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#1 2005-08-11 18:29:59

molinero
Member
From: Copenhagen/Denmark
Registered: 2004-09-19
Posts: 110

Where has the speed gone?

Hi all.

I'm been using Arch on my laptop for 1½ year now. It's been working great and I have learnt alot. But now I have encountered a small problem. I think the speed have gone out of my system. My lappie is a Acer Travelmate 1.4GHz centrino, 512MB ram so it should be ok for running normal apps (browsing, office, programming so on). I am running gnome as desktop env.

Opening following programs takes:
gedit - 7 seconds
Abiword - 5 seconds
Evolution - 9 seconds
and so on.
When I use pacman - it takes forever (10-15 seconds) before it even checks the repositories.

My 2000+ XP machine is much faster than this - that I do not like :cry:

I need some tips on how to speedup my system. It did not use to be slow.

MODULES=(usb-storage snd-intel8x0 snd-pcm-oss ipw2100 speedstep-centrino freq_table cpufreq_powersave i915)
DAEMONS=(syslogd klogd hotplug network acpid netfs crond alsamixer portmap fam dbus hal cpudyn gdm)

Any tips - please

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#2 2005-08-11 18:50:18

arooaroo
Member
From: London, UK
Registered: 2005-01-13
Posts: 1,268
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

defrag?

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#3 2005-08-11 19:18:53

molinero
Member
From: Copenhagen/Denmark
Registered: 2004-09-19
Posts: 110

Re: Where has the speed gone?

You can do that? :oops:  how? I thought it wasn't necessary. I am running ext3.

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#4 2005-08-11 19:32:42

jftaylor21
Member
From: Arch Linux Forums
Registered: 2004-02-21
Posts: 237

Re: Where has the speed gone?

I think maybe arooaroo was talking about defrag with pacman. You can do that with

pacman-optimize

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#5 2005-08-11 19:34:20

phrakture
Arch Overlord
From: behind you
Registered: 2003-10-29
Posts: 7,879
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

Yeah, but pacman-optimize is only going to improve *pacman's* load time - not gedit or abiword.

I would say first off try a different WM and see if there is any measurable difference in load times.  It could be gnome getting to be more of a hog and taking longer to render a window.

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#6 2005-08-11 19:48:57

arooaroo
Member
From: London, UK
Registered: 2005-01-13
Posts: 1,268
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

I was generally referring to pacman-optimise. However, if you think about it, if pacman will degrade over time because of fragmentation issues, then so will the entire system. Bearing in mind that the complaint is about a progressive slowing down, I'd say that fragmentation is a good guess.

Now, filesystems like Ext2/3 are more resistent to fragmentation than FAT32, but it's not immune. I've personally never defraged a linux partition - I don't even know if it's possible. But it could be worth investigating, don't you think?

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#7 2005-08-11 20:07:32

molinero
Member
From: Copenhagen/Denmark
Registered: 2004-09-19
Posts: 110

Re: Where has the speed gone?

I didn't know the pacman-optimize. Trying it out. I'm really fond of my gnome and would hate to see it go. But I am aware that gnome loads alot of services (or what they are called) - are there some of those that maybe I can disable. Or any other hints on how to optimize my gnome?

The programs that I use most often:
JBuilder
Abiword
MS word (via. crossover office)
gedit
bluefish
firefox
evolution
xmms

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#8 2005-08-11 20:16:28

cactus
Taco Eater
From: t͈̫̹ͨa͖͕͎̱͈ͨ͆ć̥̖̝o̫̫̼s͈̭̱̞͍̃!̰
Registered: 2004-05-25
Posts: 4,622
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

1 1/2 years have brough:
updates to X
updates to gnome
updates to...a damn lot of things. Likely more packages installed too.

Dont forget with speed-step, your laptop is not always running at full power (when you are on battery). That slows things down a bit too.

Reiserfs seems to have some fragmentation issues with reading lots of small files *over time*. I shouldn't say fragmentation, because it seems the files themselves are kept rather contiguous. It is just that alot of files expected to be on the disk in sequence, may become spread out over time. like the pacman db files. Each file is not fragmented, but they seem to be individually moved around on the disk.

