> Well an IDE with less features is going to be faster than VS, that isn't a question. Just see Sublime Text, insanely fast until you start adding extensions an

> Well an IDE with less features is going to be faster than VS, that isn't a question. Just see Sublime Text, insanely fast until you start adding extensions and it gradually gets slower and slower. In principle, only a small proportion of features need to be actively consuming cycles. Most require no resources until invoked by the user. Only a small proportion of those features are actively involved with drawing and so need to block the UI thread sometimes. And only a small proportion of those features perform some essential drawing operation and so need to block the UI thread every frame. So while a badly designed IDE with fewer features will outperform a badly designed IDE with many features, both will be trounced by a well-designed IDE with many features. It's the design that matters.