I first tried Mandrake. I had problems with it so I switched to SuSE 9.1. I liked it, it was easy to use.
Only problem is it took a long time to boot.

I had to go back to Windows now (so I could use dvd-shrink) but I'd like to have dual boot so I can use Linux as well.

Any suggestion on what distro would boot faster than SuSE?
As much as I don't like Windows, it boots a lot faster than SuSE did.

Try PCLinuxOS. Follow the links in "Mrs Devnet's Experiment" further down. That boots pretty quickly.

One way to make Linux start more quickly is to use whatever your distro does in order to load modules without using Hotplug.

For example, In PCLOS there is a file /etc/modprobe.preload which is a list of modules to load. When you start linux, if you go into a terminal as root, you can see which modules were loaded by hotplug, by typing: "lsmod".

Now if you list these modules in /etc/modprobe.preload and tell your distro not to use hotplug when booting up (in PCLOS it is via the Control Centre) you will shave a considerable amount of time off your bootup.

I don't know exactly how this goes in SuSE, but there will be equivalent files and tools.

Any distro can boot fast if you disable unecessary services. It may help as well if you compile your own kernel so that you are not loading unnecessary stuff.

PCLinuxOS is a mandrake derivative .. for faster boot/startup time I would suggest something like Arch/Vector/Mepis/Knoppix.
Suse 9.2 is even worse than 9.1 ..
I will agree with reddazz and add that the probelm is really hardware detection , compiled kernel will help -- but I don't recommend gentoo .. it's too cumbersome to build and maintain.

Yes, disabling unnecessary services can certainly help.. That said, I've found SuSE can take longer than, say, Mandrake to boot..

I've just been trying Kubuntu Hoary, and that boots pretty darn quick - fastest I've tried so far. And overall performance is snappy, too. Nice distribution - give it a try.

Ubuntu does not install any major servers by default so its likely to boot faster than Mandrake or Suse. That said, my Slack system boots way faster than any other distro I have tried except FreeBSD.

CRUX is the fastest on my box.

Just spending some time configuring the modules and services to be loaded at boot time and excluding those you don't need will greatly speed up booting time as well as over-all performance.

Hotplug does slow things down a bit so pre-load the modules you use and disable it as suggested above. I use Slack and after a bit of startup tweaking it boots very quickly.

One thing to keep in mind when trying to compare Linux and windoze boot times is that windoze presents you a log-in screen or desktop long before it's actually finished loading everything. This gives the false impression that it booted faster when in fact it is still performing the startup process behind the scenes where as Linux does everything up front before presenting you with a log-in.

slackware can boot really fast if you use a kernel 2.6.10 or newer, disable unnecessary services, load modules manually and disable hotplug.

.. also disabling the ldconfig at boot will speed it up a lot if you have a lot of things installed.. but there can be problems with new libraries in your system not being recognized.

there are ways to delay it so it runs after the rest of the system is booting which are safer.

while this may seem a bit much, it really does make the system boot amazingly fast.

try a SEARCH. i made a poll about this about a year ago.

Any distro will boot fast, If you configure it according to your needs.
But if you are looking for an effecient distro try Gentoo Linux or LFS (Linux From Scratch).

You can find a test speed in this forum: http://www.livecdforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=356
I've tested some distros... GoblinX and Slax are very fast... GoblinX boots in 49s... and Slax is faster...

Yes but a lot has changed and it does start a lost faster. I recently b0rked my PCLOS so before I re-installed I tried Mandriva 2005, it took ages, everything was a chore, startup took forever, so I deleted it. I then reloaded PCLOS and did all the updates including the latest kernel. I haven't even bothered to stop the hotplugging yet, and it is fairly quick starting.

I also run Gentoo with a self-compiled kernel, and no "coldplug", and guess what? It does not load any quicker than PCLOS.

Where PCLOS really stars is from the login screen to the desktop in KDE. That is quick indeed!

Thing is, Texstar (PCLOS's main author) is a very good packager, and he has put together a very carefully thought out system, not just a Mandrake clone.

I have to disagree

cumbersome

adj 1: difficult to handle or use especially because of size or weight; "a cumbersome piece of machinery"; "cumbrous protective clothing" [syn: cumbrous] 2: not elegant or graceful in expression; "an awkward prose style"; "a clumsy apology"; "his cumbersome writing style"; "if the rumor is true, can anything be more inept than to repeat it now?" [syn: awkward, clumsy, inapt, inept, ill-chosen]

I don't mean to hijack this thread, but...

I see a lot of people saying that they disable hotplug to increase speed performance and boot-up speed. What exactly does hotplug do, and what am I missing if I disable this feature.

if you pass the option in grub, for example

title Minislack...blah blah blah
root (hd0,4)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.11.6 root=/dev/sda2 nohotplug

is that going to disable hotplug?