The installation of RC1 went very well.. very smooth. I quite like the aesthetic of everything thus far. Two concerns however: 1 - Performance is pretty poor compared to my Windows 2000 partition on the very same box. By 'performance' I am largely referring to load times in Gnome.. Firefox for example takes at least twice as long to load. :| Is there any way to improve this? Am I doing something wrong? 2 - The right side of my screen is 'chopped off' by several mm. Is there a way to correct this software wise or am I stuck adjusting my monitor settings each time I boot into linux? The machine is 1.3ghz with ~800mb RAM. JON
On Saturday 10 September 2005 23:57, Jonathan Lutz wrote:
The installation of RC1 went very well.. very smooth. I quite like the aesthetic of everything thus far.
Two concerns however: 1 - Performance is pretty poor compared to my Windows 2000 partition on the very same box. By 'performance' I am largely referring to load times in Gnome.. Firefox for example takes at least twice as long to load. :| Is there any way to improve this? Am I doing something wrong? 2 - The right side of my screen is 'chopped off' by several mm. Is there a way to correct this software wise or am I stuck adjusting my monitor settings each time I boot into linux?
The machine is 1.3ghz with ~800mb RAM.
JON
Hi Jon, Last question first: Log out of your desktop, switch to tty1 ("Ctl+Alt+F1"), log in as root, drop to run level 3 ("init 3") to shut down X, then run "sax2" to reconfigure your monitor settings. On the very last screen, before "finalizing" any changes, you get the option to test first. That test screen lets you resize and reposition the display using your mouse. As far as performance goes, we've got fairly similar base configurations. I find that Firefox in any Linux I install on this machine appears to open slower than it does under XP. However, that is not really a competent measure of performance. Other differences I know of: -> I never have to update SpywareBlaster on Linux -> nor Ad-Aware -> nor Hijack This! -> nor Spybot Search and Destroy -> nor ZoneAlarm -> nor AVG anti-virus (no mail server running) ->nor TrojanHunter Yes, I have sometimes frequent YaST Online Updates, but they don't involve hours of scanning time twice a week (or more) and it isn't the same thing as having to constantly clean out malicious scriptlets and Trojan Horses and viruses that have already landed, and are *always* landing, on your system in the background if you spend any time surfing the Internet. And on the Linux side, I can be on the phone (Skype) while listening to the radio (shoutcast/xmms) while running my mail client/calendar/contacts manager (Kontact) and surfing in Konqueror *and* Firefox and have a couple of shells open and also a pdf document and be editing a web page (jEdit) while also editing a photo for that web page (GIMP)... and I can even move 700MB CD images (iso's) from drive to drive... and my music doesn't skip a beat... not once... not ever. Whereas, when I'm listening to the same station using Winamp on XP, if I just open up a single large document in Acrobat reader while I'm surfing the Internet and editing a web page, the music *always* skips and stutters. Always. That tells me that Linux knows how to use my hardware much more efficiently; that the load balancing and shifting across apps is truly graceful; light years ahead. I've also installed a utility which gives me four virtual desktops in XP. Yeah, I'm no longer stuck with just one desktop there and the idea is great, but the execution sucks... the difference in speed when switching between one desktop to the next is like day and night. In Linux, I click and I'm there... not so in XP. When I click to switch there, it sometimes takes two or three whole seconds while it juggles the loads and pages memory. That might not seem like much, but if you work like I do, with many apps open at the same time, each opened up to a different part of the same project, you'd understand that I sometimes jump from desktop to desktop and program to program as much as fifteen or twenty times a minute, depending on what the project is. Under this scenario, the race isn't even a close *third* So, be careful how you judge performance. It is very application specific and you must factor in all the side benefits and disadvantages, such as security (vs. insecurity) and privacy (vs. none) and price (real TCO) and the ability to study every line of source code installed on your computer (one says "yes' the other slams the door in your face). From all these perspectives, I don't think comparing "load times" of one application is a rational process. regards, - Carl
On Sunday 11 September 2005 1:12 am, Carl Hartung wrote:
And on the Linux side, I can be on the phone (Skype) while listening to the radio (shoutcast/xmms) while running my mail client/calendar/contacts manager (Kontact) and surfing in Konqueror *and* Firefox and have a couple of shells open and also a pdf document and be editing a web page (jEdit) while also editing a photo for that web page (GIMP)... and I can even move 700MB CD images (iso's) from drive to drive... and my music doesn't skip a beat... not once... not ever. Whereas, when I'm listening to the same station using Winamp on XP, if I just open up a single large document in Acrobat reader while I'm surfing the Internet and editing a web page, the music *always* skips and stutters. Always. That tells me that Linux knows how to use my hardware much more efficiently; that the load balancing and shifting across apps is truly graceful; light years ahead.
