Speeding up KDE? Any hints?

[D. Michael McIntyre]

On Sunday 15 July 2007, Robert Tilley wrote:

> My Kubuntu 7 KDE desktop is running as slowly as a Windows box with a bad
> registry.
>
> Can anyone throw out some helpful hints for improvements?

Usually this is RAM-related in some way.  Not enough RAM, too many 
applications running for the RAM you have, buggy applications with memory 
leaks.  Nothing bogs down KDE faster than heavy swap activity.

One easy way to look for this is to run kinfocenter and look at the Memory 
tab.  See if you see a lot of activity here.  If you do, it could explain the 
slow system.

If not, it could also be networking-related.  KDE can have weird problems if 
your local domain is busted in various ways, and applications will sit there 
for five eternities before starting normally, then they might balk like this 
periodically, depending on what they are.

It could just be a good old fashioned slow computer too.  KDE is pretty 
greedy, and a lot of people make the mistake of thinking that Linux with a 
full blown modern desktop like KDE should run on a 386-33 with 16K of RAM, 
because it's Linux, and Linux works great on old computers.

You haven't provided any information with which we might begin to go further 
than the random potshots I've taken above.
-- 
D. Michael McIntyre