Hot Take Google Chrome tests new feature that could slow your Windows 11/10 PC when you turn it on

[Parkinsond]

The new feature is in the form a toggle inside the browser settings dubbed "Launch Chrome when my computer starts," something Google has been working on since around October or November last year as the Chromium dev team had added a new kForegroundLaunchOnLogin feature flag.

As you can probably make out from the feature flag title, Google has intended this to be a foreground process, which typically tend to have higher resource priorities than background tasks. Thankfully, there is also kLaunchOnStartup flag alongside it for gatekeeping, which is essentially for the toggle for enabling or disabling the feature.

https://www.neowin.net/news/google-chrome-tests-new-feature-that-could-slow-your-windows-1110-pc-when-you-turn-it-on/

 

[SeriousHoax]

What's the purpose of doing this?
It's not like the start-up speed of Chrome is slow. Microsoft Edge had a slow startup speed once upon a time which has improved since then. Chrome was always fast to open, and still is.

 

[Parkinsond]

Microsoft Edge had a slow startup speed once upon a time which has improved since then

Even for Edge, I disable this feature; if enabled, I get Edge process running in background even if Edge is closed.

I launch the browser once per day; no need for speed boost for a solitary launch.

 

[Marko :)]

The boot time would massively increase... from 5 seconds to 5.2 seconds!!!!!!!

In all seriousness, I have this option enabled since it was introduced in Firefox. I mean, it's the first software I launch anyway and the one that I use the most, so why not.

 

[LinuxFan58]

What's the purpose of doing this?

Battle for AI dominance and the fear of zero click!

Microsoft pushes its own AI within Windows, Google's main income was generated by its search engine and search engine advertising. Higher up the search engine result page (SERP) meant more clicks and visitors. With AI providing answers to questions (entered in the search query box) people are often satisfied with the answer and don't click on any of the displayed search results beneath the AI-response (hence the name 'zero click'). Also simular to the SERP (people mostly click on results listed on the first page, with the top 5 listed getting 80% of the clicks), people tend to click on the links mentioned in AI-response. So zero click and AI-response first clicks are a serious threat to Google's business model. That is why it wants to push itself in your face before M$ does (with AI agnostic OS integration).

 

[Parkinsond]

The boot time would massively increase... from 5 seconds to 5.2 seconds!!!!!!!

 

[Sorrento]

I use Firefox each time I start PC also, issues would only arise for me if you let all things do that for example Edge which I don't use also likes pre-loading etc, & some programs I use very infrequently feel they are of such importance they need pre-loading or an update check on boot so I'm careful about startup - It does horrify me when others say 'my PC takes ages to start' & I find over a billion items in their start up (slight hyperbole there) If I'm looking at another persons PC I insist on a decent coffee before I look as I usually need it, no real coffee & the deals off!

 

[cartaphilus]

Thanks for this heads up

 

[Parkinsond]

It does horrify me when others say 'my PC takes ages to start

A while ago, I was stupid enough to try W 11 preview unofficial ISO (before it was first released officially).
It broke my PC; I was unable to boot even to BIOS.
Managed to revive by pressing BIOS reset button in MB.
After recovery, PC takes like 10 seconds more than before to boot, without showing the BIOS welcome page.
In addition, if I restart, instead of taking few seconds, it takes at least 3 minutes.

 

[Sorrento]

Something not right at all there, this PC hasn't had a clean install for maybe 3 years or more & it starts in a few seconds, have you looked in startup on hibit uninstaller for example, I thought you did clean installs quite often?? I have a quite cheap & lowly lappy that starts pretty fast with 11 on so it really should never take more than 20 seconds tops ??
Edit: I would do a clean install

 

[Parkinsond]

Something not right at all there, this PC hasn't had a clean install for maybe 3 years or more & it starts in a few seconds, have you looked in startup on hibit uninstaller for example, I thought you did clean installs quite often?? I have a quite cheap & lowly lappy that starts pretty fast with 11 on so it really should never take more than 20 seconds tops ??
Edit: I would do a clean install

It was blazingly fast in startup and restart before installing this miserable ISO.
I suspect some driver issue messed up with BIOS, leaving scar even after BIOS reset.

 

[Sorrento]

If it was me & its not but from past experience, it often takes longer to sort things like this out than to start again, it might not but, I must say that’s often the case ??

 

[Parkinsond]

If it was me & its not but from past experience, it often takes longer to sort things like this out than to start again, it might not but, I must say that’s often the case ??

Just avoiding restart as possible, and replace it with shutdown and start.
I do not replace PC as long as its light indicators are still flashing

 

[Sorrento]

If I knew you & or a relative I would bock your number & disown you at the very least @Parkinsond, you remind me of others I know personally who cause me stress & upset to do with tech (these people cannot be mentioned) If i was a mod on here you would be terminated forthwith instantly!

 

[Parkinsond]

If I knew you & or a relative I would bock your number & disown you at the very least @Parkinsond, you remind me of others I know personally who cause me stress & upset to do with tech (these people cannot be mentioned)

It's a great feeling when you have little to lose.

For example, during the past years, we had energy supply shortage leading to electricity outage several times per day, unscheduled.
Knowing you may lose near dead PC is such a relief compared to that while using a high-end one.

That is what I apply for security also; no stored credentials on drive (stored on external drive, usb drives, and another air-gaped PC), keeping only 4 credentials used on regular basis stored in Keepass database with highest possible cipher and kdf, using a long, random, and mixed pw.

You want to steal, you will not find execpt those 4 and good luck decrypting the kdbx.
You want to ransom, all important files are backed up on external drive.
And I reinstall W with ventoy from ISO on HDD (not usb drive) in less than 10 min.

 

[Sorrento]

I do see your points, I have to ask are you related to my wife or sister-in-laws by any way? There are strong similarities?? Now I will be punished by Silver or similar for messing a thread up & I blame you!

 

[Parkinsond]

I do see your points, I have to ask are you related to my wife or sister-in-laws by any way? There are strong similarities?? Now I will be punished by Silver or similar for messing a thread up & I blame you!

It's an honor to be related to UK citizens, but unfortunately I have only one foreign descendancy; my paternal grandma was Turkish; not the best hybrid

 

[Marko :)]

I use Firefox each time I start PC also, issues would only arise for me if you let all things do that for example Edge which I don't use also likes pre-loading etc, & some programs I use very infrequently feel they are of such importance they need pre-loading or an update check on boot so I'm careful about startup - It does horrify me when others say 'my PC takes ages to start' & I find over a billion items in their start up (slight hyperbole there) If I'm looking at another persons PC I insist on a decent coffee before I look as I usually need it, no real coffee & the deals off!

I usually enable auto-start only for software I actually use daily. Firefox, WARP, Lightshot, Lenovo Legion Toolkit... Everything else is disabled.