Thank you Carl! Very well put!
Went thru the installation very smoothly. Memory, ATA disks, GX300 video works great with latest drivers, extreme resolution 1600 and really great color pal. (24 mio.) All USB acc. are working instantly. -- Met vriendelijke groeten, Robert Vriens --------------------------------------------------------- Linux 2.6.13 user, swept for virusses using www.hbedv.com OpenSuse, opens the OpenSource
Hello, Thanks for the info re: the monitor settings. I have just tried this and oddly when I hit the buttons to move and/or resize the screen, it blinks but does not seem to do anything? ie. If I hit the 'move left' arrow button 10 times, it will still be in the same position it was originally. As far as performance, I understand all the benefits of linux and the ways/scenarios in which it performs better, but for my 'most-commonly-used' things (such as Firefox) load times still seem quite slow. This is pretty important. I am savvy enough to see the big picture, but for the average user coming over from another OS (windows) this is definitely an issue. As someone else mentioned, it's a big 'first impression' type item. JON On 9/11/05, Carl Hartung <suselinux@cehartung.com> wrote:
The installation of RC1 went very well.. very smooth. I quite like the aesthetic of everything thus far.
Two concerns however: 1 - Performance is pretty poor compared to my Windows 2000 partition on
On Saturday 10 September 2005 23:57, Jonathan Lutz wrote: the
very same box. By 'performance' I am largely referring to load times in Gnome.. Firefox for example takes at least twice as long to load. :| Is there any way to improve this? Am I doing something wrong? 2 - The right side of my screen is 'chopped off' by several mm. Is there a way to correct this software wise or am I stuck adjusting my monitor settings each time I boot into linux?
The machine is 1.3ghz with ~800mb RAM.
JON
Hi Jon,
Last question first: Log out of your desktop, switch to tty1 ("Ctl+Alt+F1"), log in as root, drop to run level 3 ("init 3") to shut down X, then run "sax2" to reconfigure your monitor settings. On the very last screen, before "finalizing" any changes, you get the option to test first. That test screen lets you resize and reposition the display using your mouse.
As far as performance goes, we've got fairly similar base configurations. I find that Firefox in any Linux I install on this machine appears to open slower than it does under XP. However, that is not really a competent measure of performance. Other differences I know of:
-> I never have to update SpywareBlaster on Linux -> nor Ad-Aware -> nor Hijack This! -> nor Spybot Search and Destroy -> nor ZoneAlarm -> nor AVG anti-virus (no mail server running) ->nor TrojanHunter Yes, I have sometimes frequent YaST Online Updates, but they don't involve hours of scanning time twice a week (or more) and it isn't the same thing as having to constantly clean out malicious scriptlets and Trojan Horses and viruses that have already landed, and are *always* landing, on your system in the background if you spend any time surfing the Internet.
And on the Linux side, I can be on the phone (Skype) while listening to the radio (shoutcast/xmms) while running my mail client/calendar/contacts manager (Kontact) and surfing in Konqueror *and* Firefox and have a couple of shells open and also a pdf document and be editing a web page (jEdit) while also editing a photo for that web page (GIMP)... and I can even move 700MB CD images (iso's) from drive to drive... and my music doesn't skip a beat... not once... not ever. Whereas, when I'm listening to the same station using Winamp on XP, if I just open up a single large document in Acrobat reader while I'm surfing the Internet and editing a web page, the music *always* skips and stutters. Always. That tells me that Linux knows how to use my hardware much more efficiently; that the load balancing and shifting across apps is truly graceful; light years ahead.
I've also installed a utility which gives me four virtual desktops in XP. Yeah, I'm no longer stuck with just one desktop there and the idea is great, but the execution sucks... the difference in speed when switching between one desktop to the next is like day and night. In Linux, I click and I'm there... not so in XP. When I click to switch there, it sometimes takes two or three whole seconds while it juggles the loads and pages memory. That might not seem like much, but if you work like I do, with many apps open at the same time, each opened up to a different part of the same project, you'd understand that I sometimes jump from desktop to desktop and program to program as much as fifteen or twenty times a minute, depending on what the project is. Under this scenario, the race isn't even a close *third*
So, be careful how you judge performance. It is very application specific and you must factor in all the side benefits and disadvantages, such as security (vs. insecurity) and privacy (vs. none) and price (real TCO) and the ability to study every line of source code installed on your computer (one says "yes' the other slams the door in your face). From all these perspectives, I don't think comparing "load times" of one application is a rational process.
regards,
- Carl
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1 - Performance is pretty poor compared to my Windows 2000 partition on the very same box. By 'performance' I am largely referring to load times in Gnome.. Firefox for example takes at least twice as long to load. :| Is there any way to improve this? Am I doing something wrong?
