xwindows_speed_memory_hint

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Subject: Re: xwindows slow in general or...?
From: "Hossein S. Zadeh" <hossein@hossein.bf.rmit.edu.au>
Date: Wed, 24 May 2000 18:57:07 +1000 (EST)


On Wed, 24 May 2000, Thomas Ribbrock wrote:

> On Tue, May 23, 2000 at 07:28:15PM -0700, Stephen King wrote:
> > Is it just my installations or it is a fact that xwindows, and say KDE or
> > Gnome, are slower than any win95/98/NT/2000 installation on the same
> > machine?
> [...]

<flame armor>

Let me set the record straight: X IS slower than windows on the same
hardware.

</flame armor>

This is exactly because of the same reason NT is slower than 95/98. NT
packs in much more features/functionality than 95/98; and ofcourse it runs
slower.

X packs in much more features/functionality than even NT. In addition, X
has poor 3D hardware acceleration support (at best of times). These all
make X run slower than either of 95/98/NT on the same platform.

All that said, if you give X enough RAM (at least 64M, preferably more),
then the speed difference CAN become negligible. As a rule of thumb, run
'top', press 'm', and note 'SIZE' of X. You need at least that much RAM
plus, say, 32MB (to prevent thrashing).

As usual YMMV.

===





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