Author: Christophe Theron
Date: 18:54:39 05/20/02
Go up one level in this thread
On May 20, 2002 at 16:43:21, Dan Andersson wrote:
>The BSD OS's run Linux executables natively on x86 machines. And any program you
>develop on a BSD machine will port without a hitch to linux.And OpenBSD is used
>as a Firewall by people serious about security. But as for the speed of your
>Linux installation. What are you using. Is it a 386 build, unoptimized. Is the
>XFree optimized for your processor. Is your desktop manager optimized for your
>processor. What deamons are running in the background. What needless drivers are
>in the kernel. If you don't know the answer of these questions. You should
>choose some easy to use version of linux, with some kind of optimizations
>already in place.
>
>MvH Dan Andersson
From what I know about optimization for a given processor, we are talking about
a few percent of speed here. That's not something I will notice if I make the
comparison.
But I was using a version optimized for Pentium (the other possibility was the
386 version) on a PII, on a K6-2 and then on a P4. So I guess processor
optimization was approximately OK.
I have no idea what daemons were running in the background and I'm not sure I
should have to care about this on a freshly installed Linux (my mother would
have no idea what a daemon is anyway, so an user should not have to know either
in order to get acceptable speed from a fresh install).
One simple test I did was to launch a small editor application (equivalent of
NotePad) under Linux on a PII-233 laptop (150Mb RAM). It took 2 to 3 seconds to
launch it, every time. Can someone justify this delay to launch a 100Kb
application?
Same computer running Windows ME: less than one second to start such an
application (the second time it pops up instantly).
More generally, I have been working on this laptop running WinME for several
months. It is acceptable for my daily work. Running Linux on it was a pain.
Yes I was using some easy to use desktop workstation Linux. I have tried Vector
Linux, Peanut Linux and OpenCaldera 3.1. Even with the smallest versions (Vector
and Peanut) you need loads of memory (32Mb is definitely not enough to run
something as small as NotePad), and the GUI is slooow if you do not have a
processor faster than 500MHz.
From what I had heard I was expecting something fast and light, just to discover
that it is worse than Windows on these two key points. I feel I have been
cheated somehow.
On the other hand, the most important thing about Linux is that it offers an
alternative to Windows (I don't even care if this alternative is free or not, I
would be happy to pay a reasonable amount if I knew it helped me to get rid of
Windows).
I'm ready to accept an OS that I would consider as technically inferior to
Windows (more bloated and slower). But if it is bloated, slow, hard to use,
composed of modules using inconsistent interfaces and APIs and lacks major
applications to run on it, I can't accept it.
I'm not saying Linux will stay in this state forever. Maybe in 2 to 3 years it
will be fine. I have tried it 3 years ago already and I feel there has been some
improvement.
The KDE project seems to go in the right direction, but not fast enough.
Christophe
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