ubuntu/kubuntu is sloooooooow!

[SteVe Cook]

Mario Vukelic wrote:
> On Tue, 2007-08-14 at 01:23 +0300, metin wrote:
>> I can't give specific numbers regarding performance (I did not make any 
>> benchmarking) but when you use a system it is immediately evident 
>> whether it is fast performing or not.
> 
> In any case it is important to know in which way a system underperforms,
> otherwise it is impossible to pinpoint the reason. For example, I have
> learned that you are interested in desktop performance (responsiveness)
> and not server performance (throughput)
> 
>>  For example, when you click the 
>> k-menu (kde) or gnome-menu it takes up to two seconds for the menu to 
>> come up in (k)ubuntu while it is instantaneous in archlinux or pardus. 
> 
> I have not seen this on slower machines than yours. I also doubt that
> archlinux or pardus add Gnome or KDE performance patches.  Does the
> delay only happen the first time you open the menu, when the entries
> have to be read from disk? (The menu should then be cached and open
> instantly for later accesses).
> 
>> This is more or less valid in every desktop operation. I am using all 
>> linuxes on the same machine so my system's specs are not relevant.
> 
> It really ticks me off when people ask for help, and when I am asking
> needed information to diagnose the problem, they tell me I don't need
> that. If you are so smart, why do you ask in the first place, go
> investigate yourself.
> 
> The system specs certainly are relevant. If your system were
> bottlenecking on RAM, it would have a different impact on performance
> than a slow disk, for example. You DID talk about "older systems" in
> your OP, but the one you listed does not fall into that category, IMHO.
> 
> The most likely difference in archlinux or pardus (not knowing those
> particular distros) is that they mount the disks with the noatime
> options. This can speed up disk access a lot. Just add "noatime" to the
> mount options in /etc/fstab and remount. 
> There was recently a discussion about this on lkml, see here:
> http://kerneltrap.org/node/14148
> 
> Another possibility (if HD access is really the problem) is that DMA is
> not set correctly.
> 
> 
Do all the distros use the same HD format?

In my experience ubuntu is a tad more sluggish than other distros 
'straight from the box' especially in machines with <512 RAM but, after 
twiddling things to my liking they're all much-of-a-muchness.  Those 
that use Reiserf as their default HD format are still quick obviously 
and ubuntu does appear to need that bit more RAM compared to some other 
distros.


SteVe