Can you time the load times, and report back maybe? (On my laptop, Firefox takes < 7 seconds from clicking the launcher to he window appearing) -- James Ogley james@usr-local-bin.org GNOME for SuSE: http://usr-local-bin.org/rpms Make Poverty History: http://makepovertyhistory.org
Cristian Rodriguez said:
maybe an IDE performance problem ... nordi said: You might want to have a look at my page on preloading ... James "The Man" :-) Ogley said: Can you time the load times, and report back maybe? (On my laptop, Firefox takes < 7 seconds from clicking the launcher to he window appearing)
Hi All, Am I to believe from these comments that the behavior Jonathan wrote about and I responded to /could/ be a problem? I've always dismissed it. Cross-platform programs like Firefox and Nvu sometimes /start/ faster on XP here but run like dogs when I push the system hard, as I've already described. Firefox loads in RC1 here in just under four seconds, click of launcher to my local bookmarks.html. jEdit, which is java-based and truly cross-platform, takes maybe eight to ten seconds on both sides, click of launcher to last edited document being opened automatically. I just haven't put much stock in comparing "loading" times because I'm much more concerned with overall stability and consistent responsiveness when I'm pushing the system and working hard. Comments? - Carl
Carl Hartung wrote:
Firefox loads in RC1 here in just under four seconds, click of launcher to my local bookmarks.html. jEdit, which is java-based and truly cross-platform, takes maybe eight to ten seconds on both sides, click of launcher to last edited document being opened automatically.
I just haven't put much stock in comparing "loading" times because I'm much more concerned with overall stability and consistent responsiveness when I'm pushing the system and working hard.
Have a look at the SUPER standard benchmark at [1] and look how the start times of OpenOffice changed between beta3 and beta4. It is 11 seconds versus 3 seconds on the same system! This makes it _feel_ a _lot_ faster. When you are new to Linux and your word processor takes 11 seconds to start, what will you think about Linux's performance? You will think it sucks and have a bad first impression. And you never get a second chance to make a good first impression! What do you think why there is so much work going into speeding up the boot-process? For stuff like jEdit that is very user specific I have written PePr [2]. Try how much it improves startup time of jEdit on a newly booted system. You could safe a couple of seconds. This is no big deal, but it makes the system feel much smoother if some stuff is preloaded. Cheers nordi [1] http://www.opensuse.org/SUPER_standard_benchmark [2] http://www.opensuse.org/SUPER_preloading
nordi wrote:
_lot_ faster. When you are new to Linux and your word processor takes 11 seconds to start, what will you think about Linux's performance?
you know, on windows I most of the time unset the pre-loading feature because it's a per session thing and it's pretty frequent to close a session and open an other when you share a computer. same when you freeze :-) for the same reason I never keep a windows open when I don't use it. I use already 8 (eight) desktops ans one is soon confused :-) pre-loading is nice when done on the background and with a low priority (as I think is done in SUPER). The Linux memory use is also quite intelligent and the second time one launch an app, it's mush faster. the real place where one could improve is * boot from start to login, this is quite long, and the new "static" wiev makes it feel longer (when you see the log messages, this makes the time go faster :-)) * the time for kde coming up. I know this has been worked and improved yet. But why isnt'it possible to preload the default wm during login prompt? jdd -- pour m'écrire, aller sur: http://www.dodin.net http://valerie.dodin.net http://arvamip.free.fr
jdd wrote:
* the time for kde coming up.
I know this has been worked and improved yet. But why isnt'it possible to preload the default wm during login prompt?
This is already done, check /etc/init.d/earlykdm ;) Again, compare the results from the SUPER standard benchmark [1], beta3 against beta4. Startup time for KDE went from 16 seconds to 11 seconds. The 5 seconds is what you save by preloading! In 10.1 you can expect preloading of Gnome as well. But for 10.0 I am really happy that Suse included this into the distro, even though I just hacked it together after beta1 was out. Cheers nordi [1] http://www.opensuse.org/SUPER_standard_benchmark
On Sunday 11 September 2005 10:38 am, nordi wrote:
Have a look at the SUPER standard benchmark at [1] and look how the start times of OpenOffice changed between beta3 and beta4. It is 11 seconds versus 3 seconds on the same system!
This is very very interesting. I wonder now...with all this preloading going on (OOo and the other apps like firefox etc) ...how much is the memory overhead? That is, on a newly booted system, how much memory is occupied to that of a newly booted system with no app-preloading? I definetely think preloading is the way to go though... Jorge
This is very very interesting. I wonder now...with all this
Jorge Fábregas wrote: preloading going
on (OOo and the other apps like firefox etc) ...how much is the memory overhead? That is, on a newly booted system, how much memory is occupied to that of a newly booted system with no app-preloading?
