How can I speed up GUI startup?

I have installed Matlab R2016b on a new Windows 7 machine. Starting the desktop GUI is painfully slow, taking anywhere from two to almost ten minutes. The -timing flag creates reports similar to the following:

 total   item     gap      description
 =====================================
  0.00   0.00    0.00   MATLAB script       
  0.04   0.04    0.00   main                
  0.51   0.42    0.05   LM Startup          
  0.54   0.00    0.04   splash              
  1.03   0.17    0.32      InitSunVM        
  1.33   0.27    0.03      PostVMInit       
  1.33   0.47    0.32     mljInit           
 444.71  443.38    0.01     StartDesktop      
 444.71  443.85    0.32   Java initialization 
 444.72   0.00    0.01   psParser            
 444.75   0.03    0.00   cachepath           
 445.50   0.68    0.07     matlabpath        
 565.00  120.29   444.71   Init Desktop        
 569.23   0.00   123.73      SettingsConstruct
 569.23   0.00   123.73     SettingsConstructo
 569.50  124.75    0.00   matlabrc            
 =====================================

The startup time can be greatly improved with the nodesktop flag, forgoing the GUI in favor of a simple command window. Suddenly, the timing report looks more like this:

 total   item     gap      description
 =====================================
  0.00   0.00    0.00   MATLAB script       
  0.11   0.11    0.00   main                
  0.62   0.46    0.06   LM Startup          
  0.77   0.01    0.14   splash              
  1.27   0.17    0.33      InitSunVM        
  1.58   0.28    0.03      PostVMInit       
  1.58   0.48    0.33     mljInit           
  1.60   0.50    0.33   Java initialization 
  1.62   0.00    0.02   psParser            
  1.65   0.03    0.00   cachepath           
  2.48   0.74    0.09     matlabpath        
  8.43   0.00    5.96      SettingsConstruct
  8.43   0.00    5.96     SettingsConstructo
  8.72   7.07    0.00   matlabrc            
 =====================================
 Items shown account for 93.7% of total startup time [TIMER: 3 MHz]

Still not perfect, but good enough. Except for the fact that all the convenience features are gone. So, I run the desktop command. The profiler spits out over 100 seconds stuck in the MLDesktop.getInstance.initMainFrame(0, 1); line of the desktop function, the call to that Java method accounting for all the execution time.

How do I speed up the program's startup? Waiting several minutes to get something done is not acceptable.

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

The single most important speedup you can make for MATLAB startup, is to install MATLAB on a decent SSD (Solid State Drive)

Answer 2

[Udit06]

You can refer to the following MATLAB answer that provides detailed solution for issues related to slow startup:

https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/92566-why-does-matlab-get-stuck-in-the-initializing-or-busy-state-or-take-a-long-time-to-start