Perhaps all Developers should get their old rigs out from the attic and try them there before releasing their little gems out into the big wide World?)

The world can't stop turning just because people are still using ancient hardware. There are more lightweight distributions out there than Mint. You might fare better with Lubuntu or an even more light-weight non-Ubuntu distribution.

But back to your Mint for now. Try this first: apt remove colord lvm2.

Reboot and post systemd-analyze and systemd-analyze blame outputs again.

[externa1]

ray@woods-laptop:~$ inxi -Fxz
System: Host: woods-laptop Kernel: 4.15.0-24-generic x86_64

As i stated in my last post - try to boot with the 4.15.0-20 Kernel instead of 4.15.0-24
you may do this on pressing ESC key on boot to go to grub boot menu - there select the 4.15.0-20 kernel entry and see if it's getting booted in normal speed - if so remove kernel 4.15.0-24 with update manager and blacklist it

rg
Christian

[raywoods]

I removed colord lvm2, rebooted and...

ray@woods-laptop:~$ systemd-analyze
Startup finished in 1min 8.634s (kernel) + 45.095s (userspace) = 1min 53.729s
graphical.target reached after 45.082s in userspace


ray@woods-laptop:~$ systemd-analyze blame
31.907s lightdm.service
31.904s plymouth-quit-wait.service
5.350s dev-sda5.device
5.082s systemd-journal-flush.service
4.390s systemd-modules-load.service
4.387s keyboard-setup.service
3.812s systemd-tmpfiles-setup-dev.service
3.654s systemd-random-seed.service
3.128s networkd-dispatcher.service
2.837s ubuntu-system-adjustments.service
2.810s udisks2.service
2.594s ModemManager.service
2.557s accounts-daemon.service
2.137s NetworkManager.service
1.932s grub-common.service
1.390s thermald.service
1.342s dns-clean.service
1.244s polkit.service
1.108s systemd-journald.service
780ms systemd-resolved.service
776ms lvm2-lvmpolld.service
772ms avahi-daemon.service
752ms apport.service
727ms hddtemp.service
713ms alsa-restore.service
696ms rsyslog.service
664ms systemd-logind.service
652ms systemd-fsck@dev-disk-by\x2duuid-ee6d4608\x2d2469\x2d4cf3\x2dbf
527ms systemd-tmpfiles-setup.service
498ms flatpak-system-helper.service
476ms networking.service
449ms systemd-remount-fs.service
445ms sys-kernel-debug.mount
426ms dev-hugepages.mount
426ms dev-disk-by\x2duuid-0d64a12f\x2d3012\x2d4477\x2d8140\x2d4d775a5
424ms dev-mqueue.mount
294ms upower.service
279ms kmod-static-nodes.service
255ms apparmor.service
253ms systemd-rfkill.service
222ms lm-sensors.service
204ms gpu-manager.service
176ms ntp.service
163ms plymouth-start.service
150ms systemd-sysctl.service
142ms ufw.service
140ms wpa_supplicant.service
130ms systemd-udev-trigger.service
126ms user@1000.service
78ms speech-dispatcher.service
75ms plymouth-read-write.service
73ms home.mount
56ms lvm2-lvmetad.service
48ms systemd-update-utmp.service
45ms systemd-udevd.service
28ms pppd-dns.service
27ms setvtrgb.service
26ms rtkit-daemon.service
18ms kerneloops.service
17ms ureadahead-stop.service
11ms systemd-user-sessions.service
11ms sys-kernel-config.mount
10ms systemd-update-utmp-runlevel.service
10ms sys-fs-fuse-connections.mount
7ms console-setup.service
6ms systemd-backlight@backlight:intel_backlight.service
6ms openvpn.service
5ms systemd-backlight@leds:dell::kbd_backlight.service

I must admit, not sitting here with a stop watch but, there appeared very little difference in the boot time. Once booted Mint 19 is very nice and responsive, even on my old hardware. Please remember, don't scorn the use of old computers as Land Fill will be that much more fuller without people like me! As I said, Linux Mint 19 runs very sweetly on this 10 year old Dell Latitude D630 with all the applications that I run loading in a reasonable time and are responsive, even the Mint Menu in MATE, which used to delay on first use is now always nice and quick.

I think we are going back to a time, like when Pulse Audio was first implemented and thing went wild for a bit, we are now suffering in a very similar way for System D so, don't blame the hardware (because of its age) but the immaturity of the software.

Hmm.... thinking nice thoughts

[gm10]

Please remember, don't scorn the use of old computers as Land Fill will be that much more fuller without people like me!

