From: wiegand@rtsg.mot.com (Robert Wiegand)
Subject: Re: OS/2 speed (was: dvorak, pc magazine)
Reply-To: motcid!wiegand@uunet.uu.net
Organization: Motorola Inc., Cellular Infrastructure Group
Distribution: na
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 13:57:03 GMT

tar@pa.reuter.COM (Dan Tarnower) writes:

>In <1992Aug7.125010.8106@actrix.gen.nz> Steve.Withers@bbs.actrix.gen.nz writes:

>>I run OS/2 on my 386DX/40 and it works better than Win3.1 did during it's
>>brief tenure. Speed is easily comparable. A guy with a 386sx/16 was posting in
>>this newsgroup only yesterday saying how well OS/2 ran on it. I have seen
>>Windows on a 386sx/16 and it was a pretty - slow - sight.

>Well, I just installed OS/2 last night on my 386/25 (64k cache).  It used
>to have a cache anyway.  I have to disable it, because OS/2 won't boot
>with the cache enabled.

>So far, I can't say I'm very impressed with OS/2.  My programs run
>noticeably slower.  Programs that I use under Windows 3.1 in 800x600
>resolution, run much (about 50%) slower.  In particular, I can sit and
>watch the screen updates, and my keystrokes have a very annoying delay
>before the character appears on the screen.

>And what is it with the double click with the mouse?  I have yet to
>click the mouse twice, and have the result I expect.  I find that I have to
>start clicking, and then stop when I notice that the action is beginning.
>And since the screen updates so slowly, I haven't been getting caught
>clicking too long.  Also, many times when I click on a button, nothing
>happens.  Even if I hold the mouse button down for a second or two.  But
>when I move the mouse, the button gets pushed.

>I had heard that it's possible to reboot DOS sessions without harming 
>other tasks.  When I press Ctrl-Alt-Del, it reboots the whole PC.  What 

You don't use Ctrl-Alt-Del on a window - use the window menu to control
the window. C-A-D is supposed to reboot the entire machine.

>am I doing wrong?  And, how do you set up DOS sessions with different 
>CONFIG.SYS files, for loading different DOS drivers.

Make copies of the DOS icon. They will all use the same CONFIG.SYS.
In the DOS settings for the window you can specify additional drivers 
to load in addition to the ones loaded in CONFIG.SYS.

>I'm also annoyed that every task switch causes about 10 seconds of disk
>activity.

What type of disk controller are you using? I changed my disk comtroller
and it made a noticible difference in the speed of my machine with OS/2.
(I use SCSI so I can't give you any suggestion for ESDI controllers.)
If your controller is using the generic INT 13 disk driver the performance
isn't going to be very good. A controller with OS/2 drivers designed
for it will run much faster.

>This message is not intended as a flame.  I'm not a big fan of Windows,
>but watching both of them run, I have to say I get better performance
>from Windows.

Getting the best performance out of OS/2 takes a little more work on
your part then for Windows, so hang in there.
You might want to buy an OS/2 book to help you understand all the options
you can set.

>Anyway, here's the machine I'm using:

>PC clone 386/25 (disabled 64k cache)
>8 megs of 70ns memory
>500 meg ESDI disk with 16ms access time, and 1.875 Mbytes/Sec Xfr time
>Boca Super-VGA card with 1 meg 
>Colorado DJ-20 tape drive (anyway to use this under OS/2?!?!?!?!)
>Soundblaster card             "    "    "    "    "    "    "

>I have installed with the Dual Boot option.  I need to go back to DOS-5
>from time to time, as I am involved with some projects that use the
>new features of Win3.1.

>I am trying to like OS/2, but I can't agree with all the claims I keep
>hearing that it's faster than DOS and/or Windows 3.1.

>/Dan


-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Robert Wiegand - Motorola Inc.
uunet!motcid!wiegand
Disclamer: I didn't do it - I was somewhere else at the time.