Boot Trace in Windows 11: A complete guide to analyzing boot processes

If your Windows 11 computer takes forever to boot up, or you notice that after logging in, the desktop freezes for a while, it might be time to do a... Full boot traceIt's not black magic: it's about recording in great detail what the operating system, its drivers, and certain programs do from the moment you press the power button until you can start working normally.

The system itself includes very powerful tools for recording this information, but they are somewhat hidden and their use is not always obvious. Furthermore, with There It's filling up with Digital junk: startup programs, cookies, temporary files, and remnants of updates which don't exactly help with a fast boot time. In this article, we'll see how to capture a Boot Trace in Windows 11 with Windows Performance Recorder, what role tracking sessions like the global logger play, and what additional settings you can apply to reduce crashes when shutting down or restarting.

What is a Boot Trace in Windows 11 and what is it used for?

A Boot Trace in Windows 11 is basically a extremely detailed record of the boot processWindows has internal software tracing components capable of recording what the kernel does, what drivers are loaded, what services start up, and how other event providers behave during the various startup phases.

This entire mechanism relies on Event Tracing for Windows (ETW)Event tracing technology, which Microsoft has used for years to diagnose performance problems, involves activating special tracing sessions that record events in a log file, usually with the .etl extension, instead of installing unusual external tools. This log file is then analyzed using specialized tools.

During startup, you can use various tracking methods. One of the most powerful is to rely on the global registrar tracking sessionThis session starts very early in the boot process and allows critical information to be captured even before most services begin. However, this session has significant limitations (such as the number of simultaneously active providers or the buffer size), so it's essential to understand them thoroughly before using it indiscriminately.

The beauty of Boot Trace is that it doesn't just tell you "your PC takes 80 seconds to boot," but it shows you exactly Which driver, service, or application is delaying startup?, if there are disk bottlenecks, if Explorer takes too long to load after login, or if certain third-party software is blocking shutdown or restart.

Required tools: Windows ADK and Windows Performance Toolkit

To capture a modern Boot Trace in Windows 11, the recommended option is to use the Windows Performance Recorder (WPR), which is part of the Windows Performance Toolkit (WPT)This, in turn, is included within the Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit, better known as Windows ADK.

The ADK is downloaded from the official Microsoft website using the updated download paths which are usually grouped under the short link http://aka.ms/adk. For offline environments or when you want to keep the installer, Microsoft also offers an offline version, for example ADK 21H2 compatible with Windows 10 and Windows 11, which you can obtain as a complete downloadable package.

During ADK installation, it is very important that, if you only want to work with Boot Traces and performance analysis, you only select the feature Windows Performance ToolkitThe installer includes many additional testing, deployment, and evaluation tools that you don't need for this scenario, so you can leave them all unselected to save space and time.

Once the download and installation are complete, the WPT executables will usually appear in the path C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Windows Performance ToolkitInside that folder you'll find, among other things, WPR.exe (recorder), WPA.exe (analyzer), and utilities like XPerf. It's quite common to create a shortcut to WPR on the desktop so you don't have to navigate through folders each time.

In some cases, the entire contents of that folder are compressed into a ZIP file and distributed internally, so that you can Run WPR and WPA without reinstalling the entire ADK on each machine. Simply extract the package to any location and launch the tools from there, always with sufficient permissions.

How to create a Boot Trace with Windows Performance Recorder in Windows 11

To capture a real Boot Trace in Windows 11 with WPR, the first step is to run WPR.exe with administrator privilegesYou can do this from the Start menu by typing “Windows Performance Recorder”, right-clicking and choosing “Run as administrator”, or launching the executable directly from the toolkit folder by right-clicking and selecting the same option.

Upon opening, WPR displays a fairly simple interface with several predefined settings. The most important for our purpose is the performance scenario called BoatThis scenario is already set up to record key boot information: kernel, disk, CPU, drivers, services, and activity after login.

The most convenient approach is usually to leave the other options as they are by default, unless you have a very clear reason to change them. WPR allows you to adjust, for example, the level of detail (light, detailed, etc.), whether call stacks are collected, and other advanced parameters, but for most boot diagnostics, the default settings are sufficient. recommended configuration through the tool itself.

Before starting the tracking, WPR will ask you to choose a destination to save the ETL file which will contain the trace. It's advisable to select a drive with sufficient free space and avoid slow network paths. Give it a descriptive name, something like "BootTrace_W11_DateTime.etl", so you don't mix it up with other tests you perform later.

When you click “Start”, the system will notify you that it needs to restart the computer to begin capturing the boot data. From that moment on, Windows will shut down and restart, recording the entire process in detail.You just need to let it restart, and then log in as you normally would.

After you log in, Windows Performance Recorder will automatically restart after a few seconds. You'll see a small window indicating that the tool is collecting data and a timer. By default, it usually waits for about two minutes to allow Windows Explorer and the rest of the post-startup tasks to finish loading, which also helps to identify problems during the logon phase and not just during pure boot.

