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KDE 4 Uses 40% Less Memory Than 3 Despite Eye-Candy
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.
errrrr. Backwards compatibility. So by this you imply that its impossible to run old KDE apps on the new interface. Maintin its own integrity. So by this you mean that KDE is not stable and fails after a while of use. Sorry, you appear to be talking rubbish. Vista is a slow resource hog because that is how it was designed. Its just poor crap code.
>I was starting to buy into your comments until I read "OSX on a 333MHZ PPC with 32MB of ram".
>This is simply not possible. Even in Mac OS 9, you needed 64MB ram to run Netscape 6.
I did in fact use the setup I described... and you can check that imacs were sold with 32 megs on wikipedia. Please check your facts before calling me a lier.
What you are not considering is that
1. Netscape 6 was an incredibly bloated app for that era and difficult to run on any computer... it was the reason that people switched to IE. I think I used internet explorer on that computer, or maybe omniweb (this was before safari I believe).
2. OSX had *much* better virtual memory than OS8 and OS9. Although the OSX finder itself was more bloated than the OS9 finder, the system as a whole could actually handle higher memory load. Also, at some point (I forget if they'd done it by 10.1) OSX started compressing the backing store for windows, which is a neat optimization and freed up a lot of ram.
3. I'm not talking about OSX 10.5, which is a different beast and has a lot more services, but OSX 10.1, which was probably the most efficient OSX (fewer requirements than OSX 10.0).
4. I primarily used project builder (the precursor to xcode) on that computer and did opengl development.
Like I said, developers have gotten lazy, but it is entirely possible to develop a system with modern services and profile and optimize it to run on limited hardware. The average developers idea of what limited hardware is is incredibly ridiculous at this point.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMac_G3
The original iMac had a 233 MHz PowerPC G3 (PowerPC 750) chip, with 512 KB L2 cache running at 116.6 MHz, which also ran in Apple's high-end Power Macintosh line at the time, though at higher speeds, with more expensive models shipping with 1 MB L2 cache. It sold for US$1,299, and had a 4 GB hard drive, 32 MB RAM, 2 MB video RAM, and shipped with Mac OS 8.1, which was soon upgraded to Mac OS 8.5.
Grammar Nazi