Science Forums 2

[UncleAl]

Windows XP is mind-numbingly slow. Just clicking the start button takes an unpredictable amount of time - even on a sparkling-new machine. Shutting down - an age.

We do some serious number crunching. The same C++ source code given optimum compile in the same hardware runs 40% faster in Linux than in WinXP. Datablocks in WinXP run 3-5 days at a stretch in an Athlon 55FX. Pentiums are disasters if you do serious number crunching. Intel never met memory bandwidth it could handle.

One wonders what the Redmond idiots did to cripple fine AMD hardware. ALL Windows versions are crap. They are crap when they are doing something. They are crap when they aren't doing anything at all, merely sitting idle with stripped memory (not even the sound board enabled) while a single program runs at High priority. The box has 2 GB of low-latency DRAM. Why is there a big swap file?

My AMD box is utterly isolated. It has no malware or firewall programs. My Web box has four levels of malware interdiction and crap still gets through. Damn BillGates and his stinking OS.

If you want 64-bit computing and have an AMD box, you can boot it right now,

http://www.applia.fr/contents/knoppix64.html

Slap in the CD and do it. Microsoft's promised future is everybody else's dimly remembered past.