On Wed, Dec 18, 2002 at 12:58:00PM +1000, George Michaelson wrote:
> 
> I run an unmodified current (1-2 weeks lag at most) on my Dell L400
> laptop. 256Mb memory, 1 9Gb IDE disk.
> 
> During cvs -q update -d -p runs over /usr/src, /usr/pkgsrc, /usr/xsrc
> the interactive performance nosedives. the three main desktop apps I notice
> this on are XFree86, phoenix and sylpheed, which have 25, 25 and 45Mb
> in-memory sizes apparently.  Switching between virtual desks, the time to
> re-paint, and then interact, is painful. 
> 
> Can anybody suggest why this happens? Is it a side-effect of walking over
> filesystems doing stat() on very large sparce directories? or of writing
> updates back into CVS/ subdirs which forces flush in the file buffer cache?
> 
> The other time I see this is during make on mozilla, when it does the
> tar un-pack of the distribution set. once that completes, I can compile
> to my hearts content, but the bulk fs unpacks are painful.
> 
> I know I've whinged about tuning before, and I realize its a different story
> for every class of user, but this very strongly suggests to me that something
> is mis-tuned for the average-joe desktop.
> 
> Any clue holders able to shed some light?

Why don't (all of) you try NEW_BUFQ_STRATEGY?

Jun-Young

-- 
Bang Jun-Young <junyoung@netbsd.org>