This issue is also generally only apparent on first run of an app, or first run after quite a while (linux kernel might uncache that used memory after a while). I don't know what to say. I doubt winderz would still be usable after that long. lol

If it bothers you *that* much, then you could reinstall, and use a different filesystem (if you are using reiserfs), and see how it goes a year 1/2 down the road. *shrug*
pacman-optimize will likely take care of the pacman startup issue though.


"Be conservative in what you send; be liberal in what you accept." -- Postel's Law
"tacos" -- Cactus' Law
"t̥͍͎̪̪͗a̴̻̩͈͚ͨc̠o̩̙͈ͫͅs͙͎̙͊ ͔͇̫̜t͎̳̀a̜̞̗ͩc̗͍͚o̲̯̿s̖̣̤̙͌ ̖̜̈ț̰̫͓ạ̪͖̳c̲͎͕̰̯̃̈o͉ͅs̪ͪ ̜̻̖̜͕" -- -̖͚̫̙̓-̺̠͇ͤ̃ ̜̪̜ͯZ͔̗̭̞ͪA̝͈̙͖̩L͉̠̺͓G̙̞̦͖O̳̗͍

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#9 2005-08-11 20:25:44

jftaylor21
Member
From: Arch Linux Forums
Registered: 2004-02-21
Posts: 237

Re: Where has the speed gone?

Do you notice any speed differences in other console based apps besides pacman, or is it mainly with graphical apps? I also noticed that you listed mainly gnome based programs that were moving slower, are other graphical programs (that are not gnome based) moving slower as well?
I am not sure about what services you should disable with gnome, but when I used xfce4 I disabled the session manager which made it move faster, but I do not know if it will produce similar results with gnome.

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#10 2005-08-11 20:30:53

molinero
Member
From: Copenhagen/Denmark
Registered: 2004-09-19
Posts: 110

Re: Where has the speed gone?

I have considered the updates on gnome, X, Kernel and so on. But the should it really matter that much? I really do think that a revision of my system is what is needed.
If I go and reinstall because of this speed issue then the whole Arch/Linux idea goes down the drain. Then I could just move back to MS win and "reboot my computer to finish the installation" - and reinstall everything every 3 months. I do not want to do that.

I am using ext3 - not reiserfs.
I know about the speedstep thing, took me hell of a time to get it working :-) The problem does not lie in me not knowing the current freq.

EDIT: Console apps are running perfectly - it is only graphical apps, that have problems.

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#11 2005-08-11 20:41:52

phrakture
Arch Overlord
From: behind you
Registered: 2003-10-29
Posts: 7,879
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

molinero wrote:

EDIT: Console apps are running perfectly - it is only graphical apps, that have problems.

Ah, well that makes a big difference - ignore all the crap about filesystems and things like that - this is solely a graphical issue then.

What video card are you using? Can you post your xorg.conf? Can you just *try* another WM to rule out gnome being an issue? If it is gnome only then we can work on pimping out your gnome setup...

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#12 2005-08-11 20:52:21

molinero
Member
From: Copenhagen/Denmark
Registered: 2004-09-19
Posts: 110

Re: Where has the speed gone?

I could try another wm - any suggestions?

I have had a look at the system monitor in gnome.  Panels, nautilus, applets (clock, netstats, battery) are using  a lot of memory. Under gnome-session it says ssh-agent - I am not using ssh?!

#**********************************************************************
# Module section -- this  section  is used to specify
# which dynamically loadable modules to load.
# **********************************************************************
#
Section "Module"

# This loads the DBE extension module.

    Load        "dbe"      # Double buffer extension

# This loads the miscellaneous extensions module, and disables
# initialisation of the XFree86-DGA extension within that module.
    SubSection  "extmod"
      Option    "omit xfree86-dga"   # don't initialise the DGA extension
    EndSubSection

# This loads the font modules
    Load        "type1"
#    Load        "speedo"
    Load        "freetype"
#    Load        "xtt"

# This loads the GLX module
    Load       "glx"

# This loads the DRI module
    Load       "dri"

    Load    "record"
    Load    "extmod"
    Load    "xtrap"
EndSection

Section "DRI"
    Mode 0666
EndSection


# **********************************************************************
# Files section.  This allows default font and rgb paths to be set
# **********************************************************************

Section "Files"

# The location of the RGB database.  Note, this is the name of the
# file minus the extension (like ".txt" or ".db").  There is normally
# no need to change the default.

    RgbPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"

# Multiple FontPath entries are allowed (which are concatenated together),
# as well as specifying multiple comma-separated entries in one FontPath
# command (or a combination of both methods)
# 
# 

    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/"
    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/TTF/"
    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/"
    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/CID/"
    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/"
    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/"
    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/local/"
#    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/"
#    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/TrueType/"
#    FontPath   "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/freefont/"

# The module search path.  The default path is shown here.

#    ModulePath "/usr/X11R6/lib/modules"

EndSection

# **********************************************************************
# Server flags section.
# **********************************************************************

Section "ServerFlags"

# Uncomment this to cause a core dump at the spot where a signal is 
# received.  This may leave the console in an unusable state, but may
# provide a better stack trace in the core dump to aid in debugging

#    Option "NoTrapSignals"

# Uncomment this to disable the <Crtl><Alt><Fn> VT switch sequence
# (where n is 1 through 12).  This allows clients to receive these key
# events.

#    Option "DontVTSwitch"

# Uncomment this to disable the <Crtl><Alt><BS> server abort sequence
# This allows clients to receive this key event.

#    Option "DontZap"

# Uncomment this to disable the <Crtl><Alt><KP_+>/<KP_-> mode switching
# sequences.  This allows clients to receive these key events.

#    Option "Dont Zoom"

# Uncomment this to disable tuning with the xvidtune client. With
# it the client can still run and fetch card and monitor attributes,
# but it will not be allowed to change them. If it tries it will
# receive a protocol error.

#    Option "DisableVidModeExtension"

# Uncomment this to enable the use of a non-local xvidtune client. 

#    Option "AllowNonLocalXvidtune"

# Uncomment this to disable dynamically modifying the input device
# (mouse and keyboard) settings. 

#    Option "DisableModInDev"

# Uncomment this to enable the use of a non-local client to
# change the keyboard or mouse settings (currently only xset).

#    Option "AllowNonLocalModInDev"

EndSection

# **********************************************************************
# Input devices
# **********************************************************************

# **********************************************************************
# Core keyboard's InputDevice section
# **********************************************************************

Section "InputDevice"

    Identifier    "Keyboard1"
    Driver    "kbd"

# For most OSs the protocol can be omitted (it defaults to "Standard").
# When using XQUEUE (only for SVR3 and SVR4, but not Solaris),
# uncomment the following line.

#    Option     "Protocol"      "Xqueue"

    Option "AutoRepeat" "500 30"

# Specify which keyboard LEDs can be user-controlled (eg, with xset(1))
#    Option    "Xleds"      "1 2 3"

#    Option "LeftAlt"     "Meta"
#    Option "RightAlt"    "ModeShift"

# To customise the XKB settings to suit your keyboard, modify the
# lines below (which are the defaults).  For example, for a non-U.S.
# keyboard, you will probably want to use:
#    Option "XkbModel"    "pc102"
# If you have a US Microsoft Natural keyboard, you can use:
#    Option "XkbModel"    "microsoft"
#
# Then to change the language, change the Layout setting.
# For example, a german layout can be obtained with:
#    Option "XkbLayout"   "de"
# or:
#    Option "XkbLayout"   "de"
#    Option "XkbVariant"  "nodeadkeys"
#
# If you'd like to switch the positions of your capslock and
# control keys, use:
#    Option "XkbOptions"  "ctrl:swapcaps"

# These are the default XKB settings for Xorg
#    Option "XkbRules"    "xorg"
#    Option "XkbModel"    "pc101"
#    Option "XkbLayout"   "us"
#    Option "XkbVariant"  ""
#    Option "XkbOptions"  ""

#    Option "XkbDisable"

    Option "XkbRules"    "xorg"
    Option "XkbModel"    "pc105"
    Option "XkbLayout"    "dk"

EndSection


# **********************************************************************
# Core Pointer's InputDevice section
# **********************************************************************

Section "InputDevice"

# Identifier and driver

    Identifier    "Mouse1"
    Driver    "mouse"
    Option "Protocol"    "ExplorerPS/2"
    Option "Device"      "/dev/input/mice"
    Option "ZAxisMapping"  "4 5"

