How to slow down a Windows machine, in one easy lesson
- Put Linux on it.
The Factory Case contains a Via C3/533, which is not exactly the fastest PII-compatable processor out there (the oggOmatic, which also contains a VIA C3/533, takes about 10% of the processor to decode .ogg files), and when I'm running Seaanemone, the lack of cpu cycles really shows -- Windows does not have the best multitasker in the whole wide world, and a complicated webpage will lock the whole machine up for 2-5 seconds while Waterbuffalo attempts to, in the inefficient way that C++ is oh-so-good-at ["but it's object oriented molasses, so it's much better!"], to display the pretty CSS and pictures.
Microsoft went evil a few weeks ago, so I decided to toss out their software and replace it with Linux and KDE. In retrospect, this may have been a mistake; the 2.6 kernel SuSE uses is very aggressive about powersaving, so it's constantly slowing down the C3 for even more energy savings (and this on a processor that uses less power than the video card that drives the 1600sw attached to the system). This, combined with KDE version 3 (which I will now dub "seaslug" for its less than peppy performance) and Moondragon, makes popping up windows a thing of the past; now, if I want to bring up a browser or terminal window (I'm guessing that Putty will be just as bad, but I don't know yet, because the evaluation copy of SuSE enterprise server I'm using doesn't include a C compiler) I can cheerfully look forward to spending 10 seconds watching the stupid animated bouncing ball hop while the system does, um, something.
Sigh.