Why do electronic devices like phones and computers seem slower initially after they reboot?
In: Technology
On any given operating system there are tons of background services and threads each doing its own little thing. For example, on my Windows 10 computer there’s a little thing called the Windows Search Indexer that continually monitors file changes on my computer and updates a search index or database so that when I search for bread.recipe.pdf, it doesn’t have to take 10 minutes to find it, it already knows where it is and that its a PDF and it contains a bunch of keywords in it. Anyways, when the Search Indexer launches, it fires off some helper processes that go off and start double checking every file to make sure its index is still up to date from last time. But these processes are hogging my disk and some of my RAM and CPU, and all I want to do is play Minecraft. Meanwhile there’s 200+ other processes that all need some CPU and disk access for whatever they’re trying to do.
All of these processes clamouring for a little slice of CPU and disk access all add up. Some OSs like Windows 10 can _background_ some of these things or do a “delayed start” which means they tell those things to wait a while until the computer is less busy or only permit them to do things when the computer isn’t busy at all (like if there hasn’t been a key or mouse input in say 5 minutes, which is a good indication you’re off doing something else.)
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