3 ms·

Maybe it's because I've been on Windows for too long, but people are always complaining about how terrible Windows 10 (and soon to be 11 is) as an experience (S

Maybe it's because I've been on Windows for too long, but people are always complaining about how terrible Windows 10 (and soon to be 11 is) as an experience (See recent slowdown with AMD processors). That and a little bit too much time watching all the cool things people did with 1mhz processors with no L1 cache or graphics, on 80s computers. As someone who wasn't around during that time, it's easy to get the feeling that a 1.5ghz quad core cpus +.5ghz gpu should absolutely slay any program, but in my experience using the RPI4 as a primary computer it hasn't felt that way. > For software that was written in a performance insensitive way (i.e. not games) you perhaps could achieve a 100 times performance increase by a full rewrite avoiding various overheads. However, you would not really need an OS change for that, the main performance-relevant changes would be in the app itself and you can get almost all of that by running the optimized app on a standard OS - but you would need a rewrite of all the actual software. I think this is insightful. I agree that not everything would be 100x, but I feel like at the level of an RPI 4 even a 5-10% improvement that bumps a game into 30 or 60fps territory would be noticeable. And even a 2x improvement in regular apps would have impact.

oso2k 5y ago
The reason you feel RPi4B aren’t performing is because it’s running software written using 2010s and 2020s software standards, languages and runtimes. Before 2000, many many commercial games and software were written using “classical” C/C++ and had any performance critical areas written in assembly language. People would actually profile their apps and optimize their code and loops. Most any language that had large runtimes or included a garbage collector was not considered an option. Only the most complex, data oriented or GUI oriented parts of the code would be written in high level language. A good example of this mixed language code base is the Allegro 4.x Game Programming Library for DOS, Linux, and Windows. Going back further into the 80s and 90s, many many commercial games and software were written in all assembly language. Look at the old MS DOS code bases on GitHub for a reference. All that to say that modern software does a ton things in periphery that old software considered superfluous. We know some of it makes easier to write software, or that the software is more secure, or that it can take advantage of the features of the hardware old machines didn’t have. However, that is still extra code that needs run, often in (event) loops which multiples the amount of time dedicated to that code. Look at codegolf or other minimal code challenges to see what could be accomplished with a different programming process.

oso2k 5y ago

The reason you feel RPi4B aren’t performing is because it’s running software written using 2010s and 2020s software standards, languages and runtimes. Before 2000, many many commercial games and software were written using “classical” C/C++ and had any performance critical areas written in assembly language. People would actually profile their apps and optimize their code and loops. Most any language that had large runtimes or included a garbage collector was not considered an option. Only the most complex, data oriented or GUI oriented parts of the code would be written in high level language. A good example of this mixed language code base is the Allegro 4.x Game Programming Library for DOS, Linux, and Windows. Going back further into the 80s and 90s, many many commercial games and software were written in all assembly language. Look at the old MS DOS code bases on GitHub for a reference. All that to say that modern software does a ton things in periphery that old software considered superfluous. We know some of it makes easier to write software, or that the software is more secure, or that it can take advantage of the features of the hardware old machines didn’t have. However, that is still extra code that needs run, often in (event) loops which multiples the amount of time dedicated to that code. Look at codegolf or other minimal code challenges to see what could be accomplished with a different programming process.