Logon Times/Speed

[mattpant]

Hi,

 

Just wondering how long it takes for your users to logon to your computers? What's the profile setup, Roaming? Mandatory? Re-Directed? etc etc

 

What is a normal logon time for Windows XP?, I know it's slower then Windows 98 beacuse of all the group policy processing. But would just like to get a rought idea to see what other collegues are getting.

 

Regards,

 

Matt

[free4440273]

I use mandatory profiles - logon speeds [to the desktop] are about 8-12 secs. yes, many people have MASSIVE logon problems with xp due to incorrect dns settings...in my view, at the schools I have worked at, people simply do not set up dns correctly - if it ain't set up properly, you are asking for problems...and xp will happily oblige.

[DMcCoy]

From boot to login is quite quick, however one of the options I have in my policy for staff and students must not work properly as it stops in the middle to wait for something for about 20 seconds. If I use another policy it is fine. I haven't had time to track it down, even scanned the network traffic and I can't see much.

[Quackers]

On our fastest PC's (P4 2.8's 512MB RAM) the logon speed from logon screen to desktop being seen is 3 seconds. About 5 seconds to being fully useable and everything loaded.

 

We do not use roaming profiles, we have mandatory profiles. I spent many hours when setting up the system just on performance.

[john]

We use roaming profiles, so as you will know, how long is a piece of string is the answer, but on average, a 30mb profile will take about no more than 60 seconds to logon and be ready to go

[mattpant]

@Quackers

 

Wow... I'm impressed!!! How the hell you managed to get it to logon in under 5 seconds??? Share your secrets please!!!! How have you got your Mandatory profile setup? Is it downloaded from the server each time, or have you got the Mandatory profile saved locally on each machine?? I'm guessing on the server, but 3-5 seconds does seem very fast!!!

 

Regards,

 

Matt

[MkII]

About 10 seconds max with roaming profiles here, usually it's about 5.

 

My scripts run syncronously except on Citrix where they refuse to... so it can take up to 15 seconds on that system. Still - no annoying questions about not being able to print - before the script has had time to execute.

[alan-d]

30 Mb Roaming profiles with Ranger - approx 60 secs +

 

Working on removing Ranger soon - and so far have reduced the time to approx 20 secs - but still loads to do.

 

Still need to look at DNS and all our switches as I inherited a network that didn't have a single label or map for it. You know it's gonna take a long time

[apeo]

@Quacker

 

Damn that is impressive.. Yes share your secrets!!

[Quackers]

@Quackers

 

Wow... I'm impressed!!! How the hell you managed to get it to logon in under 5 seconds??? Share your secrets please!!!! How have you got your Mandatory profile setup? Is it downloaded from the server each time, or have you got the Mandatory profile saved locally on each machine?? I'm guessing on the server, but 3-5 seconds does seem very fast!!!

 

Regards,

 

Matt

 

Profiles are stored locally.

 

There is a share on the server with a folder for each suite of PC's. In there is a profile. You get the desktop startmenu exactly has you want it in that suite. Copy it to the correct folder on the server. When the PC boots up there is a group policy with a startup script which deletes the local "Default User" folder, and copys accross the correct profile from the server. It then runs delprof to delete all local profiles. So the machine is clean. Then when a student logs on because there is no profile path set it simply uses the local default user. When ever i want to update the look of the desktop i simply copy it to the server and on next reboot the PC's pick it up.

 

In the 2 years the system has been in i have experenced no spyware, no adaware. Its fast and clean

[Netman]

@Quackers

 

Fancy sharing that startup script please chap? Been wanting to do something similar for awhile but it's just one of those jobs that keep getting put-off

[ChrisH]

So the profile is stored locally and is updated when the machines boot? Sounds good but the only problem is here that they shut the machines of every lesson so there would be alot of copying on startup. Mind you saying that they copy the default profile from the netlogon anyway at the moment.

I think I would extend your idea slightly and include some method to check a version number as well before copying.

[Quackers]

Right here is the script.

 

First i copied delprof.exe into the netlogon folder.

Then i created another share called "desktops" with a folder structure for each room. Put a profile as you want it in each folder.

 

Then put a group policy on the OU for that set of PC's and under computer policy add a batchfile as a startup script. Use the following script in that batchfile. (my script also sets the res on startup using res.exe)

 

NET USE K: \\chesterton-high\netlogon /persistent:no

NET USE W: \\moon\desktops /persistent:no

k:\delprof.exe /q

k:\res.exe 1024 768 32 75

rd /s /q "c:\documents and settings\Default User"

xcopy /i /y /h /e w:\windowsxp\room5\*.* "c:\documents and settings\Default User"

net use /delete * /y

 

Now just make sure you have NO default user in the netlogon folder and that the users have no profile path set and when they logon they should pick up the local Default User. Which on moden SATA PC's is very fast.

 

You could use robocopy instead if you wanted it to only copy modified bits. I might look at that my self later, but since this works like a dream i am not breaking it.

 

 

EDIT: Also with printers i make the profiles have no printers on then use this vbs script to add printers (use an MSI to deploy right script to right room).

 

Set WshNetwork = CreateObject("WScript.Network")

WshNetwork.AddWindowsPrinterConnection "\\venus\r26amono"

WshNetwork.AddWindowsPrinterConnection "\\venus\r26acolour"

WshNetwork.SetDefaultPrinter "\\venus\r26amono"

[ChrisH]

Good point about robocopy that would be better than using some kind of version check. I will give this a go soon.

[Netman]

@Quackers

 

Thanks very much - should save some time...

[Guest]

30 seconds for initial logon to create profile. After that 10 seconds until im on edugeek

 

Roaming profiles, cache deleted from local machine at logoff

[webman]

We run an RM CC3 network (roaming profiles) and our logon times vary, depending on machine spec and HD speeds. On our newest mahines, cached profile logons are less than 10 seconds, otherwise this can take upto 40 seconds, depending on network traffic etc

[nightowl]

I must be doing something very wrong - Ranger network - when we have 4 or 5 suites of computers all being used, it can take up to 20 minutes for some of our kids to get logged on.

 

I'm not entirely sure the systems set up right. I'm in a similar situation to Alan. Inherited network with next to no details apart from staff saying it used to crash on a daily basis.

[Guest]

@nightowl

 

Could poss be due to DNS \ DHCP probs down the line somewhere. I had this once in network I inherited . Turned out admin server was had DHCP running as well as the curic server, even though the admin network used static addresses. Because of this curric PCs were getting incorrect DNS values from the admin DCHP server.

 

Just a thought.

[free4440273]

"I must be doing something very wrong - Ranger network - when we have 4 or 5 suites of computers all being used, it can take up to 20 minutes for some of our kids to get logged on."

Remove ranger!!!

[webman]

The college I go to for CCNA use ranger, and it takes about 30-60 seconds to log on.

[mattpant]

Thanks Guys for all your feedback, it's intrestting to see how speeds can very so much from place to place under different circumstances.

 

Judging from what people have posted my logon speeds seem to be quite fair.

 

Cheers,

 

Matt

[Ric_]

7 seconds dead between hitting logon and everything loading up in the system tray

 

This user's profile was cached and it is Citrix (same gigabit switch and same rack as the DCs).

[free4440273]

"The college I go to for CCNA use ranger, and it takes about 30-60 seconds to log on".

I pity them...they have my sympathies.

[broc]

I have been experimenting with the script kindly provided by Quackers as we suffer a lot of HDD 'pollution' from locally stored profiles and I liked the idea of getting rid of them automatically! The only problem I have now is whenever I open an MS Office document I get prompted for user name and initials. Any idea how to supress this prompt for user information?

 

Brian