[Tex/LaTex] Should TeXLive installation take 17+ hours? (Windows)

texlive

Is it unusual for installation of TeXLive on windows (full) to take 17+ hours? The installer has been running for 35 minutes and is working on package 94/3110 now. It is estimating 17 hours and 46 minutes remaining.

I have my antimalware / antivirus software disabled. My machine is reasonably new (5th gen i5, 16GB RAM).

Thanks in advance! 🙂

Best Answer

Sometimes my students have problems installing MiKTeX or TeX Live with the same effect you had with TeX Live: the installing would take too much time (usual solution: change the mirror to download).

The time it needs to install depends on three things:

  1. How many downloads has the choosen mirror to do (that could mean, that you see a very slow server serving you)
  2. Your internet connection is slow (that could be because your provider is slow or one of the several servers on the route is slow)
  3. your computer is slow and has problems to handle the incomming datas from the internet

For point 1. and 2. check the quality of your internet connection. use the system panal to view how many packets are send and arrives on your computer. If the mirror is slow, change the mirror to download from.

To point 3.: Your computer is new and fast enouph to handle the download, even with activated antivirus software. But you wrote: "I have my antimalware / antivirus software disabled" Please: Never disable the antivirus software when you are connected to the internet! Just do the following:

  1. Download all needed files to your computer with---of course---activated antivirus software!
  2. Close internet connection, check the downloaded files with the antivirus software.
  3. No virus? Ok. Deactivate antivirus software and install LaTeX
  4. Activate Antivirus software and check the installed files for viruses (sure is sure).

But with a modern computer there should be no reason to deactivate antivirus software. If the computer is very slow I would check the memory and the hard disk drive. With a new computer the chanche is there that memory or hard disk drive are faulty ...