This time of 15 seconds has been present for awhile now, so I am not suggesting that it is because of the latest update of GameEx. I'm not complaining, just thought that someone would have some good advice on how to decrease this time. I actually tried to disable all databases at one point by leaving the database entry in the setup wizard blank, but GameEx would still load them. Those factors you mention are probably the reason mine and krakermans startup times differ. (Krakerman having an I7 cpu, whereas I have a E6500 core duo, among other things) GameEx is running fine after the intial load, and I do prefer the load at the start, as opposed to how it used to be when selecting a game system entry. So props to Tom for this.