# Mouse-speed setting for PS/2 mouse.

#    Option "Resolution"    "256"

# When using XQUEUE, comment out the above two lines, and uncomment
# the following line.

#    Option "Protocol"    "Xqueue"

# Baudrate and SampleRate are only for some Logitech mice. In
# almost every case these lines should be omitted.

#    Option "BaudRate"    "9600"
#    Option "SampleRate"    "150"

# Emulate3Buttons is an option for 2-button Microsoft mice
# Emulate3Timeout is the timeout in milliseconds (default is 50ms)

#    Option "Emulate3Buttons"
#    Option "Emulate3Timeout"    "50"

# ChordMiddle is an option for some 3-button Logitech mice

#    Option "ChordMiddle"

EndSection


# **********************************************************************
# Other input device sections 
# this is optional and is required only if you
# are using extended input devices.  This is for example only.  Refer
# to the xorg.conf man page for a description of the options.
# **********************************************************************
#
# Section "InputDevice" 
#    Identifier  "Mouse2"
#    Driver      "mouse"
#    Option      "Protocol"      "MouseMan"
#    Option      "Device"        "/dev/mouse2"
# EndSection
#
# Section "InputDevice"
#    Identifier "spaceball"
#    Driver     "magellan"
#    Option     "Device"        "/dev/cua0"
# EndSection
#
# Section "InputDevice"
#    Identifier "spaceball2"
#    Driver     "spaceorb"
#    Option     "Device"        "/dev/cua0"
# EndSection
#
# Section "InputDevice"
#    Identifier "touchscreen0"
#    Driver     "microtouch"
#    Option     "Device"        "/dev/ttyS0"
#    Option     "MinX"          "1412"
#    Option     "MaxX"          "15184"
#    Option     "MinY"          "15372"
#    Option     "MaxY"          "1230"
#    Option     "ScreenNumber"  "0"
#    Option     "ReportingMode" "Scaled"
#    Option     "ButtonNumber"  "1"
#    Option     "SendCoreEvents"
# EndSection
#
# Section "InputDevice"
#    Identifier "touchscreen1"
#    Driver     "elo2300"
#    Option     "Device"        "/dev/ttyS0"
#    Option     "MinX"          "231"
#    Option     "MaxX"          "3868"
#    Option     "MinY"          "3858"
#    Option     "MaxY"          "272"
#    Option     "ScreenNumber"  "0"
#    Option     "ReportingMode" "Scaled"
#    Option     "ButtonThreshold"       "17"
#    Option     "ButtonNumber"  "1"
#    Option     "SendCoreEvents"
# EndSection

# **********************************************************************
# Monitor section
# **********************************************************************

# Any number of monitor sections may be present

Section "Monitor"

    Identifier  "acertft"

# HorizSync is in kHz unless units are specified.
# HorizSync may be a comma separated list of discrete values, or a
# comma separated list of ranges of values.
# NOTE: THE VALUES HERE ARE EXAMPLES ONLY.  REFER TO YOUR MONITOR'S
# USER MANUAL FOR THE CORRECT NUMBERS.

    HorizSync   28-96

#    HorizSync    30-64         # multisync
#    HorizSync    31.5, 35.2    # multiple fixed sync frequencies
#    HorizSync    15-25, 30-50  # multiple ranges of sync frequencies

# VertRefresh is in Hz unless units are specified.
# VertRefresh may be a comma separated list of discrete values, or a
# comma separated list of ranges of values.
# NOTE: THE VALUES HERE ARE EXAMPLES ONLY.  REFER TO YOUR MONITOR'S
# USER MANUAL FOR THE CORRECT NUMBERS.

    VertRefresh 50-75
    DisplaySize 305 230
    Option       "DPMS"
EndSection


# **********************************************************************
# Graphics device section
# **********************************************************************

# Any number of graphics device sections may be present

# Standard VGA Device:

Section "Device"
    Identifier    "Standard VGA"
    VendorName    "Unknown"
    BoardName    "Unknown"

# The chipset line is optional in most cases.  It can be used to override
# the driver's chipset detection, and should not normally be specified.

