gv

[Gary Hodges]

On 11/16/05, Gary Hodges <fsunoles at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 11/16/05, Christoph Bier <christoph.bier at web.de> wrote:
> > Gary Hodges schrieb am 15.11.2005 19:15:
> >
> > > On 11/15/05, Christoph Bier <christoph.bier at web.de> wrote:
> > >
> > >>Gary Hodges schrieb am 15.11.2005 00:56:
> >
> > [...]
> >
> > >>Can you provide a copy of such a postscript file for testing on
> > >>different hardware and platforms? And which hardware do you use?
> > >
> > > My machine is a single Athlon XP 2600+ w/512MB Matrox 450 and Kubuntu
> > > 5.10.  I just tried the same thing on the following machines:
> > >
> > > Opteron 244 SMP w/4GB Matrox 400 Sarge 64 install
> > > Athlon MP 2000+ SMP w/2GB Matrox 550 Sarge install
> > >
> > > Mine and the Athlon render the pages the same.  The Opteron machine is
> > > at least twice as fast.  Still not as fast as what I _remember_ with
> > > SuSE 9.0 on my machine.  My recollection is each page in the ps doc
> > > was instantly available with each strike of the <ENTER> or <BACKSPACE>
> > > keys.  Even on the Opteron machine I can watch my plots appear in
> > > chunks.  So IF (Big IF) my memory is correct, it must not be an Xorg
> > > vs XFree86 thing.
> > >
> > > I'll email you directly with a ftp site you can download the
> > > postscript file from if you are interested.
> >
> > Ok, thanks, I downloaded it. On my desktop (Duron 1100Mhz, 512MB RAM
> > Radeon 7000/VE; Sarge, gv 3.6.1-10, gs-afpl 8.14-3) it takes about
> > 3--5 seconds for every page. On my laptop (Athlon XP 2200+ M, 256MB
> > RAM, S3 ProSavage8 KM266/KL266; Breezy, gv 3.6.1-11ubuntu1, gs-esp
> > 7.07.1-9ubuntu5) it takes about 1--2 seconds for every page. On
> > another desktop (Athlon XP 1800+, 256MB RAM, GeForce2 GTS/Pro;
> > Breezy, gv 3.6.1-11ubuntu1, gs-esp 7.07.1-9ubuntu5) it takes about 1
> > second for every page. Maybe it's a ghostscript thing. But to be
> > honest: I can not image that such a postscript file to be displayed
> > in "realtime". Results as on my laptop and the Athlon desktop are
> > reasonable, IMHO.
>
> Thanks for taking the time to test this on your machines.  I'm trying
> to find a SuSE machine in the building right now.  If I have to I'll
> find something to install SuSE on.  When I get more data I'll let you
> know.

OK, got some comparisons done with SuSE today.  Now I'm convinced I'm
not crazy.  gv on SuSE is a lot faster, just like my memory was
telling me.  Here are my results:

SuSE 9.0; gv v3.5.8
Dual Xeon (around 3GHz) unknown vid:  renders pages instantly
PII 450 w/on-board ATI: Second fastest of all machines at < 1sec to
render a page

Sarge;  gv v3.6.1
Opteron 244 SMP w/Matrox 400:  ~1 sec to render a page.  Slightly
slower than the PII.
Athlon MP 2000+ SMP w/Matrox 550:  ~4 seconds to render a page

Kubuntu 5.10;  gv v3.6.1
Athlon XP 2600+ w/Matrox 450:  ~4 seconds to render a page.

I've sent an email to the gv mailing list.  I'll report what I hear from them.

Gary