Re: Effect of Processor and Memory on KDE4 execution speed

On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 4:47 AM, Harald Schmalzbauer <
h.schmalzbauer_at_omnilan.de> wrote:

>  schrieb Mehmet Erol Sanliturk am 14.02.2012 15:39 (localtime):
> > Dear All ,
> >
> > Today I have encountered a case which I think informing you about it may
> be
> > useful .
> >
> > In my previous messages , I have mentioned very slowness of KDE4 .
> >
> >
> > Onto another computer I have installed DruidBSD 9.0 b56 amd64 , and KDE4
> .
> > In that installation KDE4 worked surprisingly fast .
> >
> > To understand whether difference is among FreeBSD or DruidBSD , I have
> > installed
> > FreeBSD 9.0 Release amd64 and KDE4 on the same computer instead of
> DruidBSD
> > .
> >
> > The KDE4 has worked flawlesly i.e. , means very fast .
> >
> > To make equivalent the installations on both computers , I have installed
> > FreeBSD 9.0 Release amd64 and KDE4 on the slow computer exactly as in
> fast
> > computer .
> >
> >
> > Starting times after first boot ( to eliminate initialization effects )
> are
> > the following
> > ( All timings are from "root" ) :
> >
> >
> > >From "startx" ( which contains "exec ... kde4 ..." )
> > to   appearance of KDE menu symbol at the bottom left corner :
> >
> >
> > Fast computer : 8 GB : 0+ ( < 1 ) minute ( 4 x 2 GB )
> > Slow computer : 4 GB : 2+ ( < 3 ) minutes ( 2 x 2 GB ) ( 2 x ! GB chips
> > removed ) ,
> >                 6 GB : 8+ ( < 9 ) minutes ( 2 x ( 2 , 1 ) GB ) .
> >                 ( Memory chip installation conforms to main board manual
> . )
> >                 ( The clock does not have second counter . )
> >
> > Fast Computer
> >   CPU : Intel Pentium Dual CPU E2220 _at_ 2.40 GHz ( 2397.65-MHz K-8class
> CPU )
> >   ACPI APIC Table : < INTEL DG965WH >
> >
> > Slow Computer
> >   CPU : Intel Core 2 QUAD CPU Q6600 _at_ 2.40 GHz ( 2397.65-MHz K-8class
> CPU )
> >   ACPI APIC Table : < INTEL DG965WH >
> >
> > ( The main boards are the same ) .
> > ( All of the memory chips are the same : Kingston HyperX 800 MHz )
> >
> >
> >
> > I could not understand the reason(s) of the differences .
> >
> >
> > Boot DMESG outputs are attached .
> >
>
> Compare 'sysctl kern.timecounter'.
> That's the only difference I could see. Also, I'd try to disable two
> cores in the bios of the quad-core machine and see if it changes
> anything. Just to rule out scheduler issues.
>
> Have you tried memtest86 to see if RAM throughput and CPU-cache rates
> are comparable?
>
> -Harry
>
>
>


I have installed FreeBSD 9.0 Release i386 to understand whether there is a
difference
between amd64 and i386 KDE4 execution speeds :

The results are as follows :


   CPU : E2220
Memory : 1 x 2 GB Memory ( slot 0 ) From E2220 computer : Good chip (
Channel A )
         1 x 2 GB Memory ( slot 0 ) From Q6600 computer : Suspected chip (
Channel B )
         2 x 1 GB Memory ( slots 1 ) From Q6600 computer : Suspected chips

        From "startx" to ( K ) Symbol : 0+ ( < 1 ) minute




kern.timecounter.tick: 1
kern.timecounter.choice: TSC-low(1000) i8254(0) ACPI-fast(900)
dummy(-1000000)
kern.timecounter.hardware: TSC-low
kern.timecounter.stepwarnings: 0
kern.timecounter.tc.ACPI-fast.mask: 16777215
kern.timecounter.tc.ACPI-fast.counter: 579674
kern.timecounter.tc.ACPI-fast.frequency: 3579545
kern.timecounter.tc.ACPI-fast.quality: 900
kern.timecounter.tc.i8254.mask: 65535
kern.timecounter.tc.i8254.counter: 51061
kern.timecounter.tc.i8254.frequency: 1193182
kern.timecounter.tc.i8254.quality: 0
kern.timecounter.tc.TSC-low.mask: 4294967295
kern.timecounter.tc.TSC-low.counter: 1581793778
kern.timecounter.tc.TSC-low.frequency: 9365834
kern.timecounter.tc.TSC-low.quality: 1000
kern.timecounter.smp_tsc: 1
kern.timecounter.invariant_tsc: 1


It is possible to say that the difference is very large :

  Less than 1 minute versus greater than ( from 8  to 10 ) minutes .


In all of my FreeBSD i386 installs , execution was very fast , but
I am not installing and using i386 mode .




Thank you very much .


Mehmet Erol Sanliturk