Long delay changing between logins

My Win 11 PC has a fast processor and is very responsive but when changing logins there is a long (10 Sec) delay with a blank screen in between. What is the OS doing? It's much longer than my old Win 10 PC.

DaiB said:

What is the OS doing?

Click to expand...

When you log out of a user account, Windows consolidates the partial user profile files it has been creating while you've been logged in.
This is also what it does when you shut down because that also involves logging out.

You'll see the files in C:\Users\YourUserName if you set File explorer to view hidden files.
The main file is ntuser.dat and all the others are the partials/additionals it has made while you've been logged in and they need to be consolidated into ntuser.dat.

Ten seconds does sound like a long time to me. Make sure your backups are up to date.
Have you crashed / been forced to shut down using the power button a lot? These can affect the user profile but a single logout-login ought to be enough to restore them to normal.

All the best,
Denis

Hi and thanks for your suggestions. My Win 11 PC is only 2 weeks old and has always behaved normally. It still takes a long time to change between accounts. These are the same two accounts and environment I was using on my previous Win 10 PC. I've just timed the change from one account to the other and it takes 8 seconds. Both accounts are Local ones. One uses a PIN and the other a password. The screen is blank during this time.