On my system it preloads 130MB of data. But /usr/bin/appspreloader.sh will stop preloading when you have less than 30MB of unused RAM. So if a system has only 128MB RAM, it will probably preload very little or nothing. Also note that this RAM is not 'used' in the sense that a program is using it. Preloading just fills the filesystem cache. If you don't use the preloaded apps then your kernel will use this RAM for something else. Cheers nordi
Load time on my machine is appx. 7-8 seconds. On 9/11/05, James Ogley <james@usr-local-bin.org> wrote:
1 - Performance is pretty poor compared to my Windows 2000 partition on the very same box. By 'performance' I am largely referring to load times in Gnome.. Firefox for example takes at least twice as long to load. :| Is there any way to improve this? Am I doing something wrong?
Can you time the load times, and report back maybe?
(On my laptop, Firefox takes < 7 seconds from clicking the launcher to he window appearing) -- James Ogley james@usr-local-bin.org GNOME for SuSE: http://usr-local-bin.org/rpms Make Poverty History: http://makepovertyhistory.org
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Jonathan Lutz escribió:
The installation of RC1 went very well.. very smooth. I quite like the aesthetic of everything thus far.
Two concerns however: 1 - Performance is pretty poor compared to my Windows 2000 partition on the very same box. By 'performance' I am largely referring to load times in Gnome.. Firefox for example takes at least twice as long to load. :| Is there any way to improve this? Am I doing something wrong? 2 - The right side of my screen is 'chopped off' by several mm. Is there a way to correct this software wise or am I stuck adjusting my monitor settings each time I boot into linux?
The machine is 1.3ghz with ~800mb RAM.
JON
maybe an IDE performance problem what reports: hdparm -i /dev/hda hdparm /dev/hda (if disk is IDE)
Here is output: /dev/hdc: Model=Maxtor 91080D5, FwRev=GAS54112, SerialNo=A506Y69C Config={ Fixed } RawCHS=16383/16/63, TrkSize=0, SectSize=0, ECCbytes=29 BuffType=DualPortCache, BuffSize=512kB, MaxMultSect=16, MultSect=16 CurCHS=16383/16/63, CurSects=16514064, LBA=yes, LBAsects=21095424 IORDY=on/off, tPIO={min:120,w/IORDY:120}, tDMA={min:120,rec:120} PIO modes: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4 DMA modes: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2 UDMA modes: udma0 udma1 *udma2 AdvancedPM=no WriteCache=enabled Drive conforms to: ATA/ATAPI-4 T13 1153D revision 17: 1 2 3 4 * signifies the current active mode /dev/hdc: multcount = 16 (on) IO_support = 1 (32-bit) unmaskirq = 1 (on) using_dma = 1 (on) keepsettings = 0 (off) readonly = 0 (off) readahead = 256 (on) geometry = 20928/16/63, sectors = 21095424, start = 0 On 9/11/05, Cristian Rodriguez <judas_iscariote@imapmail.org> wrote:
maybe an IDE performance problem what reports:
hdparm -i /dev/hda
hdparm /dev/hda
(if disk is IDE)
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Jonathan Lutz wrote:
Two concerns however: 1 - Performance is pretty poor compared to my Windows 2000 partition on the very same box. By 'performance' I am largely referring to load times in Gnome.. Firefox for example takes at least twice as long to load. :|
You might want to have a look at my page on preloading [1], especially section 5. Suse has included preloading since beta4, and it allows you to start applications _much_ faster. But in their current setup it only works if you are using KDE. In section 5 you will find a way to also activate it for Gnome (or any other WM). Cheers nordi [1] http://www.opensuse.org/SUPER_preloading
1 - Performance is pretty poor compared to my Windows 2000 partition on the very same box. By 'performance' I am largely referring to load times in Gnome.. Firefox for example takes at least twice as long to load. :| Is there any way to improve this? Am I doing something wrong?
I had the same problems with linux before, I had only 128 Ram but after updating to 256 my linux box was pretty fast. Normally with 800Mb ram the system should very quickly ( responsiveness, loading, applications start-up, boot... ). You have a problem with the configuration, have a look at the running processes, there is probably a process ( a program ) that eats a lot of ram ( there is a gnome program that monitors the performances and running processes ).
participants (9)
-
Carl Hartung -
Cristian Rodriguez -
James Ogley -
jdd -
Jonathan Lutz -
Jorge Fábregas -
nordi -
Robert Vriens -
Youssef CHAHIBI