#    Chipset    "generic"

# The Driver line must be present.  When using run-time loadable driver
# modules, this line instructs the server to load the specified driver
# module.  Even when not using loadable driver modules, this line
# indicates which driver should interpret the information in this section.

    Driver     "vga"
# The BusID line is used to specify which of possibly multiple devices
# this section is intended for.  When this line isn't present, a device
# section can only match up with the primary video device.  For PCI
# devices a line like the following could be used.  This line should not
# normally be included unless there is more than one video device
# intalled.

#    BusID      "PCI:0:10:0"

#    VideoRam    256

#    Clocks    25.2 28.3

EndSection

# Device configured by xorgconfig:

Section "Device"
    Option     "DRI"  "true"                # []
    Identifier  "** Intel i810 (generic)               [i810]"
    Driver      "i810"
    VideoRam    131072
    BoardName   "82852/855GM Integrated Graphics Device"
    Option       "DPMS"
    # Insert Clocks lines here if appropriate
EndSection


# **********************************************************************
# Screen sections
# **********************************************************************

# Any number of screen sections may be present.  Each describes
# the configuration of a single screen.  A single specific screen section
# may be specified from the X server command line with the "-screen"
# option.
Section "Screen"
    Identifier  "Screen 1"
    Device      "** Intel i810 (generic)               [i810]"
    Monitor     "acertft"
    DefaultDepth 24

    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       8
        Modes       "640x480 1024x768"
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       16
        Modes       "640x480 1024x768"
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
    Subsection "Display"
        Depth       24
        Modes       "640x480 1024x768"
        ViewPort    0 0
    EndSubsection
EndSection

# **********************************************************************
# ServerLayout sections.
# **********************************************************************

# Any number of ServerLayout sections may be present.  Each describes
# the way multiple screens are organised.  A specific ServerLayout
# section may be specified from the X server command line with the
# "-layout" option.  In the absence of this, the first section is used.
# When now ServerLayout section is present, the first Screen section
# is used alone.

Section "ServerLayout"

# The Identifier line must be present
    Identifier  "Simple Layout"

# Each Screen line specifies a Screen section name, and optionally
# the relative position of other screens.  The four names after
# primary screen name are the screens to the top, bottom, left and right
# of the primary screen.  In this example, screen 2 is located to the
# right of screen 1.

    Screen "Screen 1"

# Each InputDevice line specifies an InputDevice section name and
# optionally some options to specify the way the device is to be
# used.  Those options include "CorePointer", "CoreKeyboard" and
# "SendCoreEvents".

    InputDevice "Mouse1" "CorePointer"
    InputDevice "Keyboard1" "CoreKeyboard"

EndSection

Section "DRI"
   Mode 0666
EndSection

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#13 2005-08-11 21:03:00

phrakture
Arch Overlord
From: behind you
Registered: 2003-10-29
Posts: 7,879
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

ok, DRI and all that jazz looks fine (you have the DRI section in there twice, BTW)

another WM? - try fluxbox

and yeah applets and things like that will maul your system resources... best bet is to find one applet which does everything you need, or possibly try adesklets (though the memory usage is probably similar)

how much ram do you have? maybe upgrading that will help?

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#14 2005-08-11 21:17:35

molinero
Member
From: Copenhagen/Denmark
Registered: 2004-09-19
Posts: 110

Re: Where has the speed gone?

Removed the extra DRI section. I am going to try to disable all the applets and see if there is any difference. I'll also try fluxbox out.

I have 512MB ram - is it already to little?

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#15 2005-08-11 21:46:55

Stinky
Member
From: The Colony, TX
Registered: 2004-05-28
Posts: 187

Re: Where has the speed gone?

Nah.  512 should be plenty.  Along with fluxbox, you could also try xfce4.  It's more of a Desktop Environment, which you're use to with Gnome.

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#16 2005-08-11 22:26:20

colnago
Member
From: Victoria, BC
Registered: 2004-03-25
Posts: 438

Re: Where has the speed gone?

You could check the dma status of your drive:

hdparm -d /dev/hda

To check the processor speed:

cat /proc/cpuinfo

To see the scheduler used: 

cat /sys/block/hda/queue/scheduler

Maybe the problem is just the throttlling?

