- This topic has 5 replies, 4 voices, and was last updated Nov 9-9:36 pm by Brian Masinick.
-
Posts
-
Sod Almighty
I am impressed by how quickly AntiX can boot to a console, compared to other distros like Debian.
How is this achieved? Did you simply remove or disable a whole bunch of stuff that loads on boot; or is it that you recompiled the kernel with a bunch of unnecessary things removed?
Can you give me a general idea of what things might have been removed to achieve this faster boot time? Is it something that is easy to achieve on an existing Debian installation? Thanks.
PPC
Haven’t you ever heard the expression “antiX magic”? It’s for real, anticapitalista is a certified Level 10 wizard!
🙂
Brian Masinick
I can speak in general terms. On Debian, for example, you can greatly speed things up. For example, if I start IceWM instead of KDE or Xfce, that helps. If I remove any daemon processes that I am certain that I don’t need, that helps.
Anything else you remove that lessens the number of processes running also reduces the Kernel’s need to switch between processes.
All of this contributes to a faster system. When you remove something it’s very important to know what it’s used for. If you know, then you can properly decide what to do. Resource usage and reduced number of tasks and procedures make a difference. In my experience getting rid of the desktop environment is an obvious and immediately apparent difference and cutting down on daemons that aren’t essential is #2.
The rest helps but makes less obvious difference.
--
Brian MasinickWell, my headless servers run no desktop environment at all. Perhaps I should look into the daemon-process angle.
Should I assume, then, that the speed increase is not due to a recompilation of the kernel on the part of AntiX developers?
ModdIt
the process start which slows my boot most is cups.
Rest seem to make no real difference.Brian Masinick
Well, my headless servers run no desktop environment at all. Perhaps I should look into the daemon-process angle.
Should I assume, then, that the speed increase is not due to a recompilation of the kernel on the part of AntiX developers?
All of the features, taken together, contribute to some degree to the overall efficiency of antiX. I haven’t looked at the code in our kernel, but my guess is that it uses an effective choice of modules, and more than likely includes only key modules required to operate effectively. There are other kernels available, including Debian and Liquorix kernels for those who require additional features.
In my experience, using a lightweight window manager and reducing the number of daemon processes – both of which antiX do, provides *me personally* with the most gain. That may differ in your case because your typical “use cases” are much different than mine; in your case the kernel enhancements may be much more evident. There are a LOT of efficiencies in antiX. The manner in which each individual uses the software has a lot to do with which features will provide the most benefit. I’m guessing that what makes the most difference to me is in fact different than what you experience, but antiX utilizes as many efficiencies as possible, so there are undoubtedly a few others we haven’t discussed here too.
--
Brian Masinick
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
