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KDE 4 Uses 40% Less Memory Than 3 Despite Eye-Candy

Posted by Zonk on from the optimization-in-action dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Pro-Linux reports that KDE 4, scheduled to be released in January 2008, consumes almost 40% less memory than KDE 3.5, despite the fact that version 4 of the Free and Open Source desktop system includes a composited window manager and a revamped menu and applet interface. KDE developer Will Stephenson showcased KDE 4's 3D eye-candy on a 256Mb laptop with 1Ghz CPU and run-of-the-mill integrated graphics, pointing out that mini-optimizations haven't even yet been started." Update: 12/14 22:40 GMT by Z : Or, not so much. An anonymous reader writes "The author of the original KDE 3.5 vs KDE 4.0 memory comparison has come out with a more accurate benchmark. In reality, KDE 4.0 uses 110 MB more memory than KDE 3.5.8.

4 of 566 comments (clear)

  1. Well by markov_chain · · Score: 5, Informative

    The laptop was recent, but he limited the memory use and throttled down the CPU to 1GHz. So it still had fancy instructions and a much bigger cache, bus, etc.

    --
    Tsunami -- You can't bring a good wave down!
    1. Re:Well by JonLatane · · Score: 5, Informative
      1. There's no need for Compiz on KDE4; KWin supports composited window management built-in, and that's what he was using.
      2. The computer has Intel integrated graphics, you don't get much lower than that.
  2. Re:less memory! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    The "unused" RAM won't be nice and empty. It'll be used as the system cache to store file data etc. that then can be accessed very quickly. Modern operating systems do not waste RAM by leaving it unused.

  3. Results are completely false by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Has no one pointed out that the numbers are actually completely, utterly wrong? See Lubos and Thiagos (two high-ranking KDE and Qt devs) comments here:

    http://www.kdedevelopers.org/node/3138

    See the original authors retraction, here:

    http://www.jarzebski.pl/read/kde-3-5-vs-4-0-round-two.so

    In similar conditions KDE 3 consumed 97 MB on memory, whereas KDE 4 about 170 MB.

    So really, it should be "KDE4 uses 75% more memory", which is actually incredibly lame, but doesn't make for as good a title. I'm absolutely amazed that usually cynical slashdot readers have accepted this so uncritically.