When that timer finishes, WPR stops the trace session, writes the trace to the ETL file in the path you selected, and displays a message confirming that the boot trace has been saved successfully. From there, you can... Open the trace with Windows Performance Analyzer to study, in great detail, which parts of the startup are consuming the most time or resources.

Advanced monitoring during startup: global logger session and ETW

Behind Windows Performance Recorder is the ETW (Event Tracing for Windows) tracing system, which allows you to enable different follow-up sessions that collect events from specific components: kernel, device drivers, system services, and other specialized providers.

One of the most special sessions is the so-called global registrar tracking session (Global Logger Session). This session can be configured to activate very early during system startup, even before all conventional services are loaded, making it very useful when you want to capture information about problems that occur right in the early stages of booting.

However, the global registrar has several limitations that should be considered. For example, the number of ETW providers that can be activated simultaneously In that session, the buffer size is small, and there are also restrictions on the amount of data it can handle without losing events. If you activate too many providers or misadjust the parameters, you can end up generating incomplete or gapy traces.

For this reason, Microsoft recommends being very clear about what you want to investigate before using the global logger. If you only need to capture a typical boot trace to measure performance, the standard WPR boot scenario, which already combines the most relevant kernel and driver providers without getting into overly aggressive configurations.

In more advanced scenarios, it may make sense to adjust ETW sessions manually or with scripts, for example to Enable specific providers of a conflicting driver or certain critical third-party softwareEven so, most administrators and support technicians manage perfectly well using the configurations that come with WPR without needing to go into the details of ETW.

Junk at startup: startup programs and temporary files

Beyond traces and analyses, in real life one of the most frequent causes of slow startup problems in Windows 11 is the absurd number of programs that load automatically at startupBetween the system itself, the PC manufacturer, and utilities of hardwareWith security suites, messaging clients, game launchers, and more, it's easy for the startup manager list to overflow the screen.

On many new computers, the user completes the initial setup and then forgets about it. They rarely open the Task Manager to check what starts with Windows, or they don't even know the Startup tab exists. The result is that, in a few months, the computer seems much slower than on day one, without the person understanding exactly why this is happening to a nearly new machine.

To make matters worse, they accumulate over time. Temporary files, .tmp files, browser cache, .old update remnants, and .log logsAll this material not only takes up disk space; in some cases it can interfere with maintenance processes, backups or antivirus scans, which indirectly also affects boot and shutdown times.

A technician arriving at a PC that's running at a snail's pace typically finds hundreds of thousands of useless files scattered throughout the system. Even before starting to fine-tune the boot process with Boot Traces and other tools, it's common to spend a considerable amount of time on... clear tracking cookies, temporary and malware with specific tools such as free anti-spyware, disk cleaners, and manual reviews of key folders.

In fact, it is not uncommon for the entire cleaning process to take hours in heavily damaged equipment: install the appropriate toolsScan, remove unwanted items, and then begin optimizing the rest of the system. Only when junk files have been reduced and unnecessary startup programs have been stopped does a Boot Trace begin to show truly useful data for fine-tuning the final seconds of startup.

Diagnosing shutdown and restart problems in Windows 11

In many cases, the problems that lead to considering a boot trace are not limited to startup. It is also common for the computer to have issues. It took a long time to turn off, or it didn't even finish turning on., remaining stuck on the “Shutting down” or “Restarting” screen for a long time until the user takes the shortcut and holds down the power button.

That type of behavior usually indicates that someone The component, service, or program is blocking the closing process.Windows attempts to orderly stop all services, notify open applications, and terminate background processes. If one of these becomes unresponsive or hangs while trying to save data or release resources, the entire system may be left waiting for a response that never comes.

A first step in diagnosing and reducing these situations is to perform what is known as a Clean bootIt's not a new installation, nor a safe modebut a way to boot Windows with the minimum combination of third-party drivers and startup programs, to check if the problem comes from something that loads automatically.

The typical procedure involves opening the “Run” dialog box with the Windows+R key combination, typing msconfig and press Enter. In the System Configuration window, select the General tab and check the "Selective startup" option, unchecking the "Load startup items" box. Then go to the Services tab, and first check the box "Hide all Microsoft services" (This is very important to avoid disabling critical system services.) Then click on "Disable all" to temporarily disable third-party services.

After accepting and restarting, Windows will boot with a minimal set of services and without most third-party programs loaded at startup. From there, check if the shutdown or slow startup problems persist. If they disappear, the logical next step is to reactivate groups of services and programs one by one until you locate the source. what specific element causes the blockageIt's a somewhat cumbersome process, but very effective for detecting interference.

It's worth remembering that a clean start is a diagnostic techniqueThis is not intended as a permanent way to use the system, but rather as an aid in identifying the source of the conflict. Once resolved, the necessary services and startup items are gradually restored, leaving only those that have proven problematic or irrelevant disabled.