Hey, as long as it does the job you need it to do there's no reason to throw it out. I haven't replaced my smartphone in 7 years for that reason. So no judgement from me at all.

Back to your problem, please take note of what externa1 posted above. It has become apparent that the -24 revision kernel is causing issues on a great many systems, it's quite possible that booting to a previous revision kernel will solve your remaining boot issues. I did not originally suggest it because you said you were also slow booting from the USB, which has a -20 revision kernel, but I think you should give it a try before we do anything else.

PS: Noticed in your blame listing that I should have told you to apt purge lvm2 rather than just remove it, there's still 2 daemons starting up. Suggest you still do that, no need to keep them running.

[raywoods]

Thanks gm10. I'm out with my wife at the moment (life must go on after all) so will have a go once released from domestic duties. Thanks for your help.

[JeremyB]

Might want to try

Code: Select all

sudo apt install haveged

See if the boot time returns to normal

[raywoods]

Hey, back from the shops! I've tried all of the list below, bar changing the kernel.

Action taken so far...
sudo apt remove colord lvm2
sudo apt purge lvm2
sudo apt install haveged

I did a reboot after each action.

Boot is still slow, far too slow.
Here is System D the list of shame, I mean blame...
(These may be a bit slower because I'm using the battery at the moment)

ray@woods-laptop:~$ systemd-analyze
Startup finished in 1min 8.976s (kernel) + 52.055s (userspace) = 2min 1.031s
graphical.target reached after 52.044s in userspace

ray@woods-laptop:~$ systemd-analyze blame
32.182s lightdm.service
32.174s plymouth-quit-wait.service
8.504s systemd-resolved.service
7.227s grub-common.service
7.012s NetworkManager.service
6.926s udisks2.service
6.781s networkd-dispatcher.service
6.239s ModemManager.service
5.836s dev-sda5.device
5.532s ubuntu-system-adjustments.service
5.400s accounts-daemon.service
5.174s gpu-manager.service
4.939s systemd-journal-flush.service
2.580s polkit.service
2.323s wpa_supplicant.service
2.275s thermald.service
2.077s pppd-dns.service
2.071s rsyslog.service
2.071s networking.service
1.743s avahi-daemon.service
1.671s apparmor.service
1.219s systemd-logind.service
1.145s dns-clean.service
1.115s speech-dispatcher.service
1.114s apport.service
1.091s keyboard-setup.service
791ms hddtemp.service
784ms systemd-tmpfiles-setup.serviceapt purge lvm2
764ms systemd-fsck@dev-disk-by\x2duuid-ee6d4608\x2d2469\x2d4cf3\x2dbf
749ms alsa-restore.service
744ms lm-sensors.service
701ms systemd-modules-load.service
695ms kmod-static-nodes.service
582ms systemd-tmpfiles-setup-dev.service
539ms systemd-sysctl.service
526ms dev-disk-by\x2duuid-0d64a12f\x2d3012\x2d4477\x2d8140\x2d4d775a5
497ms systemd-udevd.service
479ms kerneloops.service
422ms console-setup.service
368ms systemd-remount-fs.service
360ms dev-hugepages.mount
347ms ntp.service
342ms systemd-journald.service
325ms sys-kernel-debug.mount
313ms upower.service
296ms dev-mqueue.mount
252ms systemd-random-seed.service
221ms systemd-update-utmp.service
219ms systemd-backlight@backlight:intel_backlight.service
207ms plymouth-start.service
194ms home.mount
169ms setvtrgb.service
134ms systemd-udev-trigger.service
133ms user@1000.service
108ms openvpn.service
98ms systemd-rfkill.service
93ms systemd-user-sessions.service
90ms systemd-backlight@leds:dell::kbd_backlight.service
88ms plymouth-read-write.service
63ms ufw.service
57ms flatpak-system-helper.service
24ms rtkit-daemon.service
20ms ureadahead-stop.service
9ms systemd-update-utmp-runlevel.service
7ms sys-fs-fuse-connections.mount
4ms sys-kernel-config.mount

Okay, thanks Guys, thinking caps on. I'm going try to boot into

[JeremyB]

Do you have an older kernel that works? If so boot into it and use update manager/view/linux kernels to uninstall 4.15.0-24
then download and install
http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~jsalisbury/lp ... g4_all.deb
http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~jsalisbury/lp ... _amd64.deb
http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~jsalisbury/lp ... _amd64.deb
http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~jsalisbury/lp ... _amd64.deb
http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~jsalisbury/lp ... _amd64.deb

This has a proposed fix to the issue, if the default download location is home/Downloads try in terminal

Code: Select all

cd Downloads
sudo dpkg -i linux*.deb

Then try the proposed fix by rebooting