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#17 2005-08-11 23:08:31

rasat
Forum Fellow
From: Finland, working in Romania
Registered: 2002-12-27
Posts: 2,293
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

molinero wrote:

I think the speed have gone out of my system.
Opening following programs takes:
gedit - 7 seconds
Abiword - 5 seconds
Evolution - 9 seconds

I am using the same programs. I have two partitions, one for day-to-day usage and another for testing new programs/developments. My day-to-day is slower than the other. I always wondered about it until Penguin came up with the idea of defrag pacman's /var/lib/pacman files. Other programs may not be upgraded and change of files as often as pacman, but within one year the frag certainly become different and most likely slowing down the performance.


Markku

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#18 2005-08-12 00:38:49

iphitus
Forum Fellow
From: Melbourne, Australia
Registered: 2004-10-09
Posts: 4,927

Re: Where has the speed gone?

the filesystem is most likely 'fragmented' in a sense.

not by the true sense where a single file's contents are scattered all over the drive, ext3 and other linux filesystems do not suffer that.

rather, say for example Xorg, needs A B and C to run. When you first install, they're pretty close to each other and dont take long to open, however over time as they get updated and changed, A B and C get moved all over the disk, causing it to take longer to get to them.

This is a problem that no filesystem can really fix unless it's linked into the package manager.

iphitus

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#19 2005-08-12 10:31:42

molinero
Member
From: Copenhagen/Denmark
Registered: 2004-09-19
Posts: 110

Re: Where has the speed gone?

My harddrive is using dma (I made sure to set it just after installation 1½ year ago)

hdparm -d /dev/hda
/dev/hda:
 using_dma    =  1 (on)

and CPU throttle is not the problem. I have made scripts myself that control the speed. I have button for what speed I want on my panel, and the CPU monitor is running in my gnome panel at all times and lets me see the current freq.

I do not know about the scheduler. But your command gave me this:

 cat /sys/block/hda/queue/scheduler
noop [anticipatory] deadline cfq

I have no idea of what it means - maybe you do :-)

I'll be trying out fluxbox and xfce4 today. I'll also be looking at the defrag question.

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#20 2005-08-12 15:39:49

phrakture
Arch Overlord
From: behind you
Registered: 2003-10-29
Posts: 7,879
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

iphitus wrote:

rather, say for example Xorg, needs A B and C to run. When you first install, they're pretty close to each other and dont take long to open, however over time as they get updated and changed, A B and C get moved all over the disk, causing it to take longer to get to them.

This is a problem that no filesystem can really fix unless it's linked into the package manager.

Yup. that's the idea.  if you want to "fix" this fragmentation, you can always pacman -S gnome and just say "yes" - it'll remove and reinstall the files.

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#21 2005-08-12 20:37:25

molinero
Member
From: Copenhagen/Denmark
Registered: 2004-09-19
Posts: 110

Re: Where has the speed gone?

hmm - thats an idea. I'll also try it out. I'll write back with the results. Thank you all very much.

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#22 2005-08-12 21:38:43

phrakture
Arch Overlord
From: behind you
Registered: 2003-10-29
Posts: 7,879
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

molinero wrote:

and CPU throttle is not the problem. I have made scripts myself that control the speed. I have button for what speed I want on my panel, and the CPU monitor is running in my gnome panel at all times and lets me see the current freq.

totally off topic, can I see your throttling setup? there's no real good info anywhere and I'd like to do a good writeup on it, so I'm going to look at as much info as I can

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#23 2005-08-13 03:03:27

Gullible Jones
Member
Registered: 2004-12-29
Posts: 4,863

Re: Where has the speed gone?

Abiword takes 5 seconds and gedit 7? Feh... That's awful! I'd recommend switching WMs, certainly - Metacity seems to have a habit of slowing things down a lot, for whatever reason.

I would mention hdparm, but I have no idea what that might do to a laptop... I'm not at all knowledgable about the differences between laptop and desktop HDDs.

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#24 2005-08-13 05:54:07

keevn7
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From: Lancaster, OH, US
Registered: 2005-06-09
Posts: 206
Website

Re: Where has the speed gone?

When is the last time you ran fsck on the partition? With ext3, I noticed a very significant speed increase when I ran fsck after not doing it for a while, say